Tackling Barriers for LGBTQ2S+ Canadians in the Workplace

Yesterday 

The job seekers that Nick Ebbadi-Cook works with have two things in common.

The first is that they’re LGBTQ2S+. And the second is that almost all of them have faced discrimination in the workplace because of it.

“We’ve had about 40 participants come through, and the majority of those folks have faced discrimination,” said Ebbadi-Cook in an interview earlier this month. “They’ve been misgendered. They’ve faced harassment. They’ve been let go because of their identity.”

Ebbadi-Cook is the program manager of Prism Employment Support Service, a program specifically designed to help LGBTQ2S+ people in Greater Vancouver learn skills, navigate workplace issues and find jobs. “The base of our resources are the general employment resources but with a queer lens,” he said.

The program, a collaboration between the YWCA and Vancouver resource centre Qmunity, is in part a reaction to what Ebbadi-Cook says is becoming an increasingly understood gap in work outcomes for LGBTQ2S+ people in Canada.

A growing body of research suggests people of diverse sexual orientations and gender identities make less money than their cisgender and heterosexual counterparts. Community advocates say that reflects persistent problems of discrimination in Canadian workplaces, which are causing some LGBTQ2S+ workers to either leave certain jobs or simply not apply for them at all.

“These experiences seem to add and compound over peoples’ careers that result in lower overall earnings,” said Basia Pakula, a senior researcher with the non-profit Social Research and Demonstration Corp. “You may be choosing a pay cut in order to work for an employer where you are feeling safe.”

The SRDC partnered with Pride at Work Canada on a series of reports into the experiences of LGBTQ2S+ Canadians in the labour market. One of those studies, published this spring, linked demographic data collected by Statistics Canada with tax filings. It found heterosexual men, on average, made $55,959 a year, compared to $50,822 for gay men; $44,740 for lesbian women; $31,776 for bisexual men and $25,290 for bisexual women.

For gay men, the analysis found the gap in earnings was explained by other factors. But those factors couldn’t explain the gaps for any other demographic groups.

The centre also performed a second, qualitative analysis interviewing queer workers about their experiences. The findings were complex: in some cases, challenges with mental health contributed to the wage gap. In others, Pakula, one of the study’s authors, says it became clear some workers believed discrimination had affected their earnings, or had chosen to not apply for jobs in certain well-paying sectors — like the skilled trades — out of concern about discrimination.

“These experiences are not uniform. There is a tremendous amount of diversity within the community,” Pakula said.

Colin Druhan, the executive director of Pride at Work, has worked as a business advisor for members of the LGBTQ2S+ community for years. “It didn’t matter what part of their life they were in. The employment piece was always a thorn in their side,” he said.

Related video: Sharp surge in LGBTQ+ threats linked to orchestrated campaign by far-right (MSNBC)  Duration 7:39  View on Watch

Druhan noted many companies are more vocal than ever about their support for LGBTQ2S+ rights. They fly rainbow flags, post signs in store windows and participate in Pride parades.

But he said that doesn’t always mean they’ve made workplaces welcoming.

“A lot of people have questions: if you’ve got that rainbow flag out, what are you doing?” Druhan said.

Ebbadi-Cook said some employers, for example, may not know about their obligations pertaining to pronouns, or may not have amenities like gender-neutral washrooms. In many ways, he said, LGBTQ2S+ people are navigating an extra set of job politics; one of the services Prism hopes to soon offer is a workshop about how to come out in the workplace.

They also compile an internal job board, he said, list companies who have responded to a survey about their values and how they accommodate employees of diverse sexual and gender identities.

In other cases, though, Ebbadi-Cook says there can be explicit discrimination. He recalls one of the first jobs he ever worked in the service industry after coming out.

“I faced a lot of harassment. I guess at the time people would have considered it light-hearted ribbing. But it’s hard to feel safe and show up as your true self in places… it’s really demoralizing, and it really makes you question whether you belong in the space,” he said.

Druhan says many queer workers simply choose to not come out to their colleagues or employer, particularly those who are already part of other marginalized groups.

“They know they are perhaps already disadvantaged, and they don’t want to disadvantage themselves further. That tells us about how privilege operates in our communities,” Druhan said.

The problem is well-known, which is why Ebbadi-Cook says the YWCA and Qmunity partnered to create Prism. He says their goal is to serve approximately 60 people in their first few months of operation. If successful, he says, the goal would be to seek more funding to expand the program to the rest of the province. They also hope to work more directly with employers, he said.

On a larger scale, though, Pakula says government responses are restrained by a dearth of data. For example, the SRDC’s research couldn’t determine what real wage gaps were between heterosexual men and people with different gender identities, such as non-binary people or transgender people. Statistics Canada began asking census respondents in 2021 whether their sex assigned at birth differs from the one they currently identified with, something policymakers said would offer a national-level snapshot of the population.

She said there was a need for more “intervention-oriented research” focused more on determining needed solutions rather than drilling down on the well-known problems.

But Pakula said the national-level data picture is still far too weak.

“You just cannot understand what’s going on and why it’s going on just by looking at the numbers,” she said.

Zak Vescera, Local Journalism Initiative Reporter, The Tyee

TRY ADOPTION FIRST

Employers boosting fertility treatment benefits but critics say provinces can do more
Tuesday

More companies are offering or boosting coverage for fertility treatments as they fill a void left by Canada's health-care system, which provides limited coverage in most of the country for people trying to have a baby.


Employers boosting fertility treatment benefits but critics say provinces can do more© Provided by The Canadian Press

Several big banks have hiked coverage this year for reproductive procedures and some also provide for surrogacy expenses as part of their benefits packages.

In vitro fertilization, or IVF, involves a series of procedures that include boosting the production of a woman's eggs with medication and retrieving them from her body. At least one egg is fertilized with sperm in a lab to create an embryo, which is placed into the woman's uterus in hopes of having a viable pregnancy.

Along with IVF, fertility benefits can include coverage for medication, freezing and storage of eggs, sperm and embryos and surrogacy costs as well as genetic testing. It may also cover a separate procedure called intrauterine insemination, or IUI, in which healthy sperm are injected directly into the uterus.

Benefits at Canada's five big bankscover most of those services, and coverage ranges from $30,000 to $60,000 in lifetime maximum coverage.

Starting in January 2023, the Bank of Montreal will increase the lifetime maximum for fertility drugs to $20,000, up from $15,000, a spokeswoman said. The bank also reimburses $20,000 each for fertility treatment and surrogacy expenses, for a potential $60,000 in capped benefits.

A spokeswoman for RBC said medication for fertility has been covered since 2004 but was increased from $6,000 to a maximum of $20,000 in July, when the bank also added up to $20,000 in costs for fertility treatment and surrogacy, for a potential lifetime maximum of $60,000 in coverage.

As of March, TD said in a statement it provides $20,000 each for treatment, medication and surrogacy expenses, for a total of $60,000 that could be accessed over a lifetime.

Scotiabank expanded coverage in April to a lifetime maximum of $10,000 for infertility treatment and medication as well as $10,000 for surrogacy expenses, to a maximum lifetime benefit of $30,000, a company statement said.

In January, CIBC began covering up to a maximum of $15,000 for treatment and drugs, along with an additional lifetime maximum of $15,000 for surrogacy, to a total lifetime maximum of $30,000 in benefits. The bank started paying up to $3,000 just for medication in 1996, a spokeswoman said.

Starbucks offers its Canadian employees a lifetime maximum of $25,000 in IVF treatment and $10,000 for medication, for a total of $35,000 in coverage, a company spokesperson said. It increased benefits for surrogacy and IUI in October to a maximum of $40,000, up from $30,000. The benefits are available to both hourly and salaried employees who work a minimum of 20 hours a week.

Sun Life Financial expanded its fertility coverage for employees in May to provide treatment, along with medication benefits, and offers a maximum lifetime benefit of $15,000 for those services.

The company said surrogacy expense benefits will be added in May 2023, but details about the coverage amount were not yet available.

Helena Pagano, a spokeswoman at Sun Life, said the benefits are a way to help make group benefits plans more inclusive.

"Everyone's path to parenting looks different and it can be a challenging and expensive process," she said in an emailed statement.

One round of IVF can cost up to $20,000 but most women do not get pregnant after a first attempt.

The Public Health Agency of Canada says about one in six couples experience infertility.

Related video: 'No point putting more money into a broken system': Trudeau on health-care funding (cbc.ca)  Duration 1:31  View on Watch

cbc.ca Head of Medical Society of P.E.I. says patients and health-care workers are suffering
7:07

Trista Harrison, 35, and her husband Kyle Harrison, of Airdrie, Alta., have spent $75,000 so far on three rounds of IVF and genetic testing since 2020.

Her public sector union provides some capped coverage, but only for medication related to infertility treatment, Trista Harrison said.

"My benefits covered $4,000, which was gone in our first round," she said.

Harrison's husband has brittle bone disease so the couple has paid $15,000 for genetic testing of embryos to screen for the disease, for which he has had numerous surgeries including for the placement of large metal rods in his legs to prevent future fractures, she said.

The couple's home province of Alberta, as well as British Columbia, Saskatchewan and all three territories do not cover fertility treatments, unlike other seven provinces that reimburse partial costs or provide a tax credit or grant for procedures and/or medication.

Harrison said increasing coverage for fertility treatment by the private and public sectors is a positive move.

"It's very encouraging that this conversation is out and that companies are seeing this as a need," she said. "But when do we get to bring in the government and how do we support Albertans and British Columbians and people from Saskatchewan? When do we get to do that as a holistic kind of thing and just have equal access?"

Prof. Sarah Kaplan, director of the Institute for Gender and the Economy at the University of Toronto's Rotman School of Management, said more companies are offering fertility benefits as a way to attract and retain a diverse talent pool, including LGBTQ employees who need those services in order to have a family.

"People are also choosing to have their families later. They want to invest in their careers and they want to build those skills and move up in organizations, which is what organizations should want — to help support their employees in achieving their career goals as well as their family goals. This goes part and parcel with creating policies that would be more supportive of caregiving responsibilities at home."

However, low lifetime caps would create challenges for workers paying for costly procedures, Kaplan said.

"If people are using surrogacy because they don't have the ability to carry children themselves that could be $80,000. So you have to be careful when they say 'We offer this benefit,' but the benefit is $2,000 for a lifetime. That's clearly not going to be enough."

Offering fertility benefits could also be cheaper in the long run compared with paying thousands of dollars for headhunters to replace people in mid-level or senior leadership positions if they quit to work for other employers providing that support in a competitive market, Kaplan said.

Dr. William Buckett, division director of McGill University's Medical Centre in Montreal, said benefits packages don't apply equitably or to everyone, and coverage through the universal health-care system would help solve that problem.

He called various provisions in seven provinces a complicated "mess."

Buckett believes it's only a matter of time before Canada will catch up with Scandinavian countries as well as others in western Europe including Belgium, the Netherlands, France, Spain and Great Britain in providing access to infertility treatment.

"It is a sexist issue," he said. "I think women's health care across Canada is poorly serviced. I think access to health generally is limited a lot by sex and I think this is one of many examples of that."

Harrison has called on Alberta politicians to join most provinces in providing some sort of financial assistance for those needing infertility treatment.

She has also joined forces with four other women to push the government to act before Albertans go to the polls in May.

"Our goal is to get a lot of things up and running early in the new year so we can begin lobbying efforts toward the election," she said.

Alberta's health ministry said it recognizes that "infertility is a problem affecting many individuals in Alberta."

"In order to balance the needs of all Albertans, Alberta Health must conduct a thorough examination of the evidence, economic impact, and potential trade-offs required to support the addition of new services to Alberta’s publicly funded health-care system," it said in an emailed statement.

"With this in mind, Alberta Health continues to review fertility treatments, including coverage for IVF."

This report by The Canadian Press was first publishedDec. 20, 2022.

Canadian Press health coverage receives support through a partnership with the Canadian Medical Association. CP is solely responsible for this content.

Camille Bains, The Canadian Press

Paradox between warming climate and intense snowstorms, say scientists

FREDERICTON — There is a complex, counterintuitive relationship between rising global temperatures and the likelihood of increasingly intense snowstorms across Canada.



Winters are becoming on average milder and warmer than they used to be, but there has also been a noted rise across the country in extreme weather events, such as intense snowstorms, said John Clague, a professor of geosciences at Simon Fraser University, in Burnaby, B.C.

People might think it illogical that parts of the country are seeing more snowstorms as the climate warms, he said. "What climate modelers are finding is that climate change involves more frequent extremes."

"That means during summer, you can have extreme high temperatures, kind of life-threatening high temperatures, such as they've experienced in India and Pakistan in recent years. And you also can have, during winter, these extreme cold conditions."

One of the reasons for the extremes involves the jet stream — defined by Environment Canada as "a narrow band of strong winds about 10 kilometres above the Earth, marking the dividing line between warm and cold air masses."

Clague said the jet stream, which moves from west to east and carries weather systems with it, is moving more slowly than it normally does and seemingly parking itself over an area for a period of time. The mass of cold or hot air that it's carrying lingers in the atmosphere where it clashes with moisture-laden currents, causing heavy snow or rain, he said.

"This interface between this moist, tempered air at lower latitudes, and the cold, drier air — Arctic air — generates snowfall."

Kent Moore, an atmospheric physics professor at the University of Toronto, said it's a paradox that climate change is producing more intense snowstorms. There is some evidence to show that the warming Earth is changing the dynamics of how the jet stream works, he said.

The jet stream can have "larger undulations" as the climate warms, which means it simply doesn't go west to east but sometimes travels north or goes south like a wave, he said. It also tugs Arctic air along with it as it moves southward, he added.

"There's some evidence that as the climate is warming, the jet stream is becoming more wavier," Moore said.

The interplay between diminishing sea ice and a fast-warming Arctic is reducing the temperature gradient from the southern tip of the country to the north, he said. And a wavier — or weakened — jet stream is bringing Arctic air south, creating intense snowstorms, he added.

Oceans on either coast also play a role because the warming climate produces more evaporation of water, Moore said. "That means that there's more water vapour in the atmosphere, which means that there's more snow as well because of that."

Blair Feltmate, head of the Intact Centre on Climate Adaptation at the University of Waterloo, said warmer air holds more moisture and has more heat energy than does colder air. "That often results in severe precipitation in the form of more rain in the summer and snow-blasts in the winter,” he said.

Global average temperatures have increased by about 1.1 C to 1.2 C over the past century, he said, adding that Canada has warmed up even more. The southern half of Canada has been warming around two times that of the global average, he said. The northern half, meanwhile, has been heating up around three times faster, he added.

"This is creating atypical or non-typical weather in different areas of the country. It's not just that we might have more snowfall, as we are seeing now, we can have extreme cold snaps as well."

Feltmate said the intensity of the top one per cent of precipitation events that occur in a single year has increased over the last six decades, by about 37 per cent toward the western end of the Great Lakes and 72 per cent toward the east.

Moore, who has studied snowfall in the Toronto region, said the amount of accumulation over a typical winter is becoming smaller while the volume of rain is increasing. "That doesn't mean you can't have a really, really intense storm that dumps a ton of snow in just a few days. That can still happen, even though in the long term, the trend is toward less snow."

Feltmate said the symphony of winter storms from Vancouver to Toronto and the Maritimes can be attributed to climate change. He used a baseball analogy to illustrate the link between climate change and recent severe weather events — the heat dome, atmospheric rivers, post-tropical storm Fiona, and "mammoth" snowstorms.

"It's a little bit like saying you have a baseball player who's gone on steroids. And all of a sudden that baseball player starts to hit five times as many home runs," Feltmate said.

"You can't say that any single home run is due to the steroids. But if he or she is hitting five times as many home runs, then you can pretty much say cause and effect is going on between taking the steroids and hitting home runs. With climate change, we have extreme weather on steroids — and the steroids are here to stay."

This report by The Canadian Press was first published Dec. 24, 2022.

Hina Alam, The Canadian Press

UPDATES

Canadian doctors raise alarm as Iranian healthcare workers targeted by regime

Story by Negar Mojtahedi • Yesterday 

Iranian hospitals and clinics have become the latest battleground in ongoing protests against the regime.


Tehran physician Dr. Aida Rostami was allegedly killed by Iranian regime forces for treating patients injured in anti-government protests. Her family says her body showed gruesome signs of torture.

“There are informants. Are they your so-called patients? Are they your colleagues, managers?” said Montreal resident Dr. Homa Fathi.

Read more:
Iranian-Canadians call on MPs to take a stand against regime’s deadly crackdown

Fathi, a former dentist in Iran, is referring to undercover officers of the Islamic Republic who often visit public hospital emergency departments searching for people injured while fighting for their freedoms on the streets – and the doctors treating them.

Iranian healthcare professionals are putting their lives at risk and facing death to help treat them.

The regime’s security forces, she said, are demanding names and details of anyone seeking treatment for wounds that could have been received in demonstrations.

Video: Canadian doctors make plea to protect Iranian healthcare professionals

Fathi, in conjunction with her sources inside the country, have created a database to track Iranian healthcare workers arrested, kidnapped and killed by the regime.

“We are sure of the death of five healthcare professionals. Two doctors, one nurse and one medical student. Apart from these healthcare professionals, there are a lot who have been arrested," Fathi said.

"So far, I have the list of 19 healthcare professions arrested. I have the list of 21 healthcare students who have also been arrested."

Iranians wounded by the Islamic Republic’s forces avoid treatment at hospitals for fear of being detained, prosecuted or killed. Many medics are defying the Islamic Republic and treating them either at home or at undisclosed locations.

Read more:
‘Silence is not the answer’: Iranian-Canadians horrified by first-known execution

Vancouver physician Dr. Katayoun Rahnavardi and a network of doctors throughout Canada are trying to help amplify the voices of medics in Iran whose lives are in danger for fulfilling an international oath.

Rahnavardi and her colleagues are writing letters and posting to social media to share the stories, names and photos of those workers, and taking part in local rallies to keep the issue in the spotlight.

Canadian creates database of Iranian healthcare professionals targeted

“Everything about what is happening looks and sounds so unbelievable," Rahnavardi said.

"All of these healthcare workers were not protesting when they got arrested or kidnapped. It’s only because they were doing their job to provide medical care to the patients."

She says she had started off with demands not to arrest Iranian healthcare professionals for doing their job but now it has escalated to “don’t kill them, don’t torture them, don’t kidnap them.”

Read more:
‘Oppressions and injustice’: Canadians want fair trial for imprisoned Iranian philanthropists

One well-known case is the killing of 36-year-old Tehran physician Dr. Aida Rostami. She treated demonstrators in secret.

Rostami disappeared on Dec. 12 after a Tehran hospital shift. When her family called the police, they claimed she had died in a car crash.

But according to sources in Iran, Rostami had injuries to her genitalia, and had one of her eyes pulled out. When her family reportedly tracked her body down at the morgue, her body was covered in bruises and showed signs of torture. She was reportedly killed by the regime.

Rahnavardi says Iranian medics are treating injuries of demonstrators who were shot in the eyes, breasts and genitals.

“Over 400 cases of eyes have been shot and removed after the injury. There are documents about that,” Rahnavardi said.

Even during the World Wars, an unspoken rule was that medics were not to be touched.

Doing so today is considered a war crime under the Geneva Convention.

Read more:
Iranian-born Canadian fears for his friends in Iranian prison where he spent 11 years

The dangers facing Iranian doctors have been recognized by medical associations across European and in North America, and the Canadian Medical Association released a statement calling on the Islamic Republic to let doctors do their jobs without interference.

The British Medical Association also released a statement calling on the regime to “cease persecution of health professionals” who treat those injured by the Islamic Republic’s forces, and the World Medical Association is demanding the immediate and unconditional end to violence against Iranian healthcare professionals.

“This is an issue of humanity. It’s my duty, my responsibility as a mother, as a woman, as a human being and as a doctor to be the voice of people who are trusting me, who don’t have help, who don’t have a voice," Rahnavardi said.

"I want everybody to follow their stories and try to provide support."

Video: Iran schoolchildren reportedly killed for protesting

Global NewsCanadian creates database of Iranian healthcare professionals targeted
1:57

At least 90 protesters detained in Iran face execution or life-threatening charges, CBC News has learned

Story by Nahayat Tizhoosh • Yesterday 

This month, a list was shared with CBC News from inside Iran, of the names of protesters who face execution by regime authorities.


A photo obtained by AFP outside Iran on Sept. 21, shows Iranian demonstrators taking to the streets of Tehran during a protest days after an Iranian woman named Mahsa Amini died in police custody. Over 18,000 people have so far been detained by the Islamic Republic since the start of the anti-regime protests in September, according to the Human Rights Activists News Agency.© AFP/Getty Images

In consultation with multiple activists and by accessing reporting by various human rights groups, CBC News can name 90 individuals detained in Iran as being at high risk.

According to information available, at least 19 have been sentenced to death, 65 could face execution and six have been handed lengthy and uncertain prison terms.

The vast majority of these individuals are accused by the regime of "waging war against God" and "corruption on earth" — crimes punishable by death under the Islamic Republic's sharia law.

Protests in Iran erupted in September after a young Iranian woman named Mahsa Amini died in police custody. The 22-year-old had been arrested by the regime's so-called morality police, allegedly for not wearing her hijab properly, part of the regime's strict Islamic dress code. Her family says she was beaten to death.

Activists shine spotlight on detained protesters

Human rights activists tell CBC News the need to identify and publicize the names of the detained protesters is urgent.

They say the attention and public pressure on the authorities in Iran, will help save the lives of many who are voiceless.

Across Europe dozens of politicians have taken on sponsorship of the vast majority of the names listed.

Many parliamentarians and senators in countries like Germany, Austria and France are amplifying the stories of those who have been detained and are lobbying Iranian ambassadors for their release.

Related video: San Diegans protest as Iranian government turns to public executions (KGTV San Diego, CA)
Duration 2:27
View on Watch
More videos

Global NewsIranian-Canadians ask MPs to sponsor prisoners after executions in Tehran
2:21

DailymotionIran Executes Second Prisoner Arrested For Alleged Crime During Protests
1:40

Dailymotion'We will not stop,' says World Cup attendee supporting Iranian protesters
2:52


Over 18,000 people have so far been detained by the Islamic Republic since the start of the anti-regime protests in September, according to the Human Rights Activists News Agency (HRANA). Of those, 506 had been killed — including 69 children and teenagers — as of Dec. 21, 2022.

In less than a month, Iranian authorities arrested, charged and carried out two known executions of Mohsen Shekari and Majid Reza Rahnavard.

Treatment of unidentified prisoners

Iranian-Canadian activist Golsa Golestaneh, who focuses on fact-checking and propaganda, says the two men were "executed in silence" because the regime is often able to "distort the truth" by amplifying false charges and convictions of detained prisoners.

Golestaneh is the spokesperson of an advocacy group called Waves (امواج), made up of young Iranians in and outside Iran who want to have a say in the political opposition to the regime.

At least 19 protesters sentenced to death

"It is extremely important to continue emphasizing the unpredictability of the Islamic regime while recognizing the importance of accuracy, to the extent possible, to minimize the chances of another silent murder."

When it comes to the treatment of unidentified prisoners in Iran, Masoud Kazemi, a journalist based in Turkey, says the regime has a "dark history and horrific track record."

"Detained protesters who are unidentified are subjected to more torture and suffering than others," Kazemi said. "And they are also given lengthier prison terms and are sometimes also sentenced with execution."

65 protesters could face execution

Activists caution that executions are just one of the ways the regime kills prisoners. Golestaneh says that even when prisoners in Iran aren't facing executions, their lives are still at risk.

"The tortures are severe and several people have been killed under it. Some committed suicide or their families were forced to say they've committed suicide inside prison," she said.

Kurdish human rights activist Soran Mansournia, who works on identifying prisoners and those killed by the regime, is urging families to come forward and publish the names of their loved ones.

6 Protestors given lengthy prison sentences

"In the last two months, at least seven people from Iranian Kurdistan died under the torture of security forces of the Islamic Republic," Mansournia said.

"Many prisoners' lives are in danger and we don't even know their names. I ask all their families to make public the abduction of their loved ones."

Why anger is just another form of fear

Story by Refresh News • Yesterday


One would not intuitively assume that in many cases, behind anger, there is simply fear. After all, a temper tantrum is rather scary for those who have to witness it. So what does anger have to do with fear?

Seen from the outside, people must sometimes seem pretty crazy. They throw dishes, throw smartphones on the floor, yell like they’re insane. They attack the other person or flee head over heels to get out of the situation as quickly as possible.

Are you angry. Anger is an intense, but above all an offensive emotion. At least at first glance. Anger seems strong, dominant, frightening to those who have to witness it.
Personal experiences with anger and fear

Anger has been “my” emotion for half my life. If you look at the basic negative emotions – i.e. anger, fear and sadness – I have the impression that one of these emotions is particularly prominent in all people. In that regard, the world for me was divided into anger, fear, and sadness types. And I think I was definitely an anger guy.

In contrast, I’ve never actually considered myself anxious. The reason I didn’t do that was because I only looked at fear on the surface, as did anger. For me, anxious people were those who didn’t dare to jump into the water from the 3-meter tower in our small town swimming pool. Those who do not dare to get on a moped and drive off without any significant experience. Those who don’t dare to ride the roller coaster, who never do Skydive do and would never travel alone. Those who fear snakes, who flinch when dogs bark, and who would never ever mount a horse. Okay, admittedly, when it comes to fear of animals, I guess I’m not entirely fearless either, because I run away when I see a spider. But other than that, I never actually had any really obvious fears. So on the surface, I was (almost) fearless – which I couldn’t exactly say for myself when it came to anger.

I only know three people who could have held a candle to me when it came to outbursts of anger. When I say that the people who experienced my tantrums were afraid of me, that would be putting it nicely. Often they didn’t even dare to say what they were thinking, in order to somehow appease me.

So for most of my life, I’ve considered myself „angry,“ easily irritable. The anger was part of the image I had of myself. Quite the opposite of fear, which I never wanted to acknowledge as part of me. Fear and anger were difficult to reconcile in my head. So to speak, distant relatives who hardly have anything to do with each other.

I now believe that fear is the source of anger. Of course, that doesn’t mean that people who are less „angry“ don’t have fears. They’re just less likely to harbor those fears aggressions transform and thus externalize them.

Different types of anger

Related video: How to Control Anger and Calm Yourself (Health Apta)

Duration 2:10 View on Watch

Of course, there is no question that behind every tantrum there is always fear. After all, there are many different reasons why one can get angry.

For example, if you are angry because you were hit on or groped in the most primitive way in the club for the tenth time, this anger certainly has little to do with fear, but with the fact that you are simply and poignantly concerned about the non-existent behavior of the person concerned excited. Same if you chatted up stupidly from the side on the street or being insulted. There are many things to get upset about, and yes, these things can also cause you to freak out. But from an emotional point of view, it’s mostly about the little things.

But this other kind of anger, which cannot simply be described using the word „freak out,“ is on a completely different level emotionally. It’s a deep-seated anger that’s deep because it feeds on our most intimate fears.

Fear as the source of anger

If you’re angry at your partner because they’d rather spend their annual vacation with friends, then you’re angry because it triggers a deep fear of missing out. Or the fear of not being good enough – and the thought that the partner would prefer to travel with other people for this reason.

If you’re angry because your partner keeps asking if you’d rather hang out with them instead of going out with friends, you’re not angry because of that fact, but because you’re scared, hemmed in and to be controlled.

fear of rejection, fear of abandonment, fear of control – What makes people angry is so individual because everyone has different fears. Often you can’t understand why another person reacts angry – just as other people often can’t understand why you get so upset about a supposed little thing.

Often behind anger there are not just any fears, but the fears that arise manifested in us in our childhood to have. Because in principle it is always the same things that make us angry – just in different variations, which ultimately all address one and the same fear.

However, what fear is present in all „angry“ people is the fear of admitting fears. Because anger is a protective mechanism that ensures that we don’t have to allow ourselves to be afraid – neither of others nor of ourselves.

In my experience, the first and most important step you have to take to release your anger is to admit your fear. From the moment I acknowledged my fears, I was able to work on them – and from there I was suddenly largely free of this deep-rooted anger that I’ve believed for half my life to be a part of me.

Ban on flags: football patriotism equals nationalism?

Story by Refresh News • Yesterday 

Ban on flags: football patriotism equals nationalism?© Provided by Refresh Lifestyle CAEN

It’s here again, the high season of football. As always in the luggage:Fan miles mice and public viewing parasites, Schland chanters and flag-wavers. Surprisingly, it is the latter who are now the topic of the discussion, because the young greens seem to be at loggerheads with the German flag.
Shitstorm from the football fans

„For the European Football Championship, we call on all fans not to leave any room for nationalistic ideas! Football fans flags down”, was on Friday evening on the Facebook site read by the Green Youth of Rhineland-Palatinate. An absolute no-go, not only for the common beer hat wearer. Also the reactions of Bundestag politician and the Greens themselves ranged from amusement to horror. For example, SPD politician Johannes Kahrs tweeted that he would now “hang another German flag over the beach chair”.

Green youth calls on football fans, dte. Rolling up the flag would promote nationalism. If we asked that of others, it would be racism

— Julia Kloeckner (@JuliaKloeckner) June 12, 2016

#GreenYouth doesn’t get it: the fans‘ flags are the opposite of the flags of yore: a symbol of cosmopolitan, friendly Germany!

— Peter Altmaier (@peteraltmaier) June 12, 2016


How embarrassing is that. Now I’m hanging a German flag over the beach chair again. Yes sir. https://t.co/tszQ3AAF1R

— Johannes Kahrs (@kahrs) June 12, 2016

The fine line between patriotism and nationalism

“Nationalism is a form of patriotism. Those who define themselves as patriotic exclude others. The effect of patriotism always has consequences and is particularly evident where it presents itself as an aggressive form and stigmatizes the other as an enemy,” writes the Green Youth. One thing is clear: About the fashionable tastelessness of German flags on the face, as headgear, sunglasses or a Mohawk wig cannot be disputed. Apparently yes about the moral intentions behind it. Above all, the Green Youth itself criticizes the “party patriotism” that occurs during major events such as world or European Championships reigns. Is there a greater danger behind the beer bliss after a Schweinsteiger goal than we thought? Again this year there are enough idiots, riots and brawls. Before the opening game of the German team attacked over 50 hooligans Ukrainian fans in the city center of Lille, there were also massive outbreaks of violence among the English and Russians. Should these idiots but represent all football fans or opportunistic biennial viewers who celebrate the EM peacefully? Is it morally reprehensible to be proud of the National team to be?

What the Green Youth forgot somewhere between the search for clicks and the probably intended call for openness and tolerance: patriotism is not the same as nationalism. Patriotism denotes aloud Federal Agency for Civic Education „a special appreciation of the traditions, cultural and historical values ​​and achievements of one’s own people“, whereas nationalism glorifying one’s own nation and belittling other nations. Whether you should see the achievements of the German national team as your own remains to be seen. But one thing is clear: whoever is proud of the achievements of one’s own country is by no means disparaging the values ​​of another. So a patriot is not a nationalist, even if the line is often very thin.

The Germans and national pride

Terms such as love of fatherland and national pride have been difficult to come off the keyboard, and not just since the events of the last few years. Somewhere there is always this bad feeling, the fear of offending someone or someone xenophobic to give any form of confirmation among us. While in countries like the US it works the other way around, with every self-respecting suburban family displaying at least one flag in their front yard, we have a hard time feeling proud of our country. After National Socialism and a decades-long divided Germany national feeling is not a matter of course for most Germans. In fact, many of us find identification with our country rather uncomfortable. With patriotism we are either sarcastic or, at best, very timid. In principle, this is probably often the smarter option: identifying and boasting about yourself and your character traits instead of some outdated stereotypes. But are feelings of national unity just as dangerous, as Jamila Schäfer, federal spokeswoman for the Green Youth, claims? In an interview with Mirror online she explains: „We fundamentally consider national community feelings to be dangerous“ – suggests that the team could also be supported with a green DFB flag.“ You could. But you don’t have to.

You can be proud – at least for two weeks

Of course we distinguish ourselves with Schland calls and German flags and maybe even find ourselves better than the rest of the group for 90 minutes World. In the same way, we grow together a bit, hug complete strangers when we celebrate a goal and suddenly we are a big, happy one familywho is happy about her own country. After a month you glare at the same people you were holding in your arms just before Subway on. Everyone has to decide for themselves whether that’s so bad.

 

https://theanarchistlibrary.org/library/rudolf-rocker-nationalism-and-culture

Nationalism and Culture - The Anarchist Library 

Nationalism and Culture is the first of the works of Rudolf Rocker to appear in English. Although the author is known as a platform speaker to wide circles ...

Panama aims for 'fair' deal with Canadian miner First Quantum

Story by By Valentine Hilaire and Steve Scherer • Yesterday 

PANAMA CITY (Reuters) -Panama's government is in talks with Canada-based miner First Quantum Minerals over the conditions under which it operates its flagship copper mine, the government's Chief Revenue Officer Publio De Gracia said on Friday.

The official from the country's economy and finance ministry said Panama was looking for a "fair" deal in which the company complies with the obligations its large operations demand.

"These activities are receiving important benefits and it is only fair that they comply with the obligations," he said, adding it was "more unfair" in view of the company's "very low" tax liability, exemptions and credits.

Panama's government on Monday ordered First Quantum to pause operations at the Cobre Panama mine after the company missed a deadline to finalize a deal that would have increased annual tax and royalties payments to the government to at least $375 million.

Related video: Can Canada capitalize on a potential treasure trove of critical minerals? (cbc.ca)  Duration 7:33    View on Watch

A key asset for both parties, Cobre Panama accounts for roughly 3.5% of the country's gross domestic product according to government figures, and according to a financial analyst generates around half of First Quantum's core earnings.

Canada's trade minister has been in contact with her counterpart in Panama in an effort to resolve the dispute, a Canadian government source said on Friday.

"Obviously, we have a keen interest in seeing resolution to this, and are optimistic that both parties are negotiating in good faith," said the source, who is familiar with the discussions.

First Quantum has disbursed more than $10 billion in the mine, according to its web page.

Zorel Morales, the director of Panama's mining chamber, said the dispute with First Quantum could have a dramatic fallout for the country, which has three other similar copper deposits that could generate up to $30 billion in future investments.

Some interested mining firms had categorically said that if the talks do not end well or end up in international courts they would not invest, added Morales, saying solving the dispute was "a matter of life or death" for the sector.

(Reporting by Valentine Hilaire in Panama City and Steve Scherer in Ottawa; Additional reporting by Elida Moreno in Panama City;Editing by Alistair Bell and Diane Craft)

SEE  https://plawiuk.blogspot.com/2022/12/panama-orders-first-quantum-to-halt.html

STELTER: Many Canadians would welcome a return to mask mandates, poll shows

Opinion by Ryan Stelter • Thursday -Winnipeg Sun

All I want for Christmas is an N95 mask.


A wayward disposable face mask hangs on a street sign pole.

That is partly a joke as I will be taking some courses at the University of Manitoba next month so I likely will need some more masks as the school still has a mandate.

Interestingly, there are plenty of Canadians who would welcome a return to mask mandates, a new Angus Reid Institute poll shows.

I, like perhaps many of you, have not been so diligent in my mask-wearing as of late. Just 31% of Canadians polled say they are wearing a mask more than half of the time in public spaces.

Nearly a quarter of those who never wear masks say they would support a mask mandate if COVID-19 gets bad again while 65% of those who rarely but sometimes wear one also say they would accommodate a return to mandatory masking.

More than half of Manitobans polled (54%) would welcome a return to mandatory masking, which is a different outlook from July when only 49% would’ve liked to see a mask mandate.

Flu season has been a bad one, which has particularly hit children hard, coupled with COVID-19 still flying around it makes sense that there are those who would probably begrudgingly throw a mask back on if they become mandatory again.

This isn’t to say that we’re all eager to sling some N95s back over our ears, but I believe I speak for a lot of people when I say that I won’t enjoy it, but I’ll do it as it’s not the hardest thing in the world to do.

The science behind it makes sense and if wearing a mask can help prevent even one person — especially a child — from getting sick, I’d say it’s a success.

When it comes to vaccine passports, there aren’t that many who would welcome a reintroduction of those infamous QR codes. Only 21% support this while 42% say mask mandates nor vaccine passports should be reintroduced.

Not bringing back vaccine passports makes sense. It was helpful for a while and trust me, it didn’t create as much division as some will say. It turned restaurant employees into COVID-19 vaccine checkers and it also created a barrier for some who likely did get all of their shots. Whether it be access to technology or even identification.

It’s interesting to look back now at all the public health restrictions, which were in our lives not that long ago.

Perhaps it’s the fault of the government, or the media, but nearly half of Canadians aren’t thinking about COVID-19 that much anymore. Just last Christmas, we were bracing ourselves for the Omicron wave, which truly blew open the floodgates.

In Manitoba, 56% of people polled said they still think about the pandemic, which is higher than the national average.

Despite what this poll says, in all likelihood mask mandates won’t be reintroduced so you can breathe easy.

As it’s been since March 2022 when Manitoba dropped its restrictions — assess your own risk. You may not like that approach and wish the government did more, but this is the hand we’ve been dealt.

This means as we head into the holiday season filled with get-togethers and parties, stay home if you’re sick. It’s that simple. I believe the pandemic has created this idea that if you’re coughing up a lung but not testing positive for COVID, you’re fine. Nope, stay home.

This Christmas will look different than years past, there will be families and friends getting together for the first time in a long time. Be mindful of what everyone’s gone through and be compassionate.

rstelter@postmedia.com

Twitter: @steltsy94

Canada's grants for master's, PhD students haven't increased since 2003. These researchers want that changed

Story by Mike Crawley • CBC - TODAY

Students doing graduate-level research say Canada risks losing its future scientists to other countries because the dollar amounts of annual grants have remained stagnant for nearly 20 years.


Sarah Laframboise, a PhD student in biochemistry at the University of Ottawa's faculty of medicine, is one of the leaders of the group Support Our Science, which wants the Trudeau government to increase the annual federal grants provided to graduate student researchers.© Pierre-Paul Couture/CBC

A Canada Graduate Scholarship from one of the three federal research funding agencies is $17,500 per year for a master's student or $21,000 per year for a doctoral student. Those amounts have not changed since 2003.

In return for that funding, the recipients are expected to work full-time on their research, and in some cases are explicitly banned from spending more than 10 hours per week on any other paid employment.

"Definitely below the poverty line in any capacity," said Sarah Laframboise, a PhD student in biochemistry at the University of Ottawa.

Laframboise is one of the organizers of a campaign called Support Our Science, calling on the Trudeau government to boost graduate student funding from the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council (NSERC), the Canadian Institutes of Health Research and the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council.

The three federal agencies fund the research of thousands of grad students every year at universities across Canada.

"These students really deserve a living wage," said Laframboise. "They're struggling to pay rent, tuition, all of these costs."

Grants haven't grown with inflation

Support Our Science has held a rally on Parliament Hill, presented a petition to the House of Commons and prepared a submission for the federal government's budget consultations.

The Minister of Innovation, Science and Industry, François-Philippe Champagne, said he is aware of the call for more funding for graduate researchers.

Recommended video: Lost pigeon flew the coop, finding her way from France to Calgary (Global News)  View on Watch

"I'm very much seized about that. This is going to be part of our discussions with the minister of finance," Champagne told CBC News earlier in December, adding that students should "stay tuned" for the 2023 budget.


"It's clear that if we want to own the podium, we need to do more to support the researchers, the students and the scientists," said Champagne.

He said the Trudeau government has invested in science and research, but Laframboise argues that those investments have not resulted in better annual funding to graduate students.

Her group wants the government to increase both the value and number of scholarships and fellowships that the three agencies give to graduate researchers.

"They often spend 40 to 60 hours a week in the lab doing their research," Laframboise said. "So when we look at it from this perspective, these students really deserve a living wage."

Inflation has eroded the value of the grants. If the $17,500 amount for a master's student researcher had risen with inflation since 2003, it would today be worth $26,140, according to the Bank of Canada's inflation calculator.

A feeling of 'generalized anxiety'

Jessica Reid, a master's student in fish ecology at Carleton University in Ottawa, says she has had to seek extra funding beyond her NSERC award to support her research and cover her costs.

"I'm one of the fortunate ones," Reid said in an interview. "There's just this feeling of generalized anxiety. Sometimes you are trying to make ends meet, or you're trying to decide between groceries and other things."

When she learned that the NSERC grant to a master's student had not changed for nearly 20 years, Reid said she found it shocking.

"It's quite frustrating to hear that my research and my contributions aren't valued," she said. "You just can't help but feel a bit slighted."

Both Reid and Laframboise believe their research is important. Laframboise's biochemistry work focuses on cancer, using yeast.

"Yeast and humans share about 30 per cent of the same genes," she said. "I study a gene that in humans causes cancer, but in yeast we can study this in a much more robust, easy, cheaper way."

Reid is researching the impact of urban development on the fish of the Jock River, which flows into the Rideau River in Ottawa.

She says the stagnant funding is a factor in Canadian students deciding to leave the country for graduate degrees.

"Feeling like you can't thrive or you just don't have the resources to stay in this field is definitely going to dampen Canada's research ability in the coming years," she said.

The Sex of Your Surgeon Is, in Fact, a Matter of Life or Death

Story by Danielle Groen •

Early this year, a Canadian study published in JAMA Surgery confirmed what many patients, especially female patients, have long suspected: The sex of your surgeon absolutely matters when it comes to your outcome in the operating room. Female physicians got better results. But it turns out that the sex of the patient matters in the OR, as well—and can even mean the difference between life and death.

Angela Jerath, an associate professor of anesthesiology at the University of Toronto, and her colleague Christopher Wallis, an assistant professor of surgery in the department of urology, canvassed the records of more than 1.3 million men and women, operated on by nearly 3,000 surgeons in Ontario over 12 years. They controlled for as many factors as possible: the age, income, and health status of the patients; the age and experience level of the surgeons; whether the surgery was performed in a small community hospital or a major medical centre. Overall, Jerath and Wallis discovered, more than 17 percent of patients suffered adverse effects within 30 days of the procedure—8.7 percent of them had complications, 6.7 percent were readmitted to hospital, 1.7 percent died. Not the best.

But when they broke down those results by sex, something more troubling emerged. “We found that female patients treated by male surgeons had 15 percent greater odds of adverse outcomes than female patients treated by female surgeons,” Jerath says. Worse still: Women operated on by a male surgeon were 32 percent more likely to die.

Here, Jerath unpacks those astonishing findings and explains how on earth we can fill the gap in care for female patients.

(Related: Women’s Health Collective Canada Is Addressing the Gap in Women’s Health)


Jerath Angela Highres 

Image: Sabrina Sisco

Why did you want to explore this area in the first place?

Chris Wallis had done some earlier work that looked at differences in outcomes between male and female surgeons, using a similar dataset from Ontario health care. That paper signalled that female surgeons across different specialities are having better outcomes than their male counterparts. And we weren’t really sure why. To be honest, we’re still trying to work out why. But one of the areas of interest was whether the interaction between the sex of the physician and the sex of the patient matters.

How did you go about measuring whether it matters?

We have the luxury of lots of health care databases in Ontario, and they’re completely anonymized. We looked at the pairings between the sex of the patient and the physician—so you’ve got four combinations—and we looked at its impact on death, readmission to hospital, or complications after surgery within 30 days. This was on around 21 surgical procedural groups, from things that are really complex, like cardiac bypass surgeries, to common bread-and-butter stuff, like having your hip or knee replaced. We were able to adjust for a lot of things that affect outcomes, like the age of the patient or the experience of the surgeon. We jam-packed those things into the model and came out with the numbers that you see.
Let’s talk about those numbers.

They’re pretty scary.

What did you think when you first saw them?

I was personally taken aback. We had a lot of internal discussions and went through the data again. Chris had done that earlier work, so we knew there was a signal here, but we just didn’t know how big the signal was going to be. It’s important to understand what those numbers might mean. They’re what we call relative numbers. Women having surgery with a male surgeon, relative to a female surgeon, had a 32 percent increased risk for death. That means if your risk for death coming in for surgery is, let’s say, one percent, then it’s 32 percent of that one percent—so the combined outcome is about 1.3 percent. That’s how to mentally compute what you’re seeing.

But should there be a difference at all?

No. And that needs a deep dive. We saw this difference across a lot of surgeries, and there were 1.3 million procedures in our database. Given that volume, we don’t sense that this is some technical thing in the operating room. The operating room is just one part of your surgical experience, which starts as soon as you step into the hospital and meet the team.

What do you think is going on here?

There may be differences around communication, understanding what a patient wants; perhaps there’s a difference in decision-making. Very few people die in the operating room. Most things happen after surgery, and picking up on those complications early can be life-saving. Perhaps men and women physicians are communicating with their teams differently. Perhaps they’re listening to patients differently. There are a lot of subtleties, which I will say don’t get taught at medical school, that might feed into some of those adverse outcomes. There are likely to be differences in style that we can all learn from.

Better communicators, better listeners—not to truck in gigantic generalizations, but that does sound like women to me. Has that been your experience working as an anesthesiologist in the operating room?

I’d say I work with great people, technically and clinically, everywhere. I find women will communicate a bit more. And if I’m concerned about something and we need to pause or think or go faster or whatever, I find they listen. It is a bit of a generalization. There are some men who do that really well. There are probably some women who do that really badly. But I’m starting to see more women surgeons—more women in leadership generally—from when I was a medical student 20 years ago. To get where they are, women often have to do much more; they’ve got to tap into tons of skills, go the umpteenth mile.

And have you noticed differences in female patients, in terms of how they might discuss their symptoms—or how they might be received by surgeons of the opposite sex?

I find women will ask more questions, but you know, how you ask your questions often dictates what’s underneath. Maybe you’re a bit nervous, or you need more reassurance about why something is important, or you may not want to do a procedure. A lot of conversation often means something else. How we perceive that information, as physicians, is so important.

How do we begin to fill this gap?

We’ve highlighted an issue, and now we need different researchers to come in. Understanding more about risk might be important. Are there patients we’re considering operating on who can get through the operation, but perhaps run into issues more frequently after surgery? And then we need researchers with an anthropological or psychology background to really dive into differences in communication style.
What has the response to this paper been like? I imagine some people in the medical community might be a bit…resistant to the findings.

It’s been a mixed bag. A lot of women feel vindicated and that their work has been recognized. There have been some male surgeons who have come up to me and said, “This is fantastic; you’ve highlighted an important area.” There’s a group in the middle who are quiet. And then there are people who are angry. We’ve had those emails, those messages on Twitter, where people feel their whole practice has been affected and are taking it very personally. Male surgeons in particular have taken it very personally.

Should they?

Our response has been that this is a very macro-level study. That’s what big data is really good at doing—it highlights something. But it’s generalistic. It can never make an inference on your individual practice.

Since we’re on a macro level, I imagine it’s a long process to turn around these disparities in care.

Probably. If there was, let’s say, a lot of funding, it would be easier to carve out lots of topics to start examining which would help accelerate us forward. But a subject like this, which is more embedded in the health equity and disparity space, is becoming more of a core subject. People are understanding that this isn’t just dinner-party conversation. There’s real science to behold here.

Next: How Heart Disease Affects Women Differently Than Men

The post The Sex of Your Surgeon Is, in Fact, a Matter of Life or Death appeared first on Best Health.