protest

The Origins of April 20th as a Day of Celebrating Cannabis

Submitted by JodieEmery on Thu, 04/04/2013 - 6:30pm

Marc speaks at a rally in VancouverThe biggest celebration day in the cannabis culture is April 20. The April 20 (4/20) celebration originally started in the mid 1970s as the time of day after school, 4:20 pm, for high school students in San Rafael, California to meet to smoke pot. The phrase "I'll see at you at 4:20" became code for, "I'll be there to smoke a joint with you after classes are over".

Read more »
video: 

'Smoke-in' marks death of marijuana activist

Submitted by Nicole Seguin on Tue, 11/29/2011 - 10:32pm

BY ROBERT KOOPMANS, DAILY NEWS STAFF REPORTER

Local medical marijuana users staged a "smoke-in" in Kamloops Saturday to mark the death of a B.C. marijuana activist who died following a hunger strike.

Carl Anderson said about 50 people gathered at Spirit Square at 4:20 p.m. to pay tribute to Istvan Marton, 69, who died Nov. 20 after suffering a heart attack following a month-long hunger strike.

Marton was fighting for changes to Canada's medical marijuana laws. His hunger strike divided his home village on Malcolm Island, off the northeast coast of Vancouver Island, where he was also known as Steve, the local fair-deal marijuana seller. Read more »

Shrinking public protest spaces

Submitted by Nicole Seguin on Mon, 03/14/2011 - 2:25pm

By: Rob Salerno, Xtra News

Organizers of the five-year-old Toronto Freedom Festival were shocked in January when city officials told them they were being denied a permit for their annual pot-themed celebration in Queen’s Park this year. Without a permit, the festival remains on hold.

The Freedom Festival, which has grown in popularity every year, drew around 30,000 revellers in conjunction with the annual Global Marijuana March in 2010, according to police estimates.

That success has become the Festival’s biggest challenge. City officials say Queen’s Park can’t handle events at which more than 15,000 people gather without significant risk of damage to the park’s centuries-old trees and turf and without risk to the safety of gatherers. Read more »

Pot festival organizers not high on city decision

Submitted by Nicole Seguin on Sat, 03/05/2011 - 11:45am

By: ADRIAN MORROW, Globe and Mail

Organizers of a Toronto marijuana festival say the streets will be crawling with hungry, thirsty, blissed-out protesters if the city doesn’t change its decision to withhold a permit that would allow the group to use the lawn of Queen’s Park.

The Toronto Freedom Festival has been held since 2007 and happens at the same time as the Global Marijuana March in early May, providing food and entertainment to legalization protesters.

However, the festival appears to have become a victim of its own success, with city officials telling organizers that the size of the crowds – an estimated 40,000 people at last year’s festival – is too large for the park to accommodate. Read more »

Prison farm protesters choose trial over 'slap on the wrist'

Submitted by Nicole Seguin on Wed, 11/17/2010 - 1:11am
By Laura Stone, Postmedia News
 
OTTAWA — A group of protesters, which includes an 87-year-old woman, has chosen to go to trial after being arrested last summer over a demonstration on the closing of Canada's prison farms.
 
While the Crown offered the group of 11 Kingston-area residents a "diversion" deal that would essentially drop all charges related to an early-morning blockade last August in front of Frontenac Institution, the protesters say they will ask an Ontario court judge on Tuesday to lay the groundwork for a trial.

Guards protest outside Man. prison

Submitted by Nicole Seguin on Sat, 11/13/2010 - 9:19am
CBC News
 
About a dozen prison guards are protesting outside Manitoba's Stony Mountain Institution, awaiting the arrival of Public Safety Minister Vic Toews.
 
Kevin Grabowsky, the Prairie region president of the Union of Canadian Correctional Officers, said the guards have wanted to meet with Toews for months.
 
They have concerns over the design of a new wing planned for the federal prison and overcrowding in cells.
 
"We went nicely to his riding and asked him politely, you know, 'Please contact us.' So now, we'll have to take a another stab at him to see if he'll meet with us," Grabowsky said.

University of Winnipeg to give honorary degree to Vic Toews

Submitted by Nicole Seguin on Thu, 10/14/2010 - 4:26pm
By: Rob Salerno, Xtra News
 
A protest is planned at The University of Winnipeg’s convocation ceremony on Sunday, Oct 17 against the school’s decision to award an honorary degree to former Conservative public safety minister Vic Toews. Activists will be encouraging attendees at the ceremony to turn their backs on Toews as he receives the accolade.
 
“Toews' positions are based on ignorance and are in direct opposition to the notions of compassion and justice that should be idealized by institutions of higher learning and the Canadian justice system,” writes protest organizer Rob McGregor in an email to members of the protest group, The Coalition for Integrity in Academic Accolades.

Prison plans concern union

Submitted by Nicole Seguin on Fri, 10/08/2010 - 10:22am
By ROB TRIPP, THE WHIG-STANDARD
 
Ottawa does not have a plan to manage the thousands of new inmates who will end up behind bars because of the Conservatives' law-and-order agenda, warns the union that represents 1,000 prison guards in the Kingston area.
 
"Tough on crime, but what's that going to mean for us inside the walls?" wondered Jason Godin, regional president of the Union of Canadian Correctional Officers.
 
Godin said the union, which represents about 1,700 Correctional Service Canada workers in Ontario, is concerned that managers and the government have not revealed any plans to expand support services, facilities and programs inside prisons to serve the growing inmate population.

Guards warn Tory plans will make prisons more dangerous

Submitted by Nicole Seguin on Wed, 10/06/2010 - 1:18pm
By Janice Tibbetts and Laura Stone, Postmedia News
 
OTTAWA — As the Harper government rolled out plans Wednesday to build new cells at six federal penitentiaries, prison guards took to the streets to protest wage clawbacks and warn that prisons will become increasingly crowded and dangerous as a result of new laws to incarcerate more offenders.
 
Public Safety Minister Vic Toews said the government will spend $95.5 million to build new units at its Bath, Collins Bay and Millhaven institutions in Ontario near Kingston, adding almost 400 new beds to the federal prison system.
 
The government was also planning to announce prison expansions in Montreal.

B.C. medical marijuana user lights up in the Commons to protest law

Submitted by Nicole Seguin on Wed, 10/06/2010 - 1:03pm
By Meagan Fitzpatrick, Postmedia News
 
OTTAWA — A medical marijuana user lit up a joint in the House of Commons Monday to draw attention to what he calls unfair rules set by Health Canada.
 
Samuel Mellace, who lives in Abbotsford, B.C., is a licensed pot user under the federal government's medical marijuana program. He started smoking a joint Monday afternoon while in the public gallery of the House of Commons as the daily question period came to an end. Mellace took a few drags on the joint before a security guard asked him to put it out and leave the gallery, which he did without incident.
video: 
Syndicate content