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Being an activist brings an emotional burden. The issues we deal with are intense, difficult and sometimes without any immediate solution. And often, we try to deal with these issues through logically planning a strategy and communicating issues using words. It's an intellectual process, but with a lot of underlying emotional baggage. Elisa Lee has some thoughts about how to get under the intellect to connect with ourselves and people in our communities on a deeper level. She, and many other people involved in grief work, think that it's important to deal with the full range of emotions ranging from anger and fear to hope and joy. Lee bases a lot of her work on the groundbreaking work of Joanna Macy. Macy turned 91 on May 2, and is still connecting with people on issues of environmental activism and grief. Throughout her life, she has been a spokesperson for the anti-nuclear movement, peace, justice and environmentalism. She has created a framework for both personal and social change and has created a workshop methodology to help people move work with social change in a way which helps them connect with their deeper selves. Lee's current activism focuses on community grief rituals and nature-based rites of passage for girls and adults. Both grief rituals and rites of passage profoundly changed her internal world, creating a strong foundation of embodied being that continues to guide and nourish her through life. A big part of that sense of being is getting beyond the intellectual processes which help us explain the world to ourselves and others, but does not get to the root of our reactions to the complex issues that we all face in these difficult times. For the past 15 years, Lee has been promoting personal development in collaboration with nature as a specialist teacher in ecological education, a self-care facilitator, and a rite of passage guide. In addition to the teachings of Joanna Macy, Lee draws on teachings from Alan Wolfelt, Francis Weller, Martin Prechtel, Animas Valley Institute, The School of Lost Borders, The Haven, and her personal sacred experiences in the wild. She holds a masters degree in environmental education with a focus on women's rites of passage and is the founder of Fire & Flower, a rite of passage organization for girls. On today's rabble radio, Elisa Lee talks to Victoria Fenner as part of rabble.ca's series on Climate Hope in the Time of the Pandemic. Image: Elisa Lee

Last year, when rabble.ca staff had one of our rare in-person staff retreats, we were talking about the climate crisis and how difficult it was to get around the fear that we all felt. So we decided to make it an editorial focus. That was back in August. At the time we came up with the idea, we had no way of knowing that our fear would be even greater because of the COVID-19 pandemic. So, when we talked about the subject again at the beginning of March as the pandemic was in the process of unfolding, our idea seemed especially relevant. Today rabble radio starts its contributions to our Climate Hope series on climate grief and hope in the time of pandemic, with a conversation between rabble radio producer and host Victoria Fenner and media artist Claude Schryer. Schryer is a sound artist, arts administrator and cultural worker born in Ottawa and raised in the francophone community in North Bay, Ontario. From an early age he developed a passion for art, environment and social action. In the 1990s, his work focused on acoustic ecology and soundscape composition, notably as a founder and first administrator of the World Forum for Acoustic Ecology. That focus has continued throughout the past few decades. Earlier this year, he attended a conference on Creative Climate Change Leadership with artists from around the world in Arizona called Crisis: Principles for Just and Creative Responses. He has just started a new blog dedicated to arts and climate action where he writes: "In May 2019, my climate denial bubble burst. It was a terrifying and disorienting experience that made me question everything about my life. In retrospect, I realize this was a zen-like gift of 'terrified awakening,' of 'clear seeing,' but at the time, I was paralyzed with emotion and dread. What triggered my climate denial bubble to burst? I feel compelled to share this personal experience, in the hope that it might help others who are also struggling with the current sustainability crisis and searching for a path forward…" Image: Sabrina Matthews. Used with permission.

Are you one of those people who would like to try vegan cooking but you just dont know how to get started? On today's rabble radio, we'll help you out, as our contribution to rabble.ca's vegan challenge. The vegan challenge is a good way for "veg-curious" people to try a vegan diet for a short time in a fun environment along with other rabble staff and readers. It's a way to encourage each other to go vegan -- or as close to it as possible -- for a week to help protect the environment, show compassion for animals and enjoy some wholesome nutritious and yummy food. Because going vegan is one of the best ways to contribute to climate justice and Earth Day. It can drastically reduce your carbon footprint, diminish air and water pollution and help reverse the destruction of ecosystems being used to produce feed for farm animals. Today's guest is Karen Burson, an accomplished cook who has worked in a wide range of food and community development environments in her home city of Hamilton, Ontario. Among many other accomplishments, she was the founding chef of the Bread and Roses Cafe in Hamilton, which was a project of the Sky Dragon Community Development Cooperative. She's also a co-founder of the Good Food Box Network at Environment Hamilton. Currently her passion for healthy food is being put to work at St. Matthew's House, preparing healthy, heartwarming breakfasts and lunches at their Seniors Centre for an enthusiastic group of East Hamilton elders. She's off on self-isolation right now, though, like a lot of us so she had time to talk to us about how to get started cooking vegan food. Recipes in today's program: Jamaican Curried Tofu with Chick Peas Vegan Pancakes Image: plesektomas/Pixabay

Covering a country like Canada while COVID-19 is wreaking havoc is a difficult thing to do. Canada is so large with lots of regional differences. And nowhere in the country is the difference so stark as it is between Canada's North and the rest of the country. Today we have two interviews from two different parts of the north -- one from Cumberland House in northern Saskatchewan, and another from a bit further north and west, up in Yellowknife. With Yellowknife being a city, and Cumberland House a much smaller community, there are differences between the two. But there are some commonalities as well that come with being two relatively isolated communities cut off from the mainstream in southern Canada. 1) Marlene McKay is a resident of both Cumberland House and Saskatoon where she is a professor of social work with the University of Regina. Her partner runs one of the local stores in the town of Cumberland House and on a nearby reserve. Cumberland House is in COVID-19 lockdown right now. This interview is an excerpt from an interview done by Don Kossick from his program Making the Links with community radio CFCR 90.5 FM in Saskatoon. 2) George Lessard, media specialist and consultant who has lived in Yellowknife and other parts of the North for many years. He talks about Yellowknife as a hub to remote communities. As of today, April 16, there are still no confirmed cases in Nunavut, five in the Northwest Territories and eight in Yukon, according to the government of Canada website. As for Cumberland House, the Saskatchewan government website says there are seven cases in the far north, but do not break down by community where they are. Image: Victoria Fenner

There are thousands of people in Canada involved in international humanitarian work. According to CARE Canada in a 2011 study, there were 14,000 full-time and 32,000 part-time workers working in international development in our country. And there are also thousands of volunteers who go oversees to provide health-care relief, build schools, help out in community radio stations, and assist in environmental initiatives, among other things. That's a lot of people. Most of them are working from home right now, and many have likely lost their jobs. The exact numbers aren't known yet. And we don't know how many volunteer placements have stopped. One thing is pretty sure -- they're wondering and worrying about the people they help. It's especially difficult because they can't physically go there to see the situation first hand, and in many cases communications infrastructure is either unreliable or unavailable. Today we're talking to two people who work in international development: David Barth is the executive director of World Accord in Waterloo, Ontario. Barth was with a group of volunteers in Honduras when airports started to close and countries were shutting their borders to stop the spread of COVID-19. They are back home now with a lot of stories to tell about what they went through. He also talks about World Accord's partners and his hopes and fears as the pandemic spreads. Simon Chambers is the director of communications for ACT Alliance. The ACT Alliance is a coalition of Protestant and Orthodox churches and church-related organizations engaged in humanitarian, development and advocacy work. The alliance has 135 members working in over 120 countries. Up until a few months ago, he was spending a lot of time on planes going to international meetings. Not now. He's in Toronto, still working but from home. Chambers talks about how the pandemic is shifting priorities for NGOs, and is hopefully not sidelining climate change efforts. Image: Victoria Fenner

Gaza is only 365 square kilometres and home to almost two million Palestinians. It's been under a comprehensive Israeli land and sea blockade for 13 years. Israeli military assaults in 2008-2009, 2012 and 2014 have laid waste to much of its infrastructure. Poor sanitation, lack of clean water, poverty, unemployment and an acute shortage of hospital beds and equipment are a perfect storm for disease transmission. The people of the Israeli-occupied Palestinian territories -- under permanent military rule and denied the most basic civil and political rights -- are particularly ill-equipped to protect themselves. The first two cases in Gaza were diagnosed on March 21. That was 12 days ago. As of April 2, there are 12 reported cases of COVID-19 in Gaza, and 155 in Palestine as a whole. David Kattenburg is the publisher of The Green Planet Monitor, a Canadian online news magazine based in Winnipeg. The situation in Palestine is one of his main ongoing areas of coverage. He spoke with Mariam Abu Alatta about the current situation early last week just after the announcement of the first two cases. Abu Alatta is project and fundraising officer of the Aisha Association for Woman and Child Protection. Image: Gigi Ibrahim/Flickr

Lois Ross, our agriculture columnist at rabble.ca has been a frequent visitor to Cuba. This year's trip was a little different and somewhat unnerving as she watched the COVID-19 pandemic cross the ocean and start to affect North America. She got home over a month ago, and the situation she was seeing was worrying, though not like it is today. She's home, she's safe ... with some thoughts about the precarious situation we find ourselves in. While Havana seems like a different world, Lois says there are lessons to be learned from Cuba which we should heed here in Canada. Her most recent column focuses on how the tiny country became self-sufficient in agriculture. rabble radio host and producer Victoria Fenner gave her a call to expand on some of her ideas. They talked about Cuba, and also how Canada is vulnerable when it comes to self-sufficiency in food production because, well, we're not self-sufficient. The gaps in grocery store shelves that we're seeing now because of the interruption of the food supply chain due to COVID-19 is a warning which we need to pay attention to. Rounding out the show on our theme of sustainability and urban agriculture is a short documentary done in 2006 in Colombo, Sri Lanka, by Victoria Fenner for Earth Chronicle Productions in Manitoba (now called The Green Planet Monitor). Colombo is a very dense city, full of concrete with a shortage of land. Nonetheless, urban farming was being encouraged and a very young group of people were getting lessons in farming from a very young age. They'd be all grown up by now, but there are still some things to learn from them. Read Lois Ross' column "Cuba Is Teaching The World Lessons in Sustainability," published on March 18. Image: Indrid__Cold/Flickr

Those of us who are gig workers and small business owners were relieved to hear the announcement yesterday that there will be some support for people like us in this time of COVID-19. But, we're not out of the woods yet. We don't know how it's all going to work. And if it works like employment insurance does, 55 per cent of already marginal incomes isn't much money. On today's rabble radio, Victoria Fenner talks to three vulnerable workers. They're sharing their questions, their fears and some of the unique dynamics of their occupation in the place where they live. 1.) Alyssa Wright is a cellist, singer/songwriter, author, advocate, activist and occasionally, an actor living in Barrie, Ontario. She talks about the idiosyncracies of life as a musician, and what she hopes the government realizes about how artists work as it puts together the financial package to help them out. 2.) Hannah McIlveen is an artist, animal rights advocate and owner-operator of Open Arms Dog Daycare and Boarding in River Ryan, Nova Scotia. She lives in Cape Breton with her husband, Kevin Kiosis, a paramedic, and a veritable zoo of pets! 3.) Karen Burson has worked in a variety of food-related occupations ... everything from owning an artisan small batch ice cream shop, to municipal food policy work and to her current role as cook and food security coordinator at St. Matthew's House in North Hamilton. And music by Alyssa Wright. This podcast topic was partly inspired by an article written by Karl Nerenberg on Tuesday this week called "Government Must extend EI to Low-Income and Gig Workers. It's an excellent article and it was good news to hear news of financial assistance yesterday from Ottawa. Though the actions of the government will help, it's only a partial solution. You'll hear some more reasons why on today's show. Image: Alyssa Wright by Scott Cooper. Used with permission. Music: Alyssa Wright. My Cup. Used with permission.

People who haven't been to university in a very long time might think of a student union as a club on campus. The reality is that most student unions in Canadian universities are sizeable employers. The student unions at larger universities employ a few hundred people, and not just students. Full-time people rely on their jobs with the students union to pay their mortgates and feed their families. They also administer dental and health plans, have seats on the governing bodies of the university and work to protect students' rights on campus. If that conforms to the definition of a "club," it's a really big one. Student unions are independent corporations, with complex agreements in place with the university administration to operate on campus and receive student fees. Most of the time, the relationship is straightforward. But not always. Ryerson University and the Ryerson Students' Union have had a fractured relationship for a couple of years, stemming from allegations of mismanagement of funds by the RSU a couple of years ago. The dispute went to court last week because the university challenged the status of the student union on campus and refused to hand over funds for the union to operate. This has been going on for a couple of years now, and the legal deliberations aren't over yet. But there was a favourable decision last week for the Ryerson Students' Union's case. Nicole Brayiannis is president of the Continuing Education Students' Association at Ryerson, also known as CESAR. CESAR had intervenor status in the case, and Nicole was in the courtroom. She talked to Victoria Fenner. Image: Hoice/Wikipedia

Podcasters Itisha Giri and Bhrikuti Rai are fed up with the male-dominated discourse in Nepali media and are determined to change it. The hosts of Boju Bajai are using their platform to speak to women, for women and about women in a space where many voices are left behind. Giri, a writer, and Rai, a journalist, met in 2016 at an audition for The Vagina Monologues in Kathmandu. They bonded over how they think the country's media has failed women, time and again. Maxine Betteridge-Moes is a freelance journalist and podcast producer from Guelph, Ontario, who is now in Nepal. She's a big fan of the podcast. She is in Nepal working with an NGO called the Blue Diamond Society, established in 2001 to advocate for the rights of Nepal's marginalized gay, transgender and other sexual and gender minority communities. A graduate of Carleton University, she has worked in media and international development in Malaysia, Ghana and now, Nepal. She is an avid listener of Boju Bajai and wanted to share what she's heard with rabble listeners. She spoke to Victoria Fenner from Nepal over Skype and shared some of the best clips from the show. Thanks to Maxine Betteridge-Moes for doing this for rabble radio, and also to the producers of Boju Bajai for letting us air portions of their show and for providing us the picture for our show notes. If you want to hear the show yourself, you can listen here. It's also available on Apple Podcasts. Image: Manjushree Thapa. Used with permission Audio Clips: Boju Bajai. Used with permission