Alright, Now What?

Overworked, overwhelmed, undervalued. Last May, we launched The Mother Rising , a campaign to draw attention to the voices of diverse mothers and caregivers in Canada. We learned that many of them were at their breaking point in the pandemic. Their mental health was suffering, and the burdens were even greater for those facing poverty, multiple forms of discrimination, and gender-based violence. O...

Content note: this episode addresses sexual violence. “Not every Ontario hospital has rape evidence kits,” reads a recent Toronto Star headline. “A proposed law would change that.” May is Sexual Assault Prevention Month, and the issue of sexual assault evidence kits not being available to survivors in all hospitals - in Ontario and throughout Canada - is an important one. But s...

The 2022 Federal Budget says that 44% of its investments are gender neutral, 42% benefit men more than women, and just 14% benefit women more than men. What this all means can be a bit confusing. Why should we look at the budget with a critical lens, and can it really move the needle on gender justice? Ann Decter, Senior Director of Community Initiatives and Policy at the Canadian Women’...

We're mindful of crises in the Ukraine, in Afghanistan, in Yemen, and other regions of the world. The goal of gender justice in Canada is intertwined with the goals of peace and safety all over the globe. But the distinct needs of women, girls, and gender-diverse people fleeing conflict as refugees and the interplay of discrimination like racism, homophobia, transphobia, and ableism are underrecog...

It's 2022 and the gender pay gap still hurts us. What does the data say? And what are some real life stories behind the numbers? The gender pay gap refers to the difference in average earnings of people based on gender. It’s a widely recognized indicator of gender inequities, and it exists across industries and professional levels. There are different ways to measure the gap, but no matter how you...

The Canadian Women's Foundation's new national survey shows a significant difference between how able people feel to support those facing abuse and how supported those survivors of abuse actually feel. It shows that most people believe everyone has a responsibility to end gender-based violence but, at the same time, almost half think the issue’s too big to play a role in ending it and almost one q...

Misogynoir is a term coined by Moya Bailey to describe the unique form of anti-Black sexism faced by Black women. It’s a key topic explored in the documentary, Subjects of Desire, an award-winning documentary written, directed, and produced by Jennifer Holness and Hungry Eyes Media. The film explores Black women and beauty standards and interrelated topics like misogynoir and gender-based violence...

We’ve seen breaking news about the rise of alt-right ideology and its connections with misogyny, racism, homophobia, and other forms of discrimination and oppression. It’s not new, but in the COVID-19 pandemic context, it’s resurging in contemporary ways. How does this ideology stand at odds with the goal of gender justice and what do we need to do to address it? Luna KC joins us on these importan...

After nearly 2 years of a global pandemic with severely gendered impacts, how are women, girls, and Two Spirit, trans, and non-binary people fairing today? What do the losses in three decades of gender equality gains and alarming trends mean when we're searching for a better way forward? What is the state of gender justice in Canada at the top of 2022? Paulette Senior , President and CEO of the Ca...

A new survey by Environics Institute for Survey Research shows that 57% of women in Canada identify as feminists, a big increase from the past. The number is especially high for young women aged 18 to 24. In addition to that, 40% of men consider themselves feminists, and 90% of people in Canada believe we need to do more to promote gender equality.  Is feminism no longer considered a "bad wor...

The Canadian Femicide Observatory for Justice and Accountability recently reported that, in 2020 and 2021, the rate of femicide - murders of women because they are women - has been on the rise. In Canada, a woman is killed by her current or former partner an average of every 6 days. That's a pretty frightening and unacceptable number. And that was the number before the pandemic's spike in risk of...

As we move into the holiday season, we have seen more news stories about gender-based violence. For every case we do learn about, there are many we don't know about. Those facing violence aren't always safe enough to tell anyone what's happening. Sometimes, they fear a response of judgement, disbelief, or retaliation. And sometimes the response they get is a complicated mixed bag with both positiv...

What can supporting someone going through abuse actually look like? And what about the times where we might have ... messed up? Our new Signal for Help Responder Campaign gives people tools and training to respond to signs or signals of abuse because a signal is only as good as its response. And we need to shift our culture of stigma about gender-based violence to a culture of support. This honest...

November 20 is the annual Transgender Day of Remembrance, a time to remember and honour the lives of trans and gender-diverse people murdered due to hate, prejudice, and discrimination. It was first held in 1999 to honour the memory of Rita Hester, whose 1998 murder in Boston, Massachusetts remains unsolved. In Canada, violence against diverse Two Spirit, trans, non-binary, and gender non-conformi...

This bonus episode will get you up to speed on what's been going on with the Signal for Help, a simple one-handed gesture you can make without leaving a digital trace. It means "I need you to check in with me safely." We launched it in April 2020 in response to an increased risk of gender-based violence in the pandemic. By July 2020, 1 in 3 people in Canada knew about it or saw it being used and i...

Many of us know what it's like to be told to "lean in". And there are lots of articles on how women and equity-seeking people can better ask for what they need and want at work. It's all meant as helpful advice, but especially in a pandemic where we've experienced historic setbacks in gender equity in the labour market, how helpful is it? Does "leaning in" actually work? What are the more useful q...

In this back-to-school season, we launched the Got Your Back campaign to support girls and gender-diverse young people in their struggles with mental health, healthy relationships, identity, belonging, and confidence in the pandemic. It got us thinking about future ramifications for diverse girls and young people – both millennials and Gen Z. We’re joined by Anjum Sultana, National Director of Pub...

The issue of trafficking is in Canadian news media all the time. But what is it? Why is the term so confusing? And why is it that matters of policing, prosecution, and prison dominate public policy discussions when learnings from the grassroots tell us a different story of what will effectively address this form of gendered violence? The realities are complicated, the impacts are highly intersecti...

After a swift campaign period, the federal election has wrapped up and the results are in. What do they actually mean when it comes to gender justice matters? What policy decisions and changes do we need to keep pushing forward with, especially at this time when gender equality gains in Canada are so at risk, especially for marginalized women? Anuradha Dugal, VP of Community Initiatives at the Can...

The September 20th federal election approaches fast and furious. What does it mean to "vote for gender justice" this time around? Ann Decter, Senior Director of Community Initiatives and Policy at the Canadian Women's Foundation, shares key issues for us to think about as we lift our pencils at the polls. She tells us what Up For Debate , an alliance of women’s rights and gender justice advocates,...

New legislation about gendered pay inequity will go into force on August 31, 2021. But there are still those who say that a gender pay gap doesn't exist in Canada at all. We're joined by Dr. Sarah Kaplan, Director of the Institute for Gender and the Economy and Distinguished Professor of Gender and the Economy and Professor of Strategic Management at Rotman. She addresses what the gender pay gap r...

Experiences of homelessness are not a monolith; women and gender-diverse people may have unique experiences and unique challenges when faced with situations of housing precarity. But the lack of recognition, investment in, and tailored responses to these experiences has contributed to the ongoing invisibility of women's homelessness. Following on the heels of the encampment evictions at Lamport St...

Technology-facilitated gender-based violence (TFGBV) occurs at shockingly high rates and has a devastating impact on those targeted. From the doxxing of public figures to the harassment of ordinary folks on social media, TFGBV can take many forms and abusers have a number of tools at their disposal. We sat down with Rosel Kim and Pam Hrick of the Women's Legal Education and Action Fund (LEAF) to d...

We are joined by social justice lawyer and advocate Fay Faraday and Vice President of Community Initiatives at the Foundation Anuradha Dugal to discuss the intersection of paid sick leave and gender. We explore the devaluing of living things within a for-profit, capitalist system and the ideological barriers that promote resistance to paid sick leave and other worker-centred policies.

We've all seen the news about abuses in the military, but the problem of sexual harassment in Canada goes far beyond any one industry. On today's episode, we're asking the question; why are some industries so much worse for sexual harassment? To explore this with us, we're joined by author and women's rights advocate, Julie S. Lalonde, and Research and Training Director of AfterMeToo, Kate Cornell...