REST IN POWER
Gerald Hannon, Toronto journalist and LGBTQ activist, dies at 77

Gerald Hannon, a talented and controversial Canadian journalist, educator, and queer activist has died at the age of 77.

© Provided by National Post

Jessica Mundie - Friday

NATTIONAL POST/POSTMEDIA

He chose to end his life by medical assistance in dying (MAID) after living with the quickly progressing atypical Parkinson’s disease for four years. He was joined by friends Peter Kingstone, Gerry Oxford, and Ed Jackson as he took his last breath, reported Xtra, the LGBTQ publication to which Hannon contributed.

In a memoriam published by Xtra, friends recalled Hannon as “guileless” and “kind,” a man who was a generous teacher of journalism students and a passionate defender of gay rights.

“When we finally met, I was surprised, disappointed even, that this gentle, soft-spoken man was the notorious Gerald Hannon. He didn’t have horns, as painted by the right-wing media, nor did he breathe fire,” Justine Pimlott, a filmmaker, told Xtra. “And this is exactly what I came to love about him — his ability to be quietly, yet fully, present, and his faculty for observation and non-judgment.”

Hannon grew up in Marathon, Ont., a small town on Lake Superior whose economy was built on pulp.

“It was very beautiful, but isolated and remote,” wrote Hannon on his website. “I trapped rabbits, with a friend. He and I wrestled frequently in the bush. We sometimes fought with knives. I discovered opera.”

He moved to Toronto at 18 and came out as gay six years later.

Hannon’s long career in journalism began in 1972 at the gay liberation magazine, The Body Politic, where he was involved from the second issue to the last. He served as a writer and photographer.

“We weren’t journalists or particularly activists, but we suddenly became so,” Hannon told the Toronto Sun in 2008.


© Postmedia/FileGerald Hannon in 1996.

The magazine tackled issues gay rights activists were passionate about in the 1970s and ’80s, such as discriminatory criminal law, workplace issues and sexuality. But it’s perhaps most famous for an article Hannon wrote in 1977 entitled Men Loving Boys Loving Men. The article discussed sexual relationships between adults and minors, and was widely seen as a defence of pedophilia.

After backlash about the article from other media outlets, namely the Toronto Sun, the magazine’s office was raided by Toronto police and in January 1978, the magazine and its publishers were charged with distributing “immoral, indecent or scurrilous material.” A year later, the case was tried. After six days of testimony, the only piece of documentary evidence presented was a copy of The Body Politic containing Hannon’s article. The magazine was acquitted, and won again on appeal in 1982.

“I must judge with objectivity and concern for the right of free discussion and dissemination of ideas unless there be a clear incitement to illegal action,” the judge wrote.

The Body Politic ceased publication in 1986 after 15 years and Hannon became a freelancer and part-time instructor of journalism at Toronto Metropolitan University (then Ryerson University). He contributed to many newspapers and magazines, including Toronto Life, the Globe and Mail, Chatelaine, and Xtra.

In 1995, Hannon caught the media’s eye again when the Toronto Sun ran a story under the headline “Ryerson Prof: I’m a Hooker” after he had responded truthfully to a reporter who asked if he engaged in sex work.

“Much was written about me, particularly after it was revealed that I supplemented my income from teaching and writing with the wages of sin as a sex worker,” wrote Hannon.

The university suspended him the day after the story came out. Even then, he had his defenders. Christie Blatchford, then a Toronto Sun writer, who would later write for the National Post until she died in February 2020, said Hannon was “a genuine eccentric, a tweedy, rumpled and engaging man with outlandish opinions and a steadfast insistence on expressing them.”

“Gerald Hannon’s mistake, in his own words, was to have ‘a controversial idea in an institution that doesn’t welcome them’. And isn’t it always the way? Now that I’m two decades out of Ryerson, I’ve finally found a cause I’d protest and a sit-in I’d join?”

Hannon continued working as a freelancer after the scandal, winning 13 National Magazine Awards for his work. He was known for his detailed profiles and ability to capture diverse people in writing such as opera singer Cornelis Opthof, journalist Wendy Mesley, and then-mayoral candidate Rob Ford.

“Hannon’s honesty, like many of his other traits, was part of what made him an utterly brilliant journalist. He never worried about hurting feelings or offending,” Montreal-based journalist Matthew Hays told Xtra.

In 2006, Hannon co-hosted a walking tour of Toronto focusing on the city’s early queer history alongside writer Jane Farrow. “I figured I could piece together the basic narrative and guide people through it, but how much cooler would it be to feature one of the guys who pretty much put the queer in queer Canadian history?” Farrow told Xtra.

Farrow remembers Hannon as “unstinting in his generosity. He gave of his heart, his talents, his take on the world freely and beautifully.”

Later in life, Hannon got the most joy from singing opera. Jackson, a former publisher of the Body Politic and in the room when Hannon died, wrote that Hannon became involved with the Toronto City Opera.

“A shameless ham, he was at his best mugging his way through the comic roles,” wrote Jackson in Xtra.

Chris Lea, who was on the board of the Toronto City Opera, praised Hannon for his writing and activism in Toronto. Lea told Xtra that Hannon was his first boyfriend.

“Without Gerald, not just our city, but all Canada, would have been less free… If they knew Gerald as I do, they would know his gentle kindness, his passion, his humour and love.”

On his website, Hannon lists some of his “distinguishing marks.”

“Never had a driver’s license.

Never had a television.

Never learned how to properly tie my shoes.

Can’t properly use a knife and fork.”

Hannon’s long-awaited memoir titled Immoral, Indecent & Scurrilous: The Making of an Unrepentant Sex Radical is scheduled to be published this summer. According to Jackson, Hannon got to see a special advance copy of the book before his death.

DUTY TO ACCOMODATE IS THE LAW

City of Ottawa loses human rights case for way it fired OC Transpo driver

Andrew Duffy -
Ottawa Citizen

UNIONS WORK
The City of Ottawa has lost a human rights case due to the way in which it fired an OC Transpo driver who missed 1,241 days of work.

 An OC Transpo bus near Tunney's Pasture.

In a recent decision, the Federal Court upheld a Canadian Human Rights Tribunal (CHRT) ruling that said the city discriminated against Jamison Todd by failing to distinguish his disability-related absences from his garden-variety absences in his termination letter.

Those absences should have been “disaggregated,” the court said, and the city should have considered other ways to accommodate his disability.

By law, businesses must accommodate disabled employees up to the point of “undue hardship.”

Todd suffered from irritable bowel syndrome and musculoskeletal pain during the course of his troubled OC Transpo career, which began in 2001 and ended with his firing in March 2014.

In the 10-year period leading to his dismissal, Todd missed 1,241 days of work. Nearly 30 per cent of those absences did not relate to his medical problems, court was told.

Todd’s manager at OC Transpo ultimately decided to fire him because he repeatedly failed to inform him when he would miss a shift.

Such notice was required under the continuing employment agreement — the plans are sometimes called last chance agreements — Todd signed with the city in 2012.

In court, city lawyers argued Todd’s regular absenteeism, combined with his inability to achieve a reasonable level of attendance due to his health problems, meant he was unable to fulfill his contractual obligation “to provide work.” They said that amounted to undue hardship for the employer, OC Transpo.

The city asked the Federal Court to set aside the tribunal’s finding that it had discriminated against Todd and dismiss the case.

But in her recent decision, Federal Court Justice Susan Elliott endorsed the reasoning of the CHRT, which said the city failed to present evidence to show it had reached the point of undue hardship in accommodating Todd.

What’s more, Elliott said, the city wrongfully lumped all of Todd’s absences together in his termination letter.

“As the CHRT found,” the judge said, “it is the reason relied upon at the time the decision to terminate the employment that counts, and the CHRT reasonably found that by identifying Mr. Todd’s overall absenteeism as one of the reasons for his termination, OC Transpo engaged the protections of the Canadian Human Rights Act against actions motivated in whole or in part by discrimination.”

The human rights tribunal has yet to decide how it will remedy the discrimination suffered.

Todd’s lawyer declined a request for comment while Ottawa city solicitor David White said he’s “not prepared to comment” on an ongoing legal matter.

The CHRT hearing took place over 19 days in 2017 and 2018.

In her susequent decision, tribunal member Kirsten Mercer concluded the city did not discriminate against Todd during the course of his employment, and did not discriminate against him by instituting a continuing employment agreement to manage his absenteeism.

It was not discriminatory for the city to fire Todd for breaching that agreement, Mercer said, but it was discriminatory to cite his disability-related absenteeism in his termination letter.

“If Mr. Todd’s breaches of the continuing employment agreement were the only reason provided for his termination,” Mercer noted, “then I do not believe that terminating him would have been discriminatory.”

The tribunal heard Todd was diagnosed with irritable bowel syndrome in 2004. A chronic condition, it affects the large intestine, and can cause abdominal pain, cramping, bloating, gas, diarrhea or constipation.

The medical restrictions put in place by Todd’s doctors made it hard for him to drive a bus, the tribunal was told, and OC Transpo agreed he could call in sick when his disability made it too difficult for him to work.

In 2012, Todd was absent without medical justification for several months, the tribunal heard, after which his supervisor placed him on the continuing employment agreement. It stipulated that Todd had to inform his manager when he would miss a shift so he could be offered alternative duties.

Todd was fired for failing to contact his manager after missing a shift with the flu in January 2014. The termination followed both verbal and written warnings about the need to inform his supervisor of an absence in advance.

NATIONALIST ASSAULT ON BILINGUALISM AND MULTICULTURALISM

BILL 96
'Anxiety and frustration': Demonstrators protest Quebec language law

Saturday
The Canadian Press


MONTREAL — On a scorching Saturday, demonstrators streamed through downtown Montreal to protest Quebec's contentious language bill, demanding it be scrapped to preserve the rights of anglophones, allophones and Indigenous communities.

The protesters, who rallied at Dawson College before marching more than two kilometres to Premier François Legault's office, made an 11th-hour plea against the legislation, which aims to strengthen the province's French-language charter.

Bill 96 is expected to pass this month, and would impose tougher language requirements on workplaces and municipalities.

It also seeks to limit the use of English in the courts and public services, grant powers of search and seizure without a warrant to Quebec's language regulator and cap enrolment at English junior colleges, called CÉGEPs, where students would have to take more courses in French.

Several thousand marchers drove home the bilingual element of Quebec society Saturday morning, shouting chants of "Mon CÉGEP, mon choix," and toting signs stating, "I'm not a second class citizen."


Marlene Jennings, a former Liberal MP in Montreal, said Bill 96 "breaks the social contract" with Quebecers, while Robert Leckey, dean of McGill University's Faculty of Law, worried it will "ride roughshod" over constitutional constraints.

"Anyone may use English and French in the courts of this province. It's hardwired into the constitution. And using English in a Quebec court involves having a judge who understands the language," he said, addressing demonstrators in English and French, as did most of the speakers.

Leckey was referencing provisions in the bill that state judges no longer need to be bilingual and that a company's pleadings in court must be in French, or translated into it.

Bill 96 also pre-emptively invokes the notwithstanding clause, setting aside fundamental equality rights enshrined in both the Canadian and Quebec charters of rights and freedoms.

“You know you’re in trouble when you hear, ‘Notwithstanding clause,’” sang Bowser and Blue, a musical comedy duo whose first gig took place at Dawson College in 1975.

Russell Copeman, executive director of the Quebec English School Boards Association, said he supports efforts to protect the French language but described Bill 96 as "discriminatory."

"I think what you're seeing is a depth of anxiety and frustration that is quite remarkable in the English community," he said in a phone interview.

Indigenous communities also have concerns about the would-be law.

"We’re being recolonized again under Bill 96," said Kenneth Deer, an Indigenous rights activist from the Mohawk Nation at Kahnawake. "We don’t force you to learn our language; don’t force us to learn yours.”

Grand Chief Kahsennenhawe Sky-Deer of the Mohawk Council of Kahnawake said demanding that young people master a third language — French — carries colonial overtones and would make it harder for them to succeed.

"Trying to encourage young people to learn our Indigenous language is challenging in itself," she said by phone.

"We always want to encourage our young people to reach for the stars. But if they want to be doctors, lawyers, nurses — any of those professional orders now are going to require very strict French proficiency."

Demonstrators flowed mostly along Sainte-Catherine Street, where many retail outlets concerned about the impact of stricter workplace language rules are located.

The changes would subject companies with 25 employees or more to "francization" — government certification that use of French is generalized in the workplace. The current threshold is 50 employees.

Estimates from the Canadian Federation of Independent Business say a company with roughly 50 employees would end up paying between $9.5 million and $23.5 million under the bill. Expenses range from fees for translation and legal services to administrative burdens, such as creating a workplace assessment to ensure French permeates all corners of the company.

More than a dozen provincial and federal Liberal legislators were on hand Saturday, including Quebec Liberal Leader Dominique Anglade.

A cluster of pro-Bill 96 student demonstrators awaited the protesters outside the premier's office. They had guitars and tambourines, and greeted the marchers with a blast of classic Quebecois songs by Jean Leloup and Gilles Vigneault.

They shouted "Vive le Québec" and "Vive le français" between lyrics. Demonstrators on both sides were draped in Quebec flags, and several quarrels broke out amid the 30 C heat, but the overall atmosphere remained upbeat.

Steban Carrillo, 21, a student at the Saint-Laurent CÉGEP and one of the approximately 15 counter-protesters, said French is threatened.

“As we know, in Quebec the language of work is French, so higher studies should be done in French as well, at least until university," he said.

The bill's requirement that CÉGEP students take either three core courses in French or three additional French-languages courses has others worried, along with concerns about a two-tiered education system whereby allophones and francophones in English junior colleges would have to take French proficiency exams while anglophones take an English one.

"The bill attacks our fundamental rights to justice, to healthcare, to education," said Celeste Trianon, an incoming undergraduate law student at the Université de Montréal.

Eric Maldoff, a Montreal lawyer and chair of the Coalition for Quality Health and Social Services, stressed without clear communication, proper health care is threatened.

“People are going to get hurt. Literally," he said, noting that Bill 96 would only allow health services in English to "historic anglophones" and, for six months after arrival, immigrants. "There are going to be errors in diagnosis, there's going to be a problem of informed consent."

The legislation also raises questions of patient confidentiality, given the enhanced powers granted to the Office québécois de la langue française to search and seize files without a warrant based on anonymous tips, Maldoff said.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published May 14, 2022.

Christopher Reynolds, The Canadian Press

SASKATCHEWAN
45 intense days: What Turnaround takes at the Co-op Refinery

Larissa Kurz - POSTMEDIA

The distinct hum of a moving crane dominates the air, as a blue-jumpsuited worker tightens his gloves around a tether line leading to the enormous cylindrical drum hovering just a few feet higher than his hard hat.

© Provided by Leader Post

Co-op Refinery Complex crews work with a crane operator to remove an old reflux drum and make way for a new one, during the site's biggest maintenance event of the year.

A shiny new drum waits off to the side, ready to take its place, as the crane operator manoeuvres the rusty old one, inch by inch, onto a stack of pallets prepped for transport.

On the other side of the Co-op Refinery Complex, the looming reactor in a sister section operates in almost unbelievably calm and quiet.

It’s almost hard to marry the two images, but it’s really a before and after reel for a film about the most important maintenance undertaking of the year at the province’s oil refinery.

Turnaround — a word capitalized in the refinery’s press releases as perhaps a nod to its importance — is really spring cleaning on a monstrous scale. Involving a $100-million investment and around 750,000 labour hours, this is when the bulk of repairs and upgrades occur to hundreds of pieces of equipment, from the smallest pipes to the most towering stacks.

It’s an event that likely goes unnoticed by the majority of the city, but one that certainly would be noticed if anything were to go wrong at the sprawling industrial complex that borders Regina’s northwest.

It’s a high stakes operation, but one that unfolds in pristinely organized chaos.

A third of the refinery is shut down completely to facilitate the work, and a legion of contract workers come to the city for a relatively short but intense period from early April to mid-June.

Wade Hillmer, superintendent of Turnaround and maintenance co-ordination, lives and breathes this project each year. He’s worked at the CRC for nearing 28 years, and he knows all the intricate puzzle pieces that fit together during the 22-month planning process leading up to spring.

Turnaround, as a project, is planned down to the minutia, because, as he says, “in a 45-day event, time is money.”

Hillmer took the Leader-Post on an exclusive tour of Turnaround operations, for a closer look at the process.


© KAYLE NEISA

 group of employees work next to a fractionator that stands tall, as crews on the ground bustle around to keep Turnaround tasks operating safely and efficiently.

How do they do it?

The complex has six sections, on a maintenance rotation of about four years.

One of the largest refineries in Canada, the CRC distributes around 17 million litres of petroleum products daily, including fuel, diesel and oil byproducts. So to shut down a portion of the complex in early spring — a time when farmers are just beginning seeding and folks are doing more travelling — requires forward thinking, to keep up with retail demand.

The refinery is strategically designed for redundancy — meaning when one section is offline, a corresponding partner section remains operational. But another part of the solution is to stockpile inventory ahead of Turnaround, both at CRC and at partner facilities in western Canada.

Turnaround focuses on two sections each year — numbers two and three currently, four and five in 2023.

Hillmer simplified the process down to a very catchy slogan: “open, clean, inspect and close.”

There are a few more steps, of course, but the primary focus of Turnaround is to complete big maintenance tasks to keep the refinery operating at peak safety. This means taking apart assets for repairs, replacements, integrity inspections, cleaning and upgrades to meet safety codes or new environmental benchmarks.


© KAYLE NEIS

Crews working on Turnaround often have access to some parts of the refinery’s assets that are normally closed up and inaccessible during regular operations.

Approximately the first 10 days are dedicated to deconstruction, where prep teams open equipment to do initial checks and cleaning, before contract workers step in.

On any given day during regular operations, there are around 600 employees on site. During Turnaround, that number spikes as high as 2,000 at the peak of activity, with as many as 1,450 temporary contract workers aiding CRC employees.

Many are local tradespeople from Saskatchewan, Alberta and Manitoba, but some specialists travel from as far as the southern United States.

“It’s quite an event, to bring everyone together and create this team,” said Hillmer.

Temporary tents house this excess human power, and security crews step up managing the site, like directing traffic during shift change.

Next, the heavy-lifting — a lot of the time, literally — begins. Priority focus is on heaters, vessels and exchangers, said Hillmer, with the addition of testing the vast amount of piping that coils through each section.

Some tasks require unique methods, like stringing in remote cameras to cast an eye on small confined spaces, or using x-rays and pressure testing to check the density, integrity and other internal factors of pipes.


© KAYLE NEIS

Workers head to great heights to refill catalyst in the hydrogen gas refomer and ARDS system during Turnaround, unloadling the bags of material by hand as it dangles from a crane.

Around 30 cranes help move and install massive pieces of equipment at staggering heights. Workers operate a high-powered, automated pressure washer, deep cleaning hundreds of pieces of equipment before reinstallation.

One of the big tasks is to purge and refill the catalyst in the hydrogen gas reformer, a substance that essentially regulates fuel quality during the refining process.

“This is the heartbeat of the event,” said Hillmer.

Crews empty out the spent material from the large cylinders, this year using a new water-jet technique to drill down and flush out, before refilling them with the help of a crane.

Every task is done with a sharp focus on preventative maintenance, said Mark Dieno, superintendent of equipment integrity and reliability engineering.

Assets that are due for an upgrade fall under the to-do list for Turnaround crews, to take advantage of having the section shut down. This means equipment gets replaced often before the end of its lifespan, because the opportunity is there.

“We have to somehow get it all to fit together, like a big puzzle,” said Dieno, of the planning.

On the tail end, another 10 days are spent doing regulatory checks, to ensure things were put back together properly. This means inspection down to every bolt, said superintendent of process safety Megan Torrie.

“We check every single joint that we opened or touched,” said Torrie. “There’s a lot of work, after the big event that is Turnaround, but process safety is about keeping the process in the pipe.”


© KAYLE NEISSections four and five of the refinery continue to run as normal, while Turnaround crews focus on sections two and three this year, to maintain production and meet retail demand for refinery products.

Why do Turnaround?

While this blitz in the spring may be the busiest time of year for maintenance, Dieno clarified that inspectors keep constant tabs on the state of refinery assets.

Regular checks for wear and tear and performance are part of the operational routine, along with checks for industry benchmarks.

“We want to make sure equipment stays in a safe working order and the risk is minimized,” said Dieno.

Hillmer and crew actually use this comprehensive data to help plan the scope of work that will take place during Turnaround, sometimes in a way that feels a little like predicting the future.

The utmost priority of Turnaround is safety, emphasized Hillmer — of the workers, of processes at the complex and, in the bigger picture, of the entire city.

The 800-acre complex houses plenty of flammable and explosive material, which could pose a potentially terrifying disaster if anything were to happen on site.

“We want everyone who comes to work to go home at the end of the day, just the same or better than when they arrived,” said Torrie.

And with the refinery bordering the edge of Regina, safety consideration also extends beyond the site’s fenced-in limits.

Keeping the complex operating safely and reliably is “paramount,” said Dieno, and the largest driving force behind Turnaround maintenance.

“We have a low tolerance for allowing anything to happen,” said Dieno. “The things we’re doing are largely to prevent things from even getting close to happening.”

lkurz@postmedia.com


© KAYLE NEIS

A member of the Turnaround crew jet washes parts pulled out of the refomer in order to clean them of build-up and residue, before they are returned to their designated homes.


© KAYLE NEIS

Regular refinery employees work alongside a huge influx of temporary contract workers to complete the maintenance project, over a very intense 45-day period beginning in April.

WHICH MEANS THEY CAN 
Oklahoma governor warns tribes not to create abortion havens

Brad Dress - The Hill

Oklahoma Gov. Kevin Stitt (R) on Sunday warned Native American tribes not to create abortion safe havens if Roe v. Wade is overturned and his state enacts a near-total ban on abortions.

Stitt told “Fox News Sunday” there was a “possibility” tribes could establish abortion havens if his state makes most abortions illegal.

“Oklahomans will not think very well of that if tribes try to set up abortion clinics,” Stitt said, warning he is monitoring the situation.

Stitt appeared on “Fox News Sunday” after the Supreme Court leak of a draft opinion showing the court was preparing to overturn the 1973 precedent Roe v. Wade, which created a constitutional right to abortions.

Oklahoma has passed into law a total ban on abortions after six weeks, only making an exception if the mother’s life is endangered. The law would go into effect if Roe v. Wade is overturned.

More than half of Oklahoma is within tribal lands. Stitt said the expansion of tribal lands in Oklahoma includes the city of Tulsa, which covers about 1 million people, so he is “watching” what might be done to establish abortion safe havens in his state.

“They think they can be one-one-thousandth tribal member and not have to follow state law,” Stitt said.

The Supreme Court is currently overseeing a case involving a separate dispute between Stitt and tribal leaders over whether the state can prosecute non-Native Americans for crimes committed on tribal lands if the victim is Native American.

IF THEY CAN IT COULD MEAN IMPROVED ACCESS TO HEALTHCARE ON RESERVES WHICH COULD THEN INCLUDE ABORTION SERVICES AS WELL

Caesar’s favourite herb was the Viagra of ancient Rome. Until climate change killed it off

James Tapper - 
The Guardian


Of all the mysteries of ancient Rome, silphium is among the most intriguing. Romans loved the herb as much as we love chocolate. They used silphium as perfume, as medicine, as an aphrodisiac and turned it into a condiment, called laser, that they poured on to almost every dish. It was so valuable that Julius Caesar stashed more than half a tonne in his treasury.

Yet it became extinct less than a century later, by the time of Nero, and for nearly 2,000 years people have puzzled over the cause.

Researchers now believe it was the first victim of man-made climate change – and warn that we should heed the lesson of silphium or risk losing plants that are the basis of many modern flavours.

Paul Pollaro and Paul Robertson of the University of New Hampshire say their research, published in Frontiers in Conservation Science, shows that urban growth and accompanying deforestation changed the local microclimate where silphium grew.

“You’ll often see the narrative that it [became extinct] because of a mix of over-harvesting and also over-grazing – sheep were very fond of it and it made the meat more valuable,” Pollaro said. “Our argument is that regardless of how much was harvested, if the climate was changing, silphium was going to go extinct anyway.”


A coin from Cyrene shows the herb silphium on one side. Photograph: Alamy

Silphium is believed to be a species of Ferula whose modern counterparts include fennel and asafoetida, a spice often used in Indian cooking. It was a bush that grew wild only in a strip of land 30 miles wide and 125 miles long in Cyrenaica, in what is now Libya.

The ancient Greeks, who colonised the north African territory in about 630BC, tried and failed for centuries to cultivate silphium. “They talked about the frustrations of trying to transplant it – ‘why doesn’t this stupid silphium plant grow’,” Robertson said. “It had these micro-climactic requirements and they couldn’t figure it out.”

Administrators in Cyrene ordered limits on how much silphium could be harvested, and fenced off areas where it grew, Pollaro said. “There’s evidence that they knew it was declining and they tried to preserve the plant. But all of these tactics were ultimately irrelevant, because they had changed the microclimate.”

Silphium grew along the drier, sea-facing side of Libya’s Jebel al-Akhdar plateau, a fertile, forested region. After harvesting, it was exported to Rome and beyond.

“It’s hard to overstate how important silphium was because the Romans in particular were absolutely obsessed with it,” Pollaro said. “They minted coins in ancient Libya that had silphium on the front of the coin and the god or the emperor’s face on the back.”

Herodotus, Theophrastus and Pliny the Elder wrote extensively about the plant and laser. Pliny extolled it as a cure for dog bites, snake venom and haemorrhoids. It could be used as a contraceptive and the plant itself was a prized vegetable.


Children walk at Apollonia near the ancient Greek and Roman city of Cyrene, in Libya. Apollonia served as a port for the export of silphium.

 Photograph: Amr Dalsh/Reuters

Exports brought wealth, which meant expansion. The Greeks and the Romans, who took control of Cyrenaica about 90BC, cut down forests on the plateau to build bigger and better houses and to clear land for crops for the growing population.

Deforestation changed rainfall patterns, causing greater erosion on the hillsides where silphium grew, which Pollaro said was confirmed by excavations at Haua Fteah cave near Benghazi. Silphium’s microclimate was ruined and it disappeared quite rapidly.

“In a way, silphium’s value was the cause of its own decline,” Pollaro said. “Without silphium, Cyrene’s economy wouldn’t have grown so much.”

Modern climate change is having a similar impact. Asafoetida, a sap extracted from a herb that grows wild in parts of Afghanistan and neighbouring countries, is widely used in India. But its footprint is shrinking due to changes in the local climate.

Professor Monique Simmonds of Kew Gardens said coffee, carrots and rice were similarly at risk. “We rely on between 10 and 12 species for most of our food,” she said. Kew was collecting seeds of wild species for its millennium seed bank and this diversity was crucial, since modern varieties might prove vulnerable to changes in climate in ways that could not be foreseen.

“If we don’t do the research and collection of wild species, we won’t have the reserves of genetic material in banks to do crosses in the future,” Simmonds added.

Lawmakers battle over Commerce tariff probe into solar panel parts

Zack Budryk - Yesterday 10:44 a.m.
The Hill


Lawmakers are battling over a Commerce Department investigation into solar panel imports that could lead to heavy tariffs on Chinese imports that are critical to the solar panel industry.

The issue is not a partisan one: Democrats and Republicans stand on both sides of the issue, with one bipartisan group arguing the investigation itself and the tariffs that could eventually come would devastate the solar sector.

In an interview with The Hill, Sen. Jacky Rosen (D-Nev.) said that both the investigation and the tariffs themselves are “causing massive disruption” in the solar industry, particularly Nevada, which has the most per capita solar jobs of any state.

“We are only able to supply about 15 percent domestically of the demand for solar panels. So we don’t have the capacity here right now to fulfill all the orders there are and even finish the projects that are already bid out,” Rosen said

Other Republicans and Democrats say Commerce was right to launch the investigation to protect U.S. jobs and prevent Chinese companies from circumventing existing laws meant to prevent the dumping of cheap products.

“A strong commitment to American manufacturing must be paired with proper trade enforcement so that investments in American production, workers, and innovation are not undermined by unfair trade practices,” Sens. Sherrod Brown (D) and Rob Portman (R) wrote in a letter to Commerce Secretary Gina Raimondo in March asking that the petition for the investigation be accepted.

Brown and Portman framed the investigation in terms of American jobs at stake, writing, “if legitimate circumvention allegations go unaddressed, entire domestic industries and thousands of American manufacturing jobs are at risk.”

Commerce accepted the petition from Auxin Solar, a San Jose, Calif.-based solar company, in March. It is investigating whether several solar panel part companies in Southeast Asia are using those companies as fronts to circumvent U.S. tariffs in place on Chinese companies.

The department had previously rejected a similar petition from the trade group American Solar Manufacturers Against Chinese Circumvention.

Rosen has been joined by a group that includes Sens. Thom Tillis (R-N.C.), Tom Carper (D-Del.), Jerry Moran (R-Kan.), Catherine Cortez Masto (D-Nev.), Brian Schatz (D-Hawaii), Sheldon Whitehouse (D-R.I.), Tim Kaine (D-Va.) and Michael Bennet (D-Colo.) in opposing the probe.

There have been no findings yet, but the Solar Energy Industries Association (SEIA), a trade group that represents solar power companies throughout the supply chain, has warned that the mere existence of the investigation could have profound negative consequences for the industry. In April, the group cut its projections of U.S. solar installation by 46 percent.

“While our hope and our expectation is that there will be a negative determination [and] there will not be tariffs imposed on panels … this action by the federal government has evidence of real policy uncertainty in the United States,” SEIA President Abigail Ross Hopper told The Hill.

Auxin, founded in 2008, claims it produces about 150 megawatts of solar panels per year, a minuscule amount compared to the Chinese companies whose exports provide most U.S. solar power. Those firms have capacity of 5 to 50 gigawatts.

Critics of the SEIA trade group say it includes as members several Chinese firms that are already subject to tariffs for breaking U.S. laws. Those companies are now being accused by Auxin of circumventing those tariffs by producing panels in other countries in Southeast Asia.

“If you take a close look at SEIA and [the American Clean Power Association], they have Chinese companies as members and they’re funded by them,” said Nick Iacovella of the bipartisan trade reform organization the Coalition for a Prosperous America.

These members include U.S. subsidiaries of Chinese companies Jinko Solar, JA Solar and Trina Solar, as well as Hanwha Q Cells, which is headquartered in Korea but bases its manufacturing in China.

“SEIA is working night and day to discredit and undermine this investigation, because the Commerce Department is looking at their companies, their members,” Iacovella said. “I don’t know how much more clear-cut it gets. Everybody should be questioning their motives here.”

Lawmakers in both parties have also accused the companies in question of profiting from forced labor of Uyghur ethnic minorities in Xinjiang, China. Sens. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.) and Jeff Merkley (D-Ore.) noted in a March 2021 letter that Jinko and JA have “publicly indicated that they source polysilicon,” a major component in solar panel manufacturing, from Xinjiang. Iacovella is a former Rubio staffer.

Dan Whitten, SEIA’s vice president of public affairs, disputed the characterization in an email to The Hill.

“The allegations of Chinese influence on SEIA are absurd and patently false. Out of SEIA’s 60 board companies, all have U.S. operations and one company has a headquarters in China. Like every board member, they have one vote.”

“SEIA represents the American solar and storage industries and American workers, full stop. Those who suggest otherwise are being fundamentally dishonest and acting in bad faith,” he said.

Auxin said the arguments the industry would be put in peril if tariffs were imposed on the imports in question are overstated.

“SEIA has always claimed that tariffs would undermine solar deployment. That has never come to pass,” Auxin CEO Mamun Rashid said in a statement to The Hill. “Solar deployment and domestic solar manufacturing has increased to historical highs with lawful duties in place.”

Rosen has co-sponsored a bill with Moran to repeal the Section 201 tariffs affecting solar panel component imports.

The Trump-era tariffs apply to imported solar cells and modules, and have long been vocally opposed by SEIA but backed by domestic solar panel manufacturers like Auxin. In February, President Biden extended the tariffs a further four years but eased their terms to exempt bifacial panels, a type of panel typically used by larger-scale developers. SEIA said at the time that it was “disappointed” with the extension but backed the exemption as a “balanced solution.”

Rosen portrayed the investigation as potentially risky to a broader agenda of rapid deployment of renewable energy in the U.S.

“We do need a green energy future. We do want a sustainable, cleaner way to produce energy. Solar is one of those ways, and we can do that every state in the country, but we have to have the right kinds of policies that allow us to continue to build what’s already on the books, and then incentivize American manufacturing to do what we need to do to continue to achieve our clean energy goals and minus and reduce energy costs,” she said.

'The broads came out!': Celebrating LGBTQ history of Broad Cove, N.L.

 The Canadian Press

ST. JOHN'S, N.L. — An event planned this summer in a small Newfoundland town aims to unite the province's LGTBQ diaspora and celebrate the lesbian history of the aptly named community of Broad Cove.

"Come Home Queer" is a play on the province's Come Home Year tourism theme, which invites Newfoundland and Labrador expats to return to the province for a visit this summer. The event, running July 15-17, is set to take place in Broad Cove, N.L., where about 30 lesbians — most of them friends from St. John's — have been settling or summering for the past three decades.

Organizer Gerry Rogers has planned a performance by Kellie Loder, readings by authors like Eva Crocker, and storytelling events about the province's LGTBQ history, including the story of Broad Cove, located about 100 kilometres west of St. John's.

"It's busting myths, you know? Rural Newfoundland and Labrador is not backwards," said Rogers who, after 30 years of visiting the town, is now building a house there to retire in. "There are lots of people here now who have children or grandchildren or relatives or friends, people in their own community who are queer. And there is acceptance."

"The broads came out!" she added.

In a province known for its uniquely named communities, Wanda Crocker says it was purely coincidence that lesbians settled in a town whose name — broad — is an old-fashioned and sometimes derogatory term for a woman. Crocker is said to be the first one to arrive — she bought a home there with her partner in 1989, and they began inviting friends out to stay with them, Rogers included.

Their guests would pitch tents in the yard and spend the weekend, drawing curious stares from residents, Crocker said in a recent interview. "They'd be stopping on the road and they have their binoculars out … we would just tell them that this is the Holy Heart reunion," she said, referring to the Holy Heart of Mary high school in St. John's, which used to be an all-girls institution.

She laughs when she imagines what they must have thought: "Like, my God, they were a poor-looking crowd, that class … they all had short hair and glasses!"

It didn't take people long to figure things out, she said. Nor did it take long for her friends to start buying their own oceanside houses in the town.

Broad Cove has since amalgamated with the neighbouring towns of Small Point, Blackhead and Adam's Cove, and roughly 385 people live in the area, according to Statistics Canada. The town sits along the northern shores of Conception Bay, on a peninsula home to places like Heart's Desire, Dildo and Red Head Cove.

In 1985, a Newfoundland town named Gayside voted to change its name to Baytona. Residents of the town, which is about 420 kilometres northwest of Broad Cove, said they were embarrassed by the name.

That kind of homophobia, however, isn't part of the story of Broad Cove, Rogers and Crocker said.

Of course some residents were uncomfortable at first with the town's growing LGTBQ population, they said. A knife-wielding man even came looking for Crocker one night, about five months after she bought her house, she recounted.

But key "transformational moments," as Crocker calls them, made them members of the community rather than outsiders.

The community stood behind Crocker when she charged the man who came at her, and he contacted her years later to apologize. The town hosted a Pride parade last year. Two members of Crocker's friend group were elected to the town council: Sue Rose is deputy mayor and Katherine Burgess is a councillor.

And then there was Beth Lacey and Pauline White's wedding in 2008, just three years after same-sex marriage was legalized in Canada.

Many in the town showed up for the ceremony, and even more hit the dance floor with the newlywed couple in their shed, Lacey said in a recent interview. It was a transformational moment.

"People came on their quads with packs of beer on the back; we had a DJ from the community and we had a grand time," Lacey said. "One of the heterosexual women from the community came over to me and she said, 'Can we have a dance? My husband doesn't like to dance.' It was just so inclusive."

They brought cards and gifts and food, and the owner of the local transport company hired to bring out the supplies waived her fee as a wedding present, Lacey said.

"And that's the way it's been here," Lacey added, noting that several artists and writers have since bought properties in the town and the surrounding area, too. "We were sort of the start of a boom on this shore."

Crocker said she hopes people from the town come out to this year's Come Home Queer celebrations, just like they did for Lacey's wedding.

"It's a long time coming, and it's a good time to celebrate," Crocker said. "Thirty years ago, I wouldn't have thought in a million years we'd be having a Holy Heart reunion … not undercover. There's no cover this time!"

This report by The Canadian Press was first published May 15, 2022.

Sarah Smellie, The Canadian Press

Buddhist chaplains on the rise in US, offering broad appeal

PORTLAND, Ore. (AP) — Wedged into a recliner in the corner of her assisted living apartment in Portland, Skylar Freimann, who has a terminal heart condition and pulmonary illness, anxiously eyed her newly arrived hospital bed on a recent day and worried over how she would maintain independence as she further loses mobility.

There to guide her along the journey was the Rev. Jo Laurence, a hospice and palliative care chaplain. But rather than invoking God or a Christian prayer, she talked of meditation, chanting and other Eastern spiritual traditions: “The body can weigh us down sometimes,” she counseled. “Where is the divine or the sacred in your decline?”

An ordained Sufi minister and practicing Zen Buddhist who brings years of meditation practice and scriptural training to support end-of-life patients, Laurence is part of a burgeoning generation of Buddhist chaplains who are increasingly common in hospitals, hospices and prisons, where the need for their services rose dramatically during the pandemic.

In a profession long dominated in the U.S. by Christian clergy, Buddhists are leading an ever more diverse field that includes Muslim, Hindu, Wiccan and even secular humanist chaplains. Buddhist chaplains say they’re uniquely positioned for the times due to their ability to appeal to a broad cultural and religious spectrum, including the growing number of Americans — roughly one-third — who identify as nonreligious.

In response, study and training opportunities have been established or expanded in recent years. They include the Buddhist Ministry Initiative at Harvard Divinity School and the Buddhism track at Union Theological Seminary, an ecumenical Christian liberal seminary in New York City. Colorado’s Naropa University, a Buddhist-inspired liberal arts college, recently launched a low-residency hybrid degree chaplaincy program. Nonaccredited certifications such as those offered by the New York Zen Center for Contemplative Care or the Upaya Zen Center in Santa Fe, New Mexico, are also popular.

“The programs keep expanding, so it seems clear that there’s a growing demand from students. And the students appear to be finding jobs after graduation,” said Monica Sanford, assistant dean for Multireligious Ministry at Harvard Divinity School and an ordained Buddhist minister.

In the past, Buddhist chaplains were often hired by the likes of hospitals and police departments specifically to minister to Asian immigrant communities. During World War II, they served Japanese American soldiers in the military. Today, however, they are more mainstream.

In a first-of-its-kind report published this month, Sanford and a colleague identified 425 chaplains in the United States, Canada and Mexico representing all major branches of Buddhism, though the researchers say there are likely many more. More than 40% work in health care, the Mapping Buddhist Chaplains in North America report found, while others serve in schools, in prisons or as self-employed counselors.

Two-thirds of respondents reported holding a Master of Divinity, another graduate degree or a chaplaincy certificate. Most of those working as staff chaplains also completed clinical pastoral education internships and residencies in health care and other settings.

Maitripa College, a Tibetan Buddhist college also in Portland, has seen increased interest in its Master of Divinity track since its launch 10 years ago, said Leigh Miller, director of academic and public programs. It appeals to a broad range, from older Buddhists with 20 years of practice to new college graduates who just started meditating, from spiritual seekers to people with multiple religious belongings.

Hospitals and other institutions are eager to hire Buddhist chaplains, Miller said, in part to boost staff diversity and also because they are adept at relating to others using inclusive, neutral language.

“Buddhist chaplains are in the habit of speaking in more universal terms, focusing on compassion, being grounded, feeling at peace,” she said. “A lot of Christian chaplains fall back on God language, leading prayers or reading Bible scriptures.”

Meanwhile, training in mindfulness and meditation, as well as beliefs regarding the nature of self, reality and the impermanence of suffering, give Buddhists unique tools to confront pain and death.

“The fruit of those hours on the (meditation) cushion really shows up in the ability to be present, to drop one’s own personal agenda and to have a kind of awareness of self and other that allows for an interdependent relationship to arise,” Miller said.

Buddhist chaplaincy also faces challenges, including how to become more accessible to Buddhists of color. The Mapping Buddhist Chaplains in North America report found that most professional Buddhist chaplains today are white and have a Christian family background, even though nearly two-thirds of the faith’s followers in the U.S. are Asian American, according to the Pew Research Center.

Traditional Buddhist communities tend to be small and run by volunteers so they often lack the resources to offer endorsements to chaplains — a necessary step for board certification, which is often required for employment.

And non-Christian chaplains can struggle with feelings of isolation and a need to code-switch in Christian-founded health care institutions where crosses hang on walls, prayers are offered at staff meetings and Jesus and the Bible are regularly invoked.

Providence Health & Services, a Catholic nonprofit based in Washington state that runs hospitals in seven Western states, is one Christian health care system seeking to change that.

Mark Thomas, a chief mission officer in Oregon, said the system employs 10 Buddhist chaplains not despite but precisely because of its Catholic identity. The aim is to ensure patients get good spiritual care however it best suits them.

“Many patients resonate with some aspect or even just a perception of Buddhism,” said Thomas, citing practices like meditation and breathing that can help them cope with suffering. “These tools have been enormously valuable.”

Laurence, the hospice chaplain at Portland’s Providence Home and Community Services, grew up in London and felt called to Buddhism after witnessing poverty, violence and racism as a caregiver in Mississippi.

She said that as more people become unchurched, many patients don’t have a language for their spirituality or it’s tied up with religious trauma. Laurence supports them in whatever way they need, be it through Christian prayer, the comfort of a cool washcloth on a forehead or a Buddhist-inspired blessing.

“For some people the language of Buddhism is a respite,” she said. “It doesn’t have the baggage, and it feels so soothing to them.”

Freimann, her patient, said she has practiced Eastern spiritual traditions and therefore was delighted to receive Laurence.

“I don’t think of God the way traditionally religious people do,” Freimann told her during the visit. “What a joy you’re here. … It would be so much harder to talk with a Christian chaplain.”

___

Associated Press religion coverage receives support through the AP’s collaboration with The Conversation US, with funding from Lilly Endowment Inc. The AP is solely responsible for this content.

Gosia Wozniacka, The Associated Press

Support for abortion rights hits new high in NBC News poll

Rachel Scully - 
The Hill


More than 60 percent of Americans oppose the prospect of the Supreme Court overturning Roe v. Wade as support for abortion rights reaches a new record high, according to a new NBC News poll.

The new poll released Sunday was conducted after the Supreme Court’s leaked draft opinion indicated that a majority of justices would support abolishing the constitutional right to abortion. The poll found that 63 percent of respondents said they oppose overturning the 1973 landmark decision.

While the percentage of respondents who oppose overturning Roe v. Wade has remained relatively the same over the years, it reached the highest amount of opposition in 2018, when 71 percent said they opposed overturning the decision.

In general, 60 percent of those polled said abortion should be legal. More specifically, 37 percent said it should always be legal, and 23 percent said it should be legal most of the time. In contrast, 32 percent said abortion should be illegal with exceptions, and 5 percent said it should have no exceptions.

In comparison, a combined 45 percent of respondents in the April 2013 poll said that abortion should be legal. The support later jumped to 55 percent in March 2018.

The latest results show the highest percentage of support for abortion since NBC began asking the question in 2003.

Across party lines, 84 percent of Democrats and 63 percent of independents said abortion should be legal, while only 33 percent of Republicans said the same.

Additionally, 52 percent of registered voters said they are less likely to vote for a candidate who supports overturning Roe v. Wade, while 26 percent said they are more likely to vote for one.

NBC’s poll was conducted on 1,000 adults from May 5 to May 7 and May 9 to May 10. It has a margin of error of 3.1 percentage points. The draft opinion leaked on May 2.spondents who oppose overturning Roe v. Wade has remained relatively the same over the years, it reached the highest amount of opposition in 2018, when 71 percent said they opposed overturning the decision.

In general, 60 percent of those polled said abortion should be legal. More specifically, 37 percent said it should always be legal, and 23 percent said it should be legal most of the time. In contrast, 32 percent said abortion should be illegal with exceptions, and 5 percent said it should have no exceptions.

In comparison, a combined 45 percent of respondents in the April 2013 poll said that abortion should be legal. The support later jumped to 55 percent in March 2018.

The latest results show the highest percentage of support for abortion since NBC began asking the question in 2003.

Across party lines, 84 percent of Democrats and 63 percent of independents said abortion should be legal, while only 33 percent of Republicans said the same.

Additionally, 52 percent of registered voters said they are less likely to vote for a candidate who supports overturning Roe v. Wade, while 26 percent said they are more likely to vote for one.

NBC’s poll was conducted on 1,000 adults from May 5 to May 7 and May 9 to May 10. It has a margin of error of 3.1 percentage points. The draft opinion leaked on May 2.