Whatever you may think about it -- and different people have dramatically different assessments -- most Canadians are acutely aware that the University of Toronto is a central hub for institutional psychiatry, with the Centre for Addiction and Mental Health (CAMH) being one of its most famous research institutes as well as one of its mega teaching hospitals.

Did you know, however, that Toronto universities are likewise famous for what is transparently the opposite -- that is, for cutting edge critiques of psychiatry? And in the latter, let me suggest, we seekers of social justice can truly take pride.

Last week the Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC) released its report, identifying "cultural genocide" as a goal of Canada's Indian Residential Schools. This report calls us to question not only historical violence but also the continual violence inflicted on Indigenous peoples in Canada. As Justice Murray Sinclair, TRC Commissioner, put it: "this is only the beginning" for reconciliation is an ongoing process that involves challenging colonial attitudes today.

It is in this spirit of challenging colonial attitudes that I take issue with Margaret Wente's editorial published in The Globe and Mail.

Why is the Harper government in such a rush to pass Bill C-51, that ominous 'anti-terrorism' omnibus legislation that quietly encroaches on our civil liberties? Something smells fishy in Ottawa. In this edition of 'Letters to Ryan,' Linda Leon tackles the Harper gov’s latest sneak-attack lawmaking.

This week marked National Adjunct Walkout Day, a day of action in support of job-insecure adjunct professors, some of whom can scarcely afford to fill up their cars in order to get to work. Angela Regnier gives some background on the nomadic lives of so-called 'Road Scholars' -- adjunct faculty members who move from contract to contract; Aalya Ahmad, meanwhile, shares her experience of consistently feeling undervalued as an adjunct.