The Conversation – Articles (CA)

Does the exodus to UpScrolled signify the end of TikTok?

2026-02-04T16:34:28Z

Soon after American investors took control of TikTok's U.S. operations, users started complaining that content on certain topics was being suppressed. (Unsplash/Appshunter.io)

Until recently, you might have never heard of the TikTok competitor UpScrolled. But as of Jan. 29, the app reached No. 1 one in Apple’s app store as disgruntled TikTok users in the United States rushed to sign up.

The exodus to UpScrolled comes after a group of American investors, including Oracle founder Larry Ellison, acquired a majority stake in TikTok’s U.S. operations on Jan. 22, a day before the deadline set by President Donald Trump for the app’s U.S operations to be separated from Chinese parent company ByteDance.

Trump and other American officials have long pushed for acquiring TikTok’s U.S. operations, citing concerns over China accessing the data of U.S. citizens. However, soon after the acquisition, TikTok users started complaining of shadow banning, a disputed tactic whereby people suggest social media sites will allow you to post, but will not allow anyone else to see what you post.

The acquisition comes amid civil unrest in the U.S. as Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers (ICE) conduct raids in cities like Minneapolis that have resulted in multiple deaths and hospitalizations. Concerned users have been uploading video documenting ICE’s actions, but began to notice their videos were not garnering any attention on TikTok, or sometimes, not uploading at all following the acquisition.

Users posting about other topics such as Palestine have also expressed concerns about censorship. Palestinian journalist Bisan Owda’s account was banned shortly after the acquisition. It was restored following an outcry from users.

TikTok says anyone experiencing a disruption over the last couple of weeks has not been shadow banned; it was result of technical problems following a polar vortex and associated weather-related issues. But this statement from U.S. TikTok came after one million downloads of UpScrolled and reports of concerned users deleting TikTok.

Controlling the algorithm

It may indeed be a coincidence that people had trouble uploading videos critical of ICE at a time of changing ownership, but the whole incident had users talking.

As part of the acquisition, TikTok has been programmed with a new U.S.-specific content moderation algorithm that influences what people do and don’t see. Like with every other social network, the algorithm is considered proprietary information, meaning no academic nor policymaker can independently audit it.

Trump has expressed interest in controlling social media algorithms, so it’s no wonder people are connecting the outage with possible censorship. Looking at Reddit posts about the TikTok sale reveals how upset some users are.

It’s well known that China engages in censorship on the Chinese version of TikTok, Douyin. In fact, this practice was commented on by France’s President Emmanuel Macron, who stated that children on TikTok in China receive more educational content than children in France do.

Knowing this, it’s not surprising that American users would connect the dots and suggest that any TikTok outage would be a result of government censorship.

The truth is, there’s no way to know for sure whether censorship did occur in the first week of the takeover, or whether it’s still occurring in less obvious ways now. Regardless of whether direct government interference is an issue, the algorithm still filters content in ways that often lead to misinformation spreading among a global user base.

Is time up for TikTok?

Does the rush of users from TikTok to apps like UpScrolled spell hard times ahead for TikTok U.S.? We’ve been here before, and the apps that take a temporary hit usually bounce back. After Elon Musk took over Twitter and rebranded it X in 2022, many users, including high-profile celebrities and corporations, left the platform. However, engagement is still strong among people who identify as right wing and MAGA.

Every couple of years, it seems, news outlets publish articles about reasons to leave Facebook. But Facebook and X are still going strong. The fact that these sites survive the exodus of both high-profile and regular users is likely due to network effects.

Social media platforms become more valuable the more people are on them. Not only do they become more interesting when there are more people posting content, but people also want to be on platforms where their friends, family and favourite celebrities already are.

Network effects mean that unless UpScrolled continues its explosive growth, people are unlikely to continue to choose it over the more established TikTok. At best, we might see a Twitter/X effect, which is where TikTok will host more pro-U.S. government content creators and those people who want to follow them, and UpScrolled will host more critical content creators and their followers. This is basically what happened when many left-leaning users moved to BlueSky as an alternative to X.

Because each social network engages in or facilitates different types of content filtering, each provides a different kind of echo chamber that people self-select into or out of.

These echo chambers are a problem because they reinforce beliefs, even ones grounded in mis- and disinformation, and in turn create deeper more polarized divisions between people that are hard to escape from. Since young people report getting most of their news from social media sites, people concerned about algorithms have more than just government censorship to worry about.

Jaigris Hodson receives funding from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada (SSHRC)

How to ensure affordable, safe and culturally grounded housing for Indigenous older adults

2026-02-04T13:44:06Z

A good home, or Minosin Kikiwa in Cree, is the foundation of dignity in later life, according to the Indigenous seniors who spoke to us. Yet “every year the rent goes sky-high and it’s tough to be homeless,” an anonymous participant said.

As members of the Indigenous Seniors Research Committee, we came together in the fall of 2022 with the goal of examining the housing and care needs of older Indigenous adults in Winnipeg. In 2023-24, we spoke with 48 Indigenous older adults between the ages of 55 and 83 and nine knowledge keepers. What we found out, and compiled in our report Minosin Kikiwa – “A Good Home”: Indigenous Older Adults in Winnipeg, is critical to share.

It turns out that many Indigenous Elders are struggling to find affordable and safe homes to age with dignity after decades of contributing to their families and communities. The evidence we’ve collected suggests a housing crisis that is not only economic but also cultural.

Affordability at the breaking point

A little more than half of the older Indigenous participants rented their housing, and 21 per cent were precariously housed or homeless. Many relied on social or income assistance they found lacking.

One participant who used a walker described having to keep working to afford the $1,050 monthly rent for a one-bedroom apartment. Another senior told us:

“[You] can’t move because [you] can’t afford it. You can’t afford it. You can’t even get a stinking room at the hotel [per month]. They’re charging over $650 for a bedbug-infested party room and people breaking in.”

Others described paying most of their fixed income for apartments with poor or unsafe conditions. One participant recalled living in a rooming house where individuals with questionable unsafe behaviours were allowed to move in. “My ex-landlady didn’t care who was in there…she was not maintaining the place.”

As committee co-chair Joanne Mason put it: “Getting a place to rent is impossible, and the ones that are for rent are dilapidated and often not well-kept at very high prices.”

Colonial legacies on housing

Indigenous older adults’ housing challenges cannot be separated from Canada’s history. Child welfare removals, residential schools and racism disrupted education, employment and the transfer of intergenerational wealth. As a result, many Indigenous older adults entered later life with mortgages or debts, and without personal savings.

As committee member Kathy Mallet explained: “The colonial system gave us (Indigenous Peoples) that legacy, and so now we’re paying for it.”

Cumulative poverty and other disadvantages compound this problem. As one participant shared, “You don’t raise four children and be wealthy when you retire.” Other low-income Indigenous participants told us they had no choice but to keep working in paid employment into their later years. Seventy-three per cent of our participants reported they either have “some difficulty” or “great difficulty” making ends meet.

These were no golden years of retirement.

Home is more than family

Housing is more than physical buildings, it is also about community and wellness.

Minosin Kikiwa for Indigenous older adults is defined as a safe, affordable and accessible space that fosters a holistic balance of physical, spiritual, mental and emotional well-being through deep connections to family, kin, community and culture.

Homes are places where one connects with family, passes on culture and finds rest. Yet restrictive housing policies frequently undermine this. One participant shared that overnight guests were forbidden in their building. “Visitors have to be out of the building by 10:30…that’s not a home.”

As Lucille Bruce, co-chair of the Indigenous Seniors Research Committee, explained: “They want to be within their communities where families can visit and where services are delivered in culturally relevant ways by Indigenous agencies.”

Intergenerational connections are disrupted when grandchildren and other family members are prevented from staying with renters due to these culturally insensitive policies, which worsens the isolation and cultural deprivation experienced by many.

When policy fails community

Winnipeg has one of the largest populations of urban Indigenous Peoples in Canada with 12.4 per cent of Winnipegers (90,990) identifying as Indigenous in 2021. The housing and later-life struggles of Indigenous older adults in the city reflect those faced by Indigenous older adults in urban settings across Canada.

Statistics Canada found that the life expectancy of an Indigenous person is about 7.8 years shorter than that of non-Indigenous Canadians. Other researchers have linked precarious housing to poor health, food insecurity and social isolation, all of which increase mortality.

Governments need to be accountable to Indigenous older adults. Public funds currently flow into dilapidated spaces and rooming houses that function as de facto “nursing homes” for low-income Indigenous older adults. As one participant stated, shelters and transitional housing too often become places “where our people come to die.”

Researchers note that government programs framed as reconciliation often amount to tokenistic gestures, with a lack of meaningful Indigenous leadership. Policy frameworks have failed to address deep-rooted challenges such as generational poverty, inadequate financial support that does not adjust for inflation, and the lack of safe, affordable and culturally representative housing options for urban Indigenous seniors.

Institutional systems, including the historical trauma of residential schools and restrictive modern housing policies (for example, prohibiting overnight guests), continue to displace Indigenous seniors from their families and communities, creating significant barriers to accessing necessary resources.

Moving toward dignity and justice

We believe that housing policy must prioritize Indigenous leadership in design, construction, ownership and governance. Housing programs should also be connected with stable and publicly funded supports for health, income and community well-being, shifting away from short-term or symbolic solutions toward lasting and transformative change.

In light of Minosin Kikiwa, we call for governments and housing providers to help ensure affordability while centring Indigenous values and leadership. Affordability should extend beyond just subsidies to building and sustaining safe, accessible and culturally relevant housing.

Housing for Indigenous older adults must transcend basic shelter to become a sanctuary of dignity and cultural sovereignty, a place where ceremonies, traditional foods and the passing of sacred knowledge are protected, not prohibited. This is no longer merely a policy suggestion, it is a fundamental requirement of reconciliation to ensure that aging in community is a right, not a privilege, for Indigenous seniors.

Hai Luo receives funding from the Manitoba Research Alliance’s Partnership Grant (SSHRC) - Community-Driven Solutions to Poverty: Challenges and Possibilities and the Winnipeg Friendship Centre. She is affiliated with Indigenous Seniors Research Committee of Winnipeg and Centre on Aging, University of Manitoba.

Laura Funk has received past funding for research, from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada and similar agencies. She is affiliated with the University of Manitoba and is a board member of the community-based Manitoba Seniors Equity Action Coalition.

Malcolm Disbrowe received funding from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council. He is affiliated with the College of Community and Global Health at the University of Manitoba and First Nations Health and Social Secretariat of Manitoba.

Increasing math scores: Why Ontario needs early numeracy screening

2026-02-03T21:55:57Z

Ontario’s 2024-25 Education Quality and Accountability Office (EQAO) standardized test results were recently released, and almost half (49 per cent) of Grade 6 students in English-language schools didn’t meet the provincial standard in mathematics.

These unsatisfactory results should not come as a surprise, and they cannot be attributed to lost time during COVID-19.

Ontario students have been struggling in math for many years. For instance, in 2018-19 and 2015-16, respectively, 52 per cent and 50 per cent of Grade 6 students failed to meet the provincial standard. What can be done to change this situation?

Setting stronger foundations in early math

We know from research in mathematical cognition that children’s early number knowledge (for example, at four-and-a-half years old) predicts their mathematical achievement later in school.

Because later learned skills build on earlier ones, kids who fall behind early may never catch up. Just as children need to get comfortable putting their face in the water before they can learn the front crawl, they need to become proficient with counting before they can learn addition and subtraction.

The best ways to support math learning are to:

Provide lessons with clear skill progressions;
Conduct regular assessments so teachers know what their students are learning; and
Ensure that students get plenty of targeted practice on skills they have not yet mastered.

We should equip our students with solid foundational numeracy skills in the early years and check that they are on track before the first EQAO tests in Grade 3.

Roots of the problem, solutions

Clearly, policy initiatives like the $60 million “renewed math strategy”, making new teachers pass a math test and the “back to the basics” math curriculum, have done little to improve low math achievement.

The skills that children learn later are scaffolded upon earlier learning. (Allison Shelley/The Verbatim Agency for EDUimages), CC BY-NC

After the 2024-25 results were announced, the Elementary Teachers’ Federation of Ontario released a statement calling for EQAO funding to be redirected to classrooms, saying “EQAO assessments shift accountability from the government’s chronic underfunding of public education to educators.”

The province agrees that math scores are too low. In the aftermath of the results release, Ontario Education Minister Paul Calandra held a news conference to say the results weren’t “good enough.” He announced the formation of a two-person advisory committee to review the situation and provide “practical recommendations that we can put into action.”

Early universal numeracy screening

As researchers studying mathematical cognition and learning, we have an evidence-based recommendation to help improve children’s math scores: schools should use universal screening to identify and track students’ numeracy learning much earlier than Grade 3 (when the first EQAO tests are given).

Screeners that assess foundational numeracy skills and other forms of assessment are critical for evaluating gaps in students’ numerical knowledge and providing them with targeted supports before they start to fall behind.

Instead of waiting for provincial results at the end of Grade 3 to identify struggling learners, we need to equip students with necessary skills and knowledge earlier.

Measuring foundational skills is critical for mathematics because more advanced skills like geometry, algebra, calculus require students to have fluent access to foundational knowledge. For example, fluent division skills support converting fractions to decimals (for instance, one quarter equals 0.25).

More complex skills like fractions are assessed in later grades. (Jimmie Quick/Flickr), CC BY

Extensive store of knowledge needed

Children who lack foundational skills will continue to struggle across grades as the expectations become more advanced. Research has found that kindergarteners with lower counting skills are more likely to under-perform in math in Grade 7. These basic skills have also been linked to other metrics of academic success.

For example, children with strong foundational numerical skills are more likely to take advanced math classes in high school or pursue post-secondary education. Importantly, students who acquire foundational skills also develop more confidence in their mathematics abilities and are less likely to develop math anxiety.

By Grade 6, students need to have acquired a rich and extensive store of knowledge for learning the more complex math required in later grades.

Students who acquire foundational skills develop more confidence in their math abilities. (Bindaas Madhavi/Flickr), CC BY-NC

The right to calculate

Human rights commissions have called for changes in education to ensure the “right to read” is protected for all students, including those with reading disabilities. We believe all students also have a right to high-quality math instruction — the right to calculate.

In efforts to connect math researchers and educators, we established the Assessment and Instruction for Mathematics (AIM) Collective. The AIM Collective is a community of researchers and educators, from universities and school districts across the country, committed to improving early math education in Canada.

Universal screening is one of the topics that AIM members have discussed in depth, because teachers often have mixed reactions to policies on screening.

However, educators we’ve partnered with have found that early math screening is a helpful teaching tool that helps educators target instruction to support children’s math learning.

Reaching full potential in math

Alberta now mandates universal numeracy screening. The Math Lab at Carleton University, where we are engaged in research, was involved in constructing grade-specific numeracy screeners for students in kindergarten to Grade 3 now in use in Alberta as well as other provinces.

Universal literacy screening is already mandated for students in Ontario from senior kindergarten to Grade 2. Initiating early universal numeracy screening is one step towards ensuring Ontario students reach their full potential in math.

Critically, screening must be accompanied by targeted support. Helping students reach their full math potential will contribute to a thriving Ontario.

As such, we call on the government to invest more in numeracy screening and earlier educational supports for struggling students.

Michael Slipenkyj is partly supported by a Mitacs internship with Vretta Inc., a Canadian educational technology company.

Heather P. Douglas has developed an early numeracy screener that is being used in four provinces in Canada. She collaborates with Vretta Inc., an educational technology company on a project to develop a digital version of the early numeracy screener. The project is funded by a Micas Accelerate grant.

Jo-Anne LeFevre has developed an early numeracy screener that is being used in four provinces in Canada. She collaborates with Vretta Inc., an educational technology company on a project to develop a digital version of the early numeracy screener, funded a Mitacs Accelerate grant.

Rebecca Merkley collaborates with Vretta Inc., a Canadian educational technology company. The project is funded by a Mitacs Accelerate grant titled: “A Research-Driven Approach to Assessment in Early Math Education”.

Hey Trump: Here’s how Canada punched above its military weight in Afghanistan — from someone with a front-row seat

2026-02-03T18:46:10Z

“We’ve never needed them. We have never really asked anything of them. You know, they’ll say they sent some troops to Afghanistan, or this or that. And they did — they stayed a little back, a little off the front lines.” So said United States President Donald Trump recently, referring to America’s NATO allies, including Canada.

The comments have provoked outrage. British Prime Minister Keir Starmer called them “frankly appalling,” especially the insinuation that soldiers from other NATO states avoided the front lines in Afghanistan, leaving the most dangerous heavy lifting to American forces.

Anyone moderately familiar with NATO’s involvement in Afghanistan knows Trump’s insult is rubbish — especially when it comes to Canada.

The Canadian Armed Forces were deployed in some of the most dangerous regions and complex situations in Afghanistan for more than a decade, paying a heavy price in casualties — the heaviest since the Korean War in the early 1950s, when Canada also supported the American-led war effort and more than 500 Canadians died doing so.

What is less commented upon is Trump’s claim: “We’ve never needed them. We have never really asked anything of them.” This, too, is rubbish as far as Canada is concerned.

A front-row seat to Rumsfeld’s request

Twenty-three years ago, in fact, the U.S. asked Canada for something substantive and specific in Afghanistan. And Canada delivered substantively.

The ask came from U.S. President George W. Bush’s secretary of defense, the late Donald Rumsfeld, in January 2003. Famous for being sharp and precise with language, Rumsfeld invited Canada’s defence minister at the time, the late John McCallum, to the Pentagon to make a request.

I was in the room that day, and I heard the ask from Rumsfeld’s own lips (I later wrote about this historic meeting in The Unexpected War: Canada in Kandahar in 2007 and again in 2025 in Chretien and the World: Canadian Foreign Policy from 1993-2003.)

Rumsfeld asked Canada to lead the International Security Assistance Force (ISAF), a multi-national stabilization mission then confined to Kabul, the war-torn capital city of Afghanistan. Rumsfeld’s request was an extremely significant one for Canada to digest. It meant providing the largest contingent of troops — about 2,200 — as well as a brigade headquarters and command of the operation.

Rumsfeld emphasized how critical the leadership of that mission was from his perspective, and how in his view Canada was better suited to take on the role than any other American ally. Gen. Richard Meyers, chairman of the U.S. Joint Chiefs of Staff at the time, was also present at the meeting and reinforced Rumsfeld’s point that ISAF was key to the Kabul region and Canada was the preferred nation to lead it.

American forces, the defense secretary argued, needed Canada to stabilize Kabul, which was awash in war lords and militia and had no real functioning government at that point.

American forces, meantime, would be otherwise engaged in the invasion of Iraq (which began a few weeks later) and holding the line in southern Afghanistan, where U.S. troops were concentrated.

The Canadian military was needed to hold Kabul together and pave the way for scheduled Afghan elections in 2004, Rumsfeld said. Kabul was an extremely important and vulnerable flank in the American war effort, and Rumsfeld needed Canada to cover that flank.

Canada answered the call

The U.S. needed Canada. The American military needed the Canadian Armed Forces. So Rumsfeld asked Canada for help. Following that meeting, McCallum returned to Ottawa and dutifully presented Rumsfeld’s ask to then Foreign Affairs Minister Bill Graham, Prime Minister Jean Chretien, Canada’s military leadership and ultimately the federal cabinet.

It was not an easy ask for Canada to fulfil in terms of military capability, capacity and risk. Canada had never done anything like this before. It was, therefore, not an easy decision to make for the government of Canada and for the Canadian military to deliver.

But Canada answered the call from its closest ally, giving the U.S. exactly what it asked for and what it needed from Canada. And for the next couple of years, more than 2,000 Canadian Armed Forces soldiers were deployed into the dangers and instability of Kabul in what was known as Operation Athena Phase 1 Kabul, where they acquitted themselves exceptionally well — as Rumsfeld predicted they would. Three Canadian soldiers gave their lives during this phase from 2003 to 2005.

Trump needs to be briefed on Canada’s military heroism before he opens his mouth again on this file. And Americans should understand that in the case of Afghanistan, they needed Canada’s help, their government asked Canada for help — and Canada delivered.

Eugene Lang is affiliated with Canadian Association of Defence and Security Industries

The mental edge that separates elite athletes from the rest

2026-02-03T16:36:32Z

Elite sport often looks like a test of speed, strength and technical skill. Yet some of the most decisive moments in high-level competition unfold too quickly to be explained by physical ability alone.

Consider Canadian hockey superstar Connor McDavid’s overtime goal at the 4 Nations Face-Off against the United States last February. The puck was on his stick for only a fraction of a second, the other team’s defenders were closing in and he still somehow found the one opening no one else saw.

As professional hockey players return to the ice at the Milan-Cortina Olympics, Canadians can expect more moments like this. Increasingly, research suggests these moments are better understood not as just physical feats, but also as cognitive ones.

A growing body of research suggests a group of abilities known as perceptual-cognitive skills are key differentiators. This is the mental capacity to turn a blur of sights, sounds and movements into split-second decisions.

These skills allow elite athletes to scan a chaotic scene, pick out the right cues and act before anyone else sees the opportunity. In short, they don’t just move faster, but they also see smarter.

Connor McDavid Wins 4 Nations Face-Off For Canada In Overtime (Sportsnet)

How athletes manage visual chaos

One way researchers study these abilities is through a task known as multiple-object tracking, which involves keeping tabs on a handful of moving dots on a screen while ignoring the rest. Multiple-object tracking is a core method I use in my own research on visual attention and visual-motor co-ordination.

Multiple-object tracking taxes attention, working memory and the ability to suppress distractions. These are the same cognitive processes athletes rely on to read plays and anticipate movement in real time.

Unsurprisingly, elite athletes reliably outperform non-athletes on this task. After all, reading plays, tracking players and anticipating movement all depend on managing visual chaos.

There is, however, an important caveat. Excelling at multiple-object tracking will not suddenly enable someone to anticipate a play like McDavid or burst past a defender like Marie-Philip Poulin, captain of the Canadian women’s hockey team. Mastering one narrow skill doesn’t always transfer to real-world performance. Researchers often describe this limitation as the “curse of specificity.”

This limitation raises a deeper question about where athletes’ mental edge actually comes from. Are people with exceptional perceptual-cognitive abilities drawn to fast-paced sports, or do years of experience sharpen it over time?

Evidence suggests the answer is likely both.

Born with it or trained over time?

Elite athletes, radar operators and even action video game players — all groups that routinely track dynamic, rapidly changing scenes — consistently outperform novices on perceptual-cognitive tasks.

At the same time, they also tend to learn these tasks faster, pointing to the potential role of experience in refining these abilities.

What seems to distinguish elite performers is not necessarily that they take in more information, but that they extract the most relevant information faster. This efficiency may ease their mental load, allowing them to make smarter, faster decisions under pressure.

My research at McMaster University seeks to solve this puzzle by understanding the perceptual-cognitive skills that are key differentiators in sport, and how to best enhance them.

This uncertainty around how to best improve perceptual-cognitive skills is also why we should be cautious about so-called “brain training” programs that promise to boost focus, awareness or reaction time.

The marketing is often compelling, but the evidence for broad, real-world benefits is far less clear. The value of perceptual-cognitive training hasn’t been disproven, but it hasn’t been tested rigorously enough in real athletic settings to provide compelling evidence. To date, though, tasks that include a perceptual element such as multiple-object tracking show the most promise.

Training perceptual-cognitive skills

Researchers and practitioners still lack clear answers about the best ways to train perceptual-cognitive skills, or how to ensure that gains in one context carry over to another. This doesn’t mean cognitive training is futile, but it does mean we need to be precise and evidence-driven about how we approach it.

Research does, however, point to several factors that increase the likelihood of real-world transfer.

Training is more effective when it combines high cognitive and motor demands, requiring rapid decisions under physical pressure, rather than isolated mental drills. Exposure to diverse stimuli matters as well, as it results in a brain that can adapt, not just repeat. Finally, training environments that closely resemble the game itself are more likely to produce skills that persist beyond the training session.

The challenge now is translating these insights from the laboratory into practical training environments. Before investing heavily in new perceptual-cognitive training tools, coaches and athletes need to understand what’s genuinely effective and what’s just a high-tech placebo.

For now, this means treating perceptual-cognitive training as a complement to sport-specific training, not as a substitute. Insights will also come from closer collaborations between researchers, athletes and coaches.

There is however, support for incorporating perceptual-cognitive tasks as an assessment of “game sense” to inform scouting decisions.

The real secret to seeing the game differently, then, is not just bigger muscles or faster reflexes. It’s a sharper mind, and understanding how it works could change how we think about performance, both on and off the ice.

Mallory Terry does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

Lessons from the sea: Nature shows us how to get ‘forever chemicals’ out of batteries

2026-02-03T15:21:42Z

As the world races to electrify everything from cars to cities, the demand for high-performance, long-lasting batteries is soaring. But the uncomfortable truth is this: many of the batteries powering our “green” technologies aren’t as green as we might think.

Most commercial batteries rely on fluorinated polymer binders to hold them together, such as polyvinylidene fluoride. These materials perform well — they’re chemically stable, resistant to heat and very durable. But they come with a hidden environmental price.

Fluorinated polymers are derived from fluorine-containing chemicals that don’t easily degrade, releasing persistent pollutants called PFAS (per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances) during their production and disposal. Once they enter the environment, PFAS can remain in water, soil and even human tissue for hundreds of years, earning them the nickname “forever chemicals.”

We’ve justified their use because they increase the lifespan and performance of batteries. But if the clean energy transition relies on materials that pollute, degrade ecosystems and persist in the environment for years, is it really sustainable?

As a graduate student, I spent years thinking about how to make batteries cleaner — not just in how they operate, but in how they’re made. That search led me somewhere unexpected: the ocean.

Why binders are important

Most commercial batteries rely on fluorinated polymer binders to hold them together. These materials perform well but come with an environmental cost. (Unsplash/CHUTTERSNAP)

Every rechargeable battery has three essential components: two electrodes separated by a liquid electrolyte that allows charged atoms (ions) to flow between them. When you charge a battery, the ions move from one electrode to the other, storing energy.

When you use the battery, the charged atoms flow back to their original side, releasing that stored energy to power your phone, car or the grid.

Each electrode is a mixture of three parts: an active material that stores and releases energy, a conductive additive that helps electrons move and a binder that holds everything together.

The binder acts like glue, keeping particles in place and preventing them from dissolving during use. Without it, a battery would be unable to hold a charge after only a few uses.

Lessons from the sea

Many marine organisms have evolved in remarkable ways to attach themselves to wet, slippery surfaces. Mussels, barnacles, sandcastle worms and octopuses produce natural adhesives to stick to rocks, ship hulls and coral in turbulent water — conditions that would defeat most synthetic glues.

For mussels, the secret lies in molecules called catechols. These molecules contain a unique amino acid in their sticky proteins that helps them form strong bonds with surfaces and hardens almost instantly when exposed to oxygen. This chemistry has already inspired synthetic adhesives used to seal wounds, repair tendons and create coatings that stick to metal or glass underwater.

Building on this idea, I began exploring a related molecule called gallol. Like catechol in mussels, gallol is used by marine plants and algae to cling to wet surfaces. Its chemical structure is very similar to catechol, but it contains an extra functional group that makes it even more adhesive and versatile. It can form multiple types of strong, durable and reversible bonds — properties that make it an excellent battery binder.

Mussels use molecules called catechols to stick to surfaces. (Unsplash/Manu Mateo)

A greener solution

Working with Prof. Dwight S. Seferos at the University of Toronto, we developed a polymer binder based on gallol chemistry and paired it with zinc, a safer and more abundant metal than lithium. Unlike lithium, zinc is non-flammable and easier to source sustainably, making it ideal for large-scale applications.

The results were remarkable. Our gallol-based zinc batteries maintained 52 per cent higher energy efficiency after 8,000 charge-discharge cycles compared to conventional batteries that use fluorinated binders. In practical terms, that means longer-lasting devices, fewer replacements and a smaller environmental footprint.

Our findings are proof that performance and sustainability can go hand-in-hand. Many in industry might still view “green” and “effective” as competing priorities, with sustainability an afterthought. That logic is backwards.

We can’t build a truly clean energy future using polluting materials. For too long, the battery industry has focused on performance at any cost, even if that cost includes toxic waste, hard-to-recycle materials and unsustainable and unethical mining practices. The next generation of technologies must be sustainable by design, built from sources are renewable, biodegradable and circular.

Nature has been running efficient, self-renewing systems for billions of years. Mussels, shellfish and seaweeds build materials that are strong, flexible and biodegradable. No waste and no forever chemicals. It’s time we started paying attention.

The ocean holds more than beauty and biodiversity; it may also hold the blueprint for the future of energy storage. But realizing that future requires a cultural shift in science, one that rewards innovation that heals, not just innovation that performs.

We don’t need to sacrifice progress to protect the planet. We just need to design with the planet in mind.

This research was supported by the National Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada, the Canadian Foundation for Innovation, and the Ontario Research Fund. Alicia M. Battaglia received funding from the Ontario Graduate Scholarship Program.

Why Canada must step up to protect children in a period of global turmoil

2026-02-03T15:16:03Z

Over half a billion children are now living in conflict zones, according to a 2025 Save the Children report, and the world is turning its back on them.

At a time of unprecedented global insecurity, funding and resources to care for, protect and engage with children affected by armed violence continue to decline.

The Donald Trump administration’s recent announcement of unprecedented American cuts to funding for international organizations — including reductions to the United Nations Offices of the Special Representatives of the Secretary-General for Children in Armed Conflict and on Violence Against Children — further undermines an already fragile system.

Cuts like these can have a devastating effect on some of the world’s most vulnerable populations, undermining important work to identify and prevent violations against children, and to assist children in rebuilding their lives in the aftermath of violence. Canada cannot sit on the sidelines.

Preventing violence against children

Violence against children is a global crisis. Without a seismic shift in how states take action to prevent such violence, the costs will continue to impact people around the world.

As a global community, we have a collective responsibility to build communities where children are not only safe and thriving, but where their capacity and agency as future peace-builders, leaders and decision-makers in their families, schools and communities are built upon and nurtured in wartime and post-conflict societies. These are core responsibilities that the global community is failing at miserably.

As many as 520 million war-affected children deserve better.

Canada has a long history of serving as a champion of children’s rights in armed conflict. Canadians have led global initiatives, including leading the first International Conference on War-affected Children, championing the Ottawa Treaty to ban landmines and developing the Vancouver Principles on Peacekeeping and Preventing the Recruitment and Use of Child Soldiers .

Canada is also the founder and chair of the Group of Friends of Children and Armed Conflict, an informal but vital UN network focused on child protection.

Now more than ever — amid American economic and political disengagement from core child protection priorities — there is both an opportunity and an imperative for Canada to demonstrate active leadership in the promotion of children’s rights and enhanced safety for children impacted by the devastation of armed conflict.

Complacency threatens to perpetuate generational impacts of violence.

Global leadership required

The Canadian government must once again stand up and provide global leadership on children and armed conflict by bolstering strategic alliances and funding efforts to protect and engage children impacted by armed conflict.

As a community of Canadian scholars dedicated to studying children, organized violence and armed conflict, we are deeply concerned about the growing vulnerability of children worldwide.

We see an opportunity for Canada to reclaim its role as a global leader in advancing and protecting children’s rights, especially in a time of political upheaval and heightened global insecurity. Canada can reassert itself and live up to its global reputation as a force for good in the world. It can stand on the global stage and draw attention to a crisis with generational impacts.

Children need protection from the effects of war, but they also need to be seen as active agents of peace who understand their needs and can help secure better futures.

Investments of attention and funding today can make significant differences in the emotional and social development of children who are navigating post-conflict life.

Canada must take the lead

These investments are critical to the social structures of peaceful communities. Canadian leadership is well-positioned to take on this role, not only because of the country’s history and reputation, but because Canadian scholars are at the forefront, are organized around this issue and can be leveraged for maximum impact.

Prime Minister Mark Carney’s recent celebrated speech at the World Economic Forum’s annual conference at Davos signalled a possible and important shift in alliances, priorities and global moral leadership for Canada.

Canadian foreign policy can build upon this. Making the vulnerability of children affected by armed conflict and the capacity of children to be agents of peace a key foreign policy issue would positively affect the lives of millions of children globally. It would also signal to the world that Canada is ready to take on the significant global human rights challenges it once did.

The following scholars, members of The Canadian Community of Practice on Children and Organized Violence & Armed Conflict, contributed to this article: Maham Afzaal, PhD Student, Queens University; Dr. Marshall Beier, McMaster University; Sophie Greco, PhD Candidate, Wilfrid Laurier University; Ethan Kelloway, Honours Student, Mount Saint Vincent University; Dr. Marion Laurence, Dalhousie University; Dr. Kate Swanson, Dalhousie University; Orinari Wokoma, MA student, Mount Saint Vincent University.

Catherine Baillie Abidi receives funding from Social Science and Humanities Research Council of Canada.

Izabela Steflja receives funding from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada.

Kirsten J. Fisher receives funding from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada.

Myriam Denov receives funding from the Social Science and Humanities Research Council of Canada, and the Canada Research Chair Program.

Here are Canada’s 2026 Winter Olympic medal hopefuls, from hockey to freestyle skiing

2026-02-02T20:03:14Z

Game Plan. Best Ever ‘88. Own the Podium. The messaging from the Canadian government’s Olympic high-performance sport initiatives over the past 50 years makes the stakes clear: winning is important.

Gone are the days of Canadian athletes being satisfied with simply making it to the Olympics. An expectation of excellence now pervades the Olympic program. Athletes are considered ambassadors of their countries and symbols of national pride.

This year in Italy, that expectation will be front and centre amid recent geopolitical tensions. It’s no wonder the new slogan is one that evokes unity and patriotism: “We Are All Team Canada.”

While there is little doubt that all Olympic athletes are expected to play and perform under pressure, Canada’s historical successes at the Winter Games have created heightened expectations. The country set a record for the most gold medals won by a host nation at a single Winter Olympics with 14 in Vancouver in 2010.

When I ask my undergraduate students which Canadian athletes they believe feel the most pressure to win gold at the Olympics, most say hockey, though that may be too simple an answer.

Curling hopefuls

It is certainly true that Canadians expect strong results from men’s and women’s hockey teams, and for good reason. Canada is the most successful ice hockey nation in Olympic history, with 23 medal wins.

Yet many Canadian hockey fans recognize the strength of other hockey nations. Canadians both love and loathe the Swedes, Finns, Slovaks, Czechs and Americans that play for their National Hockey League teams. A loss to those players and those teams is devastating, but explicable.

Curling presents a different story. Here, expectations are clear: gold medals. Casual Olympic viewers may not realize that Scots and Swiss make up the top-three men’s curling rinks in the world, and the Swiss women have won two of the last four World Championships.

That said, Canada’s teams are formidable. The men’s rink, led by Brad Jacobs, won gold in 2014 in Sochi, and the women’s rink, led by Rachel Homan, is currently ranked No. 1 in the world. Far from a golden fait accompli, Canada’s curlers are among the most heavily scrutinized athletes heading to Milan Cortina.

Speed skating hopefuls

Canada has realistic medal potential in both short-track and long-track speed skating. Laurent Dubreuil is a defending silver medallist in the 1000m and finished fourth in the 500m in Beijing 2022.

Ivanie Blondin and Isabelle Weidemann are members of the defending gold medallist Team Pursuit team and silver medallists in other distances. The Team Pursuit event is among the most exciting long-track events at the Olympics and certainly worth circling on the viewing calendar.

On short track, the location of some of the highest drama and most intense finishes at every Olympics, Canada has some serious medal potential with a full complement of 10 skaters headed to Milan.

The women’s team features four-time Olympic medallist Kim Boutin, who will compete at her third consecutive Olympic Winter Games. Boutin received medals in all three women’s individual events at PyeongChang 2018 and later added bronze in the 500m at Beijing 2022. Over the past decade, she has earned 17 medals at the ISU World Short Track Championships and two more world titles at the 2025 Championships, winning gold in the women’s 3000m relay and the mixed relay.

Freestyle skiing hopefuls

Many Canadians might assume speed skating has produced the most medals for Canada over the years. Speed skating accounts for 23 total events between short and long-track at this year’s Olympics, and Canada won their first speed skating medal in 1932.

However, despite it only being added as a full medal sport in 1992, Canada has won 30 total medals in a different sport, including the distinction of Canada’s first home gold medal won by Alexandre Bilodeau in 2010: freestyle skiing.

Equal parts agility and artistry, freestyle skiing is definitely one of Games’ most beguiling and exhilarating watches.

Comprised of eight separate disciplines, Canada has numerous medal threats, headlined by “greatest mogul skiier of all time” Mikaël Kingsbury, fresh off of a Jan. 10 victory in men’s moguls at Val St. Côme, marking a staggering 100 career World Cup victories for the skier.

And then, there’s hockey.

Ice hockey hopefuls

The centre of the women’s hockey is a binary system: two stars bound together, their combined gravity ordering the remaining planets, paling in size and importance to their suns.

This year marks a new era, as professional women’s players will compete for the first time at the Olympics, following the establishment of the Professional Women’s Hockey League.

Since 1990, only one team other than Canada and the U.S. — Finland in 2019 — has reached the Ice Hockey World Championships gold medal game. Canada won bronze that year.

Gold medallists in five of seven previous Olympics, the Canadian women’s team enters as a slight underdog this year, with Team USA defending their World Champion title.

Given the storied history of these two teams and the heightened tension currently between the two nations, their matchup will assuredly be among the most exciting 60 minutes played this year.

On the men’s side, a long, protracted wait is over: NHL players return to the Olympics. Canadian captain Sidney Crosby will be aiming for his third Olympic gold.

Alongside the return of pro talent comes a familiar source of tension for Canadian hockey fans: consternation around goaltending.

Canada remains one of the tournament’s favourites, shimmering with a galaxy of superstars on forward and defence, yet persistent concerns over net-minding continue to fuel doubt among some fans.

No shortage of Olympic hopefuls

There are many more medal hopefuls for Team Canada heading into Milan Cortina, from alpine skiiers and ski cross athletes to snowboarding, figure skating and freestyle skiing.

But simply taking in the Games when possible can be a rewarding experience in and of itself.

While cynicism and skepticism towards the International Olympic Committee and Olympic movement are certainly warranted, the Winter Olympics will provide the opportunity for Canadian athletes to achieve global sporting excellence.

While we know that pressure creates diamonds, these athletes may soon prove that it can produce gold, too.

Taylor McKee receives funding from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada

Tariffs are reshaping Canadian manufacturing, but not all workers are being impacted the same way

2026-02-02T19:08:28Z

American tariffs have reshaped Canada’s manufacturing sector, but labour-market impacts have not been evenly shared across workers.

The United States imposed tariffs on Canadian steel, aluminum, automobiles and auto parts as part of a broader protectionist push under Donald Trump’s administration. Canada’s government responded with its own counter-tariffs and trade measures, but disruptions to the industry were already underway by that point.

Manufacturing is a major source of employment for both immigrant and Canadian-born workers. It includes everything from automotive and aerospace parts to food processing and steel products, and it contributes roughly 10 per cent of Canada’s GDP.

Manufacturing is particularly vulnerable to U.S. tariffs because of its deep integration with cross-border supply chains. More than 60 per cent of Canada’s manufacturing sector has substantial trade exposure to the U.S., making it the primary channel through which tariffs affect the Canadian economy.

As firms adjusted to rising costs and trade uncertainty, immigrant and Canadian-born workers experienced different forms of employment risk at different points in 2025.

A sector under strain

A recent report shows that between January and September 2025, Canada’s manufacturing sector experienced lower production, fewer jobs and higher prices.

After momentum earlier in the year, manufacturing jobs fell sharply in the spring, with the largest consecutive job losses occurring in April, when 30,600 jobs were lost, and May, when a further 12,200 jobs disappeared. Overall, employment fell by nearly 43,000 workers between March and May.

This was followed by persistent instability rather than sustained recovery later in the year. Employment rebounded in September, with 27,800 jobs gained, and rose again in October, but these gains were partially reversed in November, when 9,300 jobs were lost.

Firms responded to the tariff shocks through delayed and incremental employment cuts, but these sector-wide adjustments were experienced differently by immigrant and Canadian-born workers.

Immigrant workers are more vulnerable

Not all workers felt the shocks from the labour market equally. Immigrant workers were disproportionately affected by tariff-related employment adjustments and are particularly vulnerable when manufacturing employment becomes unstable.

Manufacturing is a critical source of employment for immigrants, particularly in large metropolitan regions and along industrial corridors.

In March 2025, immigrants accounted for 30 per cent of employment in Canada’s manufacturing sector, compared with 70 per cent of Canadian-born workers. By December 2025, however, the immigrant share had declined to 28 per cent, while the share of Canadian-born workers increased to 72 per cent.

This disparity was compounded by a structural educational mismatch. While 80 per cent of workers in the sector don’t have a university degree, immigrant workers were more than twice as likely as Canadian-born workers to be university educated.

Nevertheless, these higher education levels often do not translate into higher-paid roles within manufacturing.

Lower wages amplify employment risk

Wage data shows that many immigrant manufacturing workers are concentrated in lower-paid or more labour-intensive jobs that are particularly vulnerable during an economic downturn.

Throughout 2025, immigrant workers earned roughly $2.50 to $3 less per hour than Canadian-born workers. This gap did not narrow even when wages recovered later in the year.

Average hourly wages for all workers increased from $34.43 in March to $35.29 in December. Yet the wage gap for immigrant workers widened slightly — from $2.52 to $2.56.

Lower pay combined with higher educational attainment points to persistent credential under-utilization, meaning workers possess skills or qualifications that are not fully used or rewarded in their jobs. This under-utilization increases immigrant workers’ exposure to employment instability when trade disruptions occur.

How job loss patterns shifted

Job loss also unfolded differently over time. In the first half of 2025, unemployed former workers who were immigrants were more likely to report layoffs — temporary or permanent — as the cause of their joblessness.

That share remained consistently high — at 66 per cent in June — before gradually declining later in the year. By December, 51 per cent of immigrant former workers reported job loss as the reason for unemployment.

In contrast, job loss became increasingly concentrated among Canadian-born workers in the second half of the year. In March, only 53 per cent reported job loss as the reason for unemployment. This share rose steadily throughout the rest of the year, reaching 71 per cent by December.

These trends indicate that firms initially relied more heavily on reductions in immigrant labour, and later expanded layoffs to include Canadian-born workers as tariff pressures persisted.

Differential adjustment strategies

U.S. tariffs reshaped Canadian manufacturing not through a single employment shock, but through different labour-adjustment strategies over time.

Highly educated immigrant workers, many of whom were concentrated in lower-paid roles, were more exposed to early layoffs, wage penalties and unstable employment. As tariff pressures deepened, job loss became more concentrated among Canadian-born workers as longer-term restructuring took place.

These patterns matter for policy. If manufacturing is to remain a viable pillar of the Canadian economy in an era of trade disruption, policy responses must recognize these unequal adjustment patterns and address the underlying vulnerabilities that leave some workers more exposed than others.

This could include targeted income supports and rapid-response training for displaced workers, and tailored settlement and employment services for immigrant workers who, as a group, are concentrated in lower-wage and more unstable jobs.

In addition, better co-ordination between trade, industrial, and immigration policies could help ensure that adjustment costs are not disproportionately borne by already vulnerable workers.

Marshia Akbar receives funding from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada (SSHRC).

Devaanshi Khanzode does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

Canada should be wary of embracing ‘total national defence’ to ward off an American invasion

2026-02-02T17:21:14Z

As the Donald Trump administration in the United States continues to threaten Canadian sovereignty — including a recent suggestion that Alberta could secede from Canada and join the U.S. — Canadians, like many others in the world, finds themselves in a period of extreme uncertainty.

Trump’s continued violations of the rules-based international order means Canada can no longer rely on its partners to the same extent as it has in the past.

The world must, as Prime Minister Mark Carney recently noted, accept the current climate as it is, rather than looking to the past.

To do so, Canada must develop a defence policy that can meet the country’s needs. The Canadian government’s recent budget envisions a significant increase in defence spending over the next several years. The problem Canada faces, however, is one that all middle powers face: an inability to compete with great powers in a conventional war.

The Canadian government must therefore pursue non-conventional means to overcome conventional weakness. Simultaneously, the country must be cognizant of the implications of alternative defence policies. The former Yugoslavia provides a harrowing example.

How to ward off an invasion

The turmoil created by the mercurial American president has caused Canada to examine how it could resist a U.S. invasion in a series of war games. Inevitably, Canada was unable to defeat the U.S. in these exercises, and was forced to rely on unconventional warfare.

One way Canada is considering addressing this issue is by creating a civilian defence force and incorporating “total national defence” principles. This development is not completely new; Canada has been considering it for some time.

Total national defence in theory

Total national defence is not a new concept. After the Second World War, it became clear to many medium-sized countries that they could not compete with the great powers in a conventional war.

In the 1950s, Yugoslavia spent 22 per cent of its GDP on defence, yet still recognized it was unlikely to defeat a great power in a conventional war. Yugoslavia, and other countries, needed an alternative. Enter total national defence.

The concept of total national defence seeks to mobilize all aspects of society for the war effort. Given the uniqueness of each country, no country’s total national defence system looks the same as the other. What’s important for Canada’s examination, however, is the command-and-control elements of the system.

The biggest vulnerability is the enemy eliminating their command-and-control functions early in the conflict. The U.S., as seen in Iraq in 1991, excels at these types of operations. Russia, while not as effective, attempted to do the same against Ukraine in the early phases of its full-fledged invasion.

For a smaller country to survive such an attack, it needs to ensure that resistance can continue regardless if centralized command is compromised.

Under the theory of total national defence, countries decentralize command and control functions to prevent them being eliminated.

The extent to which countries do so varies. Individual units may operate at the local level without centralized guidance to maintain the struggle against an opponent. In short, even if an opponent succeeds in eliminating the central command of a state, its army and people can continue the struggle.

Canada’s chosen example: Finland

Canada, as it considers implementing such a policy, has looked to Finland for inspiration. Prior to joining NATO, Finland was a relatively small country that could not rely upon allies for defence.

What Canadian officials found in Finland impressed them. Finnish officials have long relied upon extensive joint-use facilities, such as bunkers. It also uses conscription to maintain a strong deterrent.

But Canada and Finland are fundamentally different countries. The persistent threat of Russian invasion has, over time, normalized policies like conscription among the Finnish. Furthermore, and most critically, Finland is, unlike Canada, a unitary state and not a federation.

Canada’s worst-case scenario: Yugoslavia

Much like the former Yugoslavia, Canada is a federation. It has stark regional differences, both in terms of culture and economics.

The divisions in Canada aren’t as entrenched as those in Yugoslavia in the 1980s. Nevertheless, as CSIS recently warned Parliament, the divides are real and outside forces could magnify and exploit them.

U.S. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent’s recent encouragement of Albertan separatism, and Albertan separatist meetings with Trump officials, are examples of how foreign entities can magnify these divides.

Yugoslavia’s embrace of total national defence relied on the unity of the people to overcome the weaknesses of a decentralized command structure. Without it, not only would the effectiveness of such a defence have been compromised but, more worryingly, separatist forces could have used such decentralized forces for their own purposes.

In fact, separatists did so , using these decentralized defence forces for their own purposes against Yugoslavia. That helped fuel the former country’s conflicts and ultimate dissolution in the 1990s.

Learning from the past

But just because Yugoslavia’s embrace of total national defence and a civilian defence force helped facilitate the breakup of the country doesn’t mean that will happen to Canada. Too often, people assume that history is repetitive.

Instead, the past is an inventory of ideas. Yugoslavia’s embrace of total national defence failed, but Canada can learn lessons about what worked and what will not in a federation, and in doing so improve its own capabilities.

Canada is wise to pursue non-conventional defence strategies. The country, and its defence planners, however, must ensure they’re drawing from the right examples.

James Horncastle does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

Addressing climate change without the ‘rules-based order’

2026-02-02T17:12:00Z

At the recent World Economic Forum in Switzerland, Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney proclaimed “a rupture” in the global “rules-based order” and a turn to great power rivalry.

While its demise is not certain, even the current disruption to global order, largely due to the Donald Trump administration in the United States, promises profound impacts on the global response to climate change. The world is at risk of losing even the insufficient progress made in the last decade.

But it’s unclear what that effect will be. That uncertainty is both a cause for concern and a source of hope. The climate crisis is not slowing, and humanity must figure out how to navigate the disruption.

Unfortunately, much of what we know about how climate politics works has depended on a relatively stable rules-based order. That order, however problematic, provided institutions like the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change and the Paris Agreement.

It also established trade rules for energy technology, co-operative agreements on public and private climate finance, and parameters for how civil society and states interact. It structured the opportunities and obstacles for acting on climate change.

Everyone who cares about climate action must now grapple with how climate politics can function in a new world of uncertainty. It won’t be easy.

But, to inject a slight note of hope, I’m not convinced that meeting the climate challenge is harder now. It’s difficult in a different way. Let’s be clear: the rules-based order was not producing effective global co-operation on climate change.

Limited successes of the rules-based order

Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney’s speech in Davos where he noted the ‘rupture’ in the global rules-based order.(The Journal)

The U.S. has consistently been an obstacle to global climate action. As Carney noted, under the the rules-based order “the strongest would exempt themselves when convenient.” Clearly the U.S. decided from very early on that a stable climate was not a public good it was willing to seriously support.

The U.S. failed to see benefits from climate action that outweighed the perception of costs and has consistently been influenced by status quo, fossil-capital economic interests.

That’s not to say there was no progress under the old rules-based system. At least five sources of progress are worth highlighting:

A coalition of the ambitious, mostly anchored in Europe, consistently pushed for action. This coalition stayed in the Kyoto Protocol and took action domestically, moving forward on emissions reductions and globally significant technological innovation.
The changing political economy of renewable energy has drastically decreased the costs of wind and solar power.
The growth of municipal, sub-national and transnational efforts expanded the reach of climate action while also maintaining some momentum in countries, like the U.S., that were reluctant to move aggressively.
Public support and concern over the climate has grown, in part because the increasing impacts of climate change have made it a tangible problem of the present, not future.
There’s now a different global architecture for climate governance with the Paris Agreement — one based on collected national actions rather than global collective action. This new architecture was less vulnerable to the first U.S. withdrawal in 2016.

Possibilities for progress

These sources of past progress on climate action could survive the current disruption and play a role in increasing momentum in the global response to climate change. But uncertainties and questions are more plentiful than answers.

A coalition of the ambitious is clearly what Carney’s speech is seeking to catalyze among middle powers. He was not talking about climate change, but a commitment to climate action could and should be a cornerstone that a new order is built upon. This may even attract one of those competing great powers that he alluded to — China. Will China see climate leadership as a means to enhance its global position?

The political economy of renewable energy has momentum that is at least somewhat insulated from the current disruption. How insulated it remains depends on a number of uncertainties.

What will trade rules and practices look like moving forward? What happens within the fossil-fuel energy sector as the U.S. continues to engage in resource imperialism? How will resource competition and co-operation in the renewables sector (over critical minerals, for example) play out moving forward?

Can experimental efforts be a source of resistance and change within the U.S., especially among individual states? And can they play the same role that they did previously, catalyzing further innovation and public support?

Public support for climate action in this new era will likely vary wildly by country. How will growing dissatisfaction with the status quo play out as it intersects with increasingly severe climate impacts?

This could generate further support for right-wing populism. However, affordability and inequality concerns could also become the foundation for building support for climate action and a just transition.

Does the Paris Agreement survive this? It could become a backbone institution for the coalition of the ambitious. The U.S. is gone, again. Maybe other recalcitrant governments should be sidelined from multilateral climate efforts as well, and those willing to act can proceed.

If full global co-operation around climate change is no longer even a façade of the possible now, then the imperative to bring everyone along at each step in the process may evaporate.

None of the ways forward I’ve laid out here are easy. Even if the positive possibilities materialize, they do not guarantee decarbonization and a just transition that is fast and effective enough to matter; to head off the worst of climate change.

What is clear, though, is that like Carney, climate scholars and activists may need to let the fiction of the global rules-based order go. It was not working either in addressing climate change or enhancing justice. Perhaps its disruption is an opportunity to build better foundations for a just and effective global response to climate change.

Matthew Hoffmann receives funding from Social Science and Humanities Research Council and the Lawson Climate Institute.

ChatGPT is in classrooms. How should educators now assess student learning?

2026-02-02T16:56:17Z

Generative artificial intelligence (GenAI) is now a reality in higher education, with students and professors integrating chatbots into teaching, learning and assessment. But this isn’t just a technical shift; it’s reshaping how students and educators learn and evaluate knowledge.

Our recent qualitative study with 28 educators across Canadian universities and colleges — from librarians to engineering professors — suggests that we have entered a watershed moment in education.

We must grapple with the question: What exactly should be assessed when human cognition can be augmented or simulated by an algorithm?

Research about AI and academic integrity

In our review of 15 years of research that engages how AI affects cheating in education, we found that AI is a double-edged sword for schools.

On one hand, AI tools like online translators and text generators have become so advanced that they can write just like humans. This makes it difficult for teachers to detect cheating. Additionally, these tools can sometimes present fake news as facts or repeat unfair social biases, such as racism and sexism, found in the data used to train them.

On the other hand, the studies we reviewed showed AI can be a legitimate assistant that can make learning more inclusive. For instance, AI can provide support for students with disabilities or help those who are learning an additional language.

Because it’s nearly impossible to block every AI tool, schools should not just focus on catching cheaters. Instead, schools and post-secondary institutions can update their policies and provide better training for both students and teachers. This helps everyone learn how to use technology responsibly while maintaining a high standard of academic integrity.

Participants in our study positioned themselves not as enforcers, but as stewards of learning with integrity.

Their focus was on distinguishing between assistance that supports learning and assistance that substitutes for it. They identified three skill areas where assessment boundaries currently fall: prompting, critical thinking and writing.

Prompting: A legitimate and assessable skill

Participants widely viewed prompting — the ability to formulate clear and purposeful instructions for a chatbot — as a skill they could assess. Effective prompting requires students to break down tasks, understand concepts and communicate precisely.

Several noted that unclear prompts often produce poor outputs, forcing students to reflect on what they are really asking.

Prompting was considered ethical only when used transparently, drawing on one’s own foundational knowledge. Without these conditions, educators feared prompting may drift into over-reliance or uncritical use of AI.

Critical thinking

Educators saw strong potential for AI to support assessing critical thinking. Because chatbots can generate text that sounds plausible but may contain errors, omissions or fabrications, students must evaluate accuracy, coherence and credibility. Participants reported using AI-generated summaries or arguments as prompts for critique, asking students to identify weaknesses or misleading claims.

These activities align with a broader need to prepare students for work in a future where assessing algorithmic information will be a routine task. Several educators argued it would be unethical not to teach students how to interrogate AI-generated content.

Writing: Where boundaries tighten

Writing was the most contested domain. Educators distinguished sharply between brainstorming, editing and composition:

• Brainstorming with AI was acceptable when used as a starting point, as long as students expressed their own ideas and did not substitute AI suggestions for their own thinking.

• Editing with AI (for example, grammar correction) was considered acceptable only after students had produced original text and could evaluate whether AI-generated revisions were appropriate. Although some see AI as a legitimate support for linguistic diversity, as well as helping to level the field for those with disabilities or those who speak English as an additional language, others fear a future of language standardization where the unique, authentic voice of the student is smoothed over by an algorithm.

• Having chatbots draft arguments or prose was implicitly rejected. Participants treated the generative phase of writing as a uniquely human cognitive process that needs to be done by students, not machines.

Educators also cautioned that heavy reliance on AI could tempt students to bypass the “productive struggle” inherent in writing, a struggle that is central to developing original thought.

Our research participants recognized that in a hybrid cognitive future, skills related to AI, together with critical thinking are essential skills for students to be ready for the workforce after graduation.

Living in the post-plagiarism era

The idea of co-writing with GenAI brings us into an post-plagiarism era where AI is integrated into into teaching, learning and communication in a way that challenges us to reconsider our assumptions about authorship and originality.

This does not mean that educators no longer care about plagiarism or academic integrity. Honesty will always be important. Rather, in a post-plagiarism context, we consider that humans and AI co-writing and co-creating does not automatically equate to plagiarism.

Today, AI is disrupting education and although we don’t yet have all the answers, it’s certain that AI is here to stay. Teaching students to co-create with AI is part of learning in a post-plagiarism world.

Design for a socially just future

Valid assessment in the age of AI requires clearly delineating which cognitive processes must remain human and which can be legitimately cognitively offloaded. To ensure higher education remains a space for ethical decision-making especially in terms of teaching, learning and assessment, we propose five design principles, based on our research:

1. Explicit expectations: The educator is responsible for making clear if and how GenAI can be used in a particular assignment. Students must know exactly when and how AI is a partner in their work. Ambiguity can lead to unintentional misconduct, as well as a breakdown in the student-educator relationship.

2. Process over product: By evaluating drafts, annotations and reflections, educators can assess the learning process, rather than just the output, or the product.

3. Design assessment tasks that require human judgment: Tasks requiring high-level evaluation, synthesis and critique of localized contexts are areas where human agency is still important.

4. Developing evaluative judgment: Educators must teach students to be critical consumers of GenAI, capable of identifying its limitations and biases.

5. Preserving student voice: Assessments should foreground how students know what they know, rather than what they know.

Preparing students for a hybrid cognitive future

Educators in this study sought ethical, practical ways to integrate GenAI into assessment. They argued that students must understand both the capabilities and the limitations of GenAI, particularly its tendency to generate errors, oversimplifications or misleading summaries.

In this sense, post-plagiarism is not about crisis, but about rethinking what it means to learn and demonstrate knowledge in a world where human cognition routinely interacts with digital systems.

Universities and colleges now face a choice. They can treat AI as a threat to be managed, or they can treat it as a catalyst for strengthening assessment, integrity and learning. The educators in our study favour the latter.

Sarah Elaine Eaton receives funding from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada and the University of Calgary.

Rahul Kumar has received funding from SSHRC in the past.

Robert Brennan receives funding from the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada (NSERC).

Beatriz Antonieta Moya Figueroa does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

Pierre Poilievre aces leadership review: Why the Conservatives opted to stand by their man

2026-02-01T19:46:45Z

With the support of almost 90 per cent of party delegates, Pierre Poilievre’s Conservative party leadership review results are clear and decisive.

These results not only demonstrate that the party continues to believe that he is their best option to win the next federal election, but that a large majority of Conservatives remain broadly united behind his leadership and message.

Post-election reflection

Poilievre was chosen by 2,500 delegates to the convention who were elected by Conservative party members across the country. The price of a ticket to the Calgary convention for each delegate was $999.

He entered the review following a period of assessment and recovery. As is typical after an election loss, this phase involved internal debate, intense media scrutiny and renewed attention to the leader’s perceived weaknesses.

Critics pointed to a familiar set of concerns: Poilievre’s attack-dog political style, his strained relationship with much of the national media and his perceived alignment with American populism, particularly Donald Trump.

His approach, they argued, had been designed for Justin Trudeau and was less effective against the former prime minister’s replacement, Mark Carney. Polling reinforced the sense of unease. While the Conservative Party continues to be seen as a better economic manager, Poilievre also lags behind Carney in personal popularity.

Organizational concerns also compounded these doubts. Controversies over nomination processes and strained relationships with other Conservative politicians, particularly Ontario Premier Doug Ford, raised questions about party management and coalition-building.

Within conservative intellectual circles, there has also been extensive ideological debate about tone, strategy and the party’s electoral ceiling.

Poilievre, after all, had to win an Alberta by-election after he lost his Ottawa seat in the federal election and has faced high-profile floor crossings over the past several months.

Yet this moment of reflection proved more cathartic than transformative. Much of the criticism levelled against Poilievre by Conservatives proved fleeting, an emotional response to loss rather than a durable movement to replace him. Instead, it reflected a familiar post-election pattern: disappointment amplified by punditry and frustration rather than a genuine collapse of confidence within the party.

Election results

How did Poilievre survive? Likely because the election results themselves were ambiguous. Although the Conservatives failed to form government, they were otherwise successful by many other measures.

They increased their vote share, expanded their support to new voter constituencies — especially young adults and recent immigrants — and demonstrated strength on core issues such as affordability, housing and cost of living. From the conservative perspective, this suggests incompletion — an inability to seal the final deal — rather than total rejection.

With the largest share of the popular vote for any Conservative party in Canada since 1988, the only thing that stood between the party and governing was a few percentage points.

This creates a powerful argument for continuity. Replacing Poilievre would have required the party to gamble that a new leader could quickly unify the coalition, define themselves nationally and outperform an already familiar figure in Carney — all without the benefit of incumbency or clear front-runner status.

Compounding this, of course, was the absence of a clear successor. No alternative candidate commanded widespread loyalty or offered an obviously superior electoral profile. In such circumstances, continuity becomes the least risky option.

The broader political and electoral context also matters. While Carney may be more personally popular than Poilievre, he governs on top of a coalition that is internally complex, undefined and potentially short-lived.

Carney’s electoral success depended heavily on the collapse of the NDP vote and the broader political disruption caused by Trump’s threats to annex Canada. With a new NDP leader, the New Democrats could recover and cut into Liberal margins.

Meanwhile, the government’s more mixed response to issues such as pipeline development, housing and the cost-of-living crisis could push enough voters toward the Conservatives by the next federal election campaign.

Young voters like Poilievre

All this said, however, Poilievre’s support cannot be explained solely by institutional inertia or a lack of alternative leadership candidates. His leadership has and continues to generate genuine enthusiasm among some voters — especially those who are young, recently immigrated or working in trades. This support is fuelled by economic frustration, declining living standards and the sense of a lost promise.

At a moment when centre-right parties elsewhere are struggling with internal upheaval and fragmentation, Poilievre’s Conservative Party has remained cohesive and even expanded by organizing around what former communications director Ben Woodfinden calls the “locked-out:” voters who feel shut out of prosperity amid weak growth and chronic productivity problems.

In this context, Poilievre’s orthodox centre-right agenda — cutting regulatory burdens, boosting competition and removing interprovincial trade barriers — continues to attract broad, cross-class support that transcends cultural and regional divides.

The success of this can be seen from the fact that, throughout his keynote address at the Conservative Party convention, Poilievre’s core message and policy proposals haven’t changed substantively.

But there has been a shift in style. Poilievre has begun to pair his combative style with a more personal, reflective and occasionally vulnerable public persona, an adjustment aimed at consolidating support while expanding appeal among undecided voters.

Finally, although Poilievre’s coalition wasn’t large enough to win the 2025 election, Canadian electoral history suggests that his prospects aren’t bleak. There’s a long history of decisive results or shifts playing out across two electoral successes, as coalitions are consolidated and expanded. Both John Diefenbaker and Stephen Harper, for example, endured defeats before securing durable governing mandates.

By endorsing Poilievre so decisively, Conservatives signalled their belief that he remains on an upward trajectory. The leadership review was less about absolution than affirmation: a collective judgment that the party is closer to power with Poilievre than without him.

Sam Routley does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

Black women’s health-care experiences remain marked by structural racism — here’s how institutions should move forward

2026-02-01T14:18:32Z

Racism has long disrupted relationships, deepened social divisions and hindered collective action on global challenges. While modern societies strive to be just and advocate against social injustices, many still turn away from engaging in conversations surrounding racism, health inequities and racial tensions.

Yet these issues significantly impact health — including the care Black people receive and their health outcomes. Research shows that racism has many long-term effects on health, and is linked to both poorer mental and physical health overall.

Black History Month is an opportunity to reflect critically on the impact of racism in health care and how to address it. As researchers focused on Black women’s acute and critical care experiences, our recent review draws lessons from studies on Black women’s health-care experiences in high-income countries to propose an approach for addressing racism.

The review included 10 studies conducted in the United States between 1987 and 2024. We found that Black women’s experiences in health care continue to be marked by reports of structural racism, microaggressions and persistent mistrust of the care system and care providers. Such experiences reduced the chances for shared decision-making, early detection of health issues, adherence to treatments, pain management and person-centred care.

We revealed that the enduring legacy of racism in medicine contributes to suboptimal communication and poor-quality care for Black women. Some of the women did not receive appropriate followup for diagnostic tests or see a specialist because their physician dismissed their concerns. Most of the women felt invisible because their providers disregarded their concerns. As a result, they felt discouraged from seeking care.

For instance, in one of the studies included in our review, a woman described her experiences of arriving at the emergency department for care. She said:

“As a Black woman I was told that it was a female problem, instead of my heart….The head doctor took a look at me and said, she doesn’t have a heart problem, this is absolutely no heart problem, it’s some kind of female problem. It was in my head.”

Another described feeling dismissed by doctors due to the way she described her pain, stating:

“I called it a wrecking ball pain. That’s what I was experiencing … Then my doctor, who likes to joke about everything, would say ‘Oh! Here’s the lady with the wrecking ball disease.’”

This left the patient feeling like a medical novelty — rather than being seen as a person worthy of respect and care.

Our discussions also identified how some Black adult patients responded to racial tensions and unjust conditions in their care.

When feeling disregarded by clinicians, some people purposefully limited what they shared. Others changed how they spoke to clinicians to fit white-dominated medical culture. Some even disengaged from the care decision-making process entirely — while others chose to advocate for themselves.

Further, if the physician appeared dismissive or disrespectful, some people ignored their medical advice as they felt the doctor didn’t have their best interests at heart. Others became hyper-vigilant against injustices and were likely to interpret subsequent care encounters based on past experiences.

Impact of racism on health care work

Health-care staff are compassionate people who want to provide the best care for patients. But they may not always be sure how to avoid getting it wrong.

Research indicates that nurses worry about getting it wrong and coming across as disrespectful when caring for people from different cultural backgrounds. Likewise, many nurses fear being labelled as racist, as they say it implies they’re a terrible person. Yet many are unwilling to accept personal responsibility for their actions — or inactions — if such a label is given to them.

There’s also a lack of clarity among nurses regarding what constitutes racist practices. This causes them anxiety. Some find it upsetting to think that their actions have been perceived as racist when that wasn’t their intention. Others are hesitant to express their genuine opinions on issues of this nature due to the fear of being called racist.

A separate study on nurse-patient relationships found that racism hinders nurses’ ability to meet a patient’s care needs and threatens patients’ and nurses’ dignity in the care system. Racism from patients also increases nurses’ stress and causes emotional trauma.

Racism in health-care settings continues to have a detrimental effect on the care patients are receiving. It’s clear institutions need to do more to ensure patients aren’t being harmed when receiving care.

Inclusive and nurturing communities

We believe that building inclusive and nurturing communities that counter racism and celebrate our interdependence is how we can move forward and address racism in health care.

Inclusive and nurturing communities equip people to have difficult conversations about race — whether that’s in health care, the classroom, universities, workplaces and neighbourhoods.

This type of community teaches people the importance of listening and engaging authentically and open-mindedly, and of learning about racism through the experiences of others. It doesn’t see people who engage in racist practices as inherently racist — but as people who need more support in recognizing and addressing racism.

In such spaces, every person bears a social responsibility to combat racism in their own ways — whether by fostering conversations about racism in their homes, workplaces or shared community spaces.

We’re hoping to conduct research investigating how such spaces can be built — and how this framework can be used in health-care settings to address the racism patients experience there.

We’re all part of the bigger picture. When we create safe and brave spaces for thinking, analyzing and talking about racial tensions, we’re inviting everyone to authentically participate in problem-solving.

Research shows trust is essential in building strong and productive human relations. So in order to build inclusive and nurturing communities, we need to invest time and effort into restoring the broken trust of racialized communities through accountability, transparency, consistency and genuine efforts to address systemic racism.

Elizabeth Kusi Appiah is affiliated with the GROWW national mentorship program.

Elisavet Papathanasoglou receives funding from Women & Children health Research Institute (WHCRI).

Frustration in hetero relationships has a long history — that’s why today’s crisis looks so familiar

2026-02-01T14:18:00Z

“Many women tell me they want to have a man in their life, but they are no longer willing to be the only person giving in the relationship. They don’t want to be with a man who needs to be taken care of. In that case, it’s easier and more pleasant to be without a man.”

These words speak eerily to the current moment. Yet their date of publication? 1984.

You’ll find them in psychotherapist and acclaimed author Marjorie Hansen Shaevitz’s The Superwoman Syndrome, one of the earliest books to grapple with the superwoman myth — the idea that women can effortlessly balance work and family responsibilities in workplaces not designed to support them. And that any evidence of struggle is interpreted as a personal failing rather than a systemic one.

Despite its articulation of the burdens women face in the formal economy, its solutions to what is now called the the “second shift” involve telling women to make lists and prioritize their responsibilities. These, of course, are hardly the strategies that will move the needle in improving women’s daily lives.

Similar frustrations appear in another influential work from the same period. In a report written by feminist Shere Hite, published in 1987, most American women described feeling frustrated with their relationships.

Ninety-eight per cent reported wanting more verbal closeness with the men they loved: more sharing of thoughts, feelings and plans, and more reciprocal curiosity. Eighty-three per cent reported being the ones to initiate deep conversations with their partners, and 63 per cent reported being met with “great resistance” when trying to get their partner to talk about their feelings.

Though these findings were released decades ago, their relevance raises questions about how much has really changed for women.

The media-fuelled illusion of novelty

Both Hite’s report and Shaevitz’s book were published long before the term “heteropessimism” or the decentring men trend came into vogue. They came out long before any of us were considering where we fell on the “is having a boyfriend embarrassing?” debate. (My take? No relationship status should be slotted hierarchically above or below another).

Yet these publications capture the mood of contemporary heterosexual culture to a tee: women continue to be doing the most emotional, cognitive and unpaid housework and child-care labour, and women continue to be sick and tired of doing it.

News outlets today report on the “great divide” between men and women, particularly among younger generations. They discuss how women are turning to voluntary celibacy and/or rejecting heterosexual dating outright. They frame these trends and attitudes as out of the norm: for the first time, women are opening up about how they feel. But the truth is, these trends are normative and historically patterned.

It seems that women’s frustration — with the unpaid labour they are culturally expected to perform, with the men who won’t share in it, and with the social institutions that fail to support its redistribution — is the heartbeat of history. But it doesn’t need to be so.

Frustration keeps reproducing itself

Unlike what “tradwife” influencers will have you believe, working women are, on average, less depressed and have higher rates of self-esteem than stay-at-home mothers. Yet working mothers still face anxieties and role conflicts.

Where does this anxiety come from? Is it because women are “naturally” suited to the home and therefore ill-equipped for work in the formal economy, as tradwife influencers suggest? Or is it something else?

Looking at the problem from a sociological lens, it’s clear that anxiety results from the structures of paid work (which have not changed, despite women and the demographic composition of the workforce changing) and the distressing (and at times violent) contours of contemporary heterosexual culture, in which men continue to free-ride off women’s unpaid labour.

Anxieties also pervade as many governments fail to mandate paid parental and care leave, workplaces fail to offer family-friendly policies, and the ideology of individualism, in contrast to collectivism and communal care, remains dominant. Above all, anxiety is rife because cultural beliefs about gender, parenthood and work have remained stubbornly resistant to change.

Every few years, a flurry of news articles and social media posts lament women’s unpaid work and individual men are tasked with becoming equal helpers in the home. While individuals have their part to play in facilitating this cultural transformation, sociologists like myself are interested, too, in the role that social institutions, such as work, media and government, play in structuring individual lives.

Why hasn’t change happened yet?

We set ourselves up for failure when we hold individual men responsible but fail to provide them with cultural frameworks of masculinity that laud men’s contributions to housework and child care, and when we fail to vote for (or don’t have the option of voting for) governments that will introduce paid parental leave, regulate corporations to enhance worker power and fund community-building initiatives.

To be sure, frameworks and representations of caring masculinities do exist, but they’re not often shown in mainstream media. This is why the representation of communicative and consensual masculinities that reject male domination in television shows like Ted Lasso, Shrinking and Heated Rivalry matters. They demonstrate to men alternative modes of being, living and relating to others in our world today.

Representation matters, but so does concrete political transformations.

For too long, work and family have been treated as separate domains. Perhaps the solution lies in their convergence: a radical reimagining of how work and parenthood ought to look.

Potential strategies include disrupting gendered occupational segregation, raising the wages of feminized work, decreasing hours of paid work and building a normative definition of masculinity centred around care.

Otherwise, we’re bound to keep having the same conversations, year after year, decade after decade — like we have been.

Meaghan Furlano does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

Epiaceratherium itjilik: The rhino that lived in the Arctic

2026-02-01T14:17:45Z

Paleontologists at the Canadian Museum of Nature have recently been studying the skeletal remains of a rhinoceros. This might not sound remarkable at first, but what makes these remains fascinating is that they were found on Devon Island in the Canadian Arctic.

Today, mammals inhabit nearly every corner of the Earth. In Asia, Europe and North America, mammals arrived via three routes, one over the Bering Strait and two over the North Atlantic.

The Bering Land Bridge is the best known, having enabled the arrival of humans in North America approximately 20,000 years ago and shaped the population genetics of animals such as bears, lions and horses.

Less well known are the two routes that traversed the North Atlantic, one from the Scandinavian Peninsula over Svalbard and Greenland, and another from Scotland over Iceland to Greenland and the Canadian Arctic.

However, it has typically been thought that land animals could not have crossed the North Atlantic by the Early Eocene, a period around 50 million years ago when the Earth’s climate was warmer.

However, the Arctic rhino’s remains provide tantalizing evidence that land mammals were able to traverse the North Atlantic using frozen land bridges much more recently than the Early Eocene.

A rhinoceros in the Arctic

Danielle Fraser explains her team’s research on the Arctic rhinoceros. (Canadian Museum of Nature)

The new species of rhinoceros was discovered from a nearly complete specimen collected from the Haughton Formation of Devon Island in Nunavut — lake sediments formed in an asteroid impact crater that likely date to the Early Miocene, around 23 million years ago.

The sediments of the Haughton Formation preserve plants, mammals and birds, among others. The majority of the rhinoceros was collected in the 1980s by paleontologist Mary Dawson and her team, with additional collections by paleontologists Natalia Rybczynski, Marisa Gilbert and their team in the 2010s.

The rhinoceros lacked a horn, which is common among extinct rhinos. It is remarkable, however, in possessing features of much more ancient forms, like teeth of forms many millions of years older. It also has a fifth toe on the forefoot, which is rare among rhinoceroses.

Anatomical comparison and evolutionary analysis suggest the specimen belongs to an existing genus, Epiaceratherium, found only in Europe and western Asia. In naming the new species, the team consulted with Jarloo Kiguktak, an elder from the nearest Indigenous community to the Haughton Crater, Aujuittuq (Grise Fiord). Together, they named it Epiaceratherium itjilik. Itjilik is an Inuktitut word meaning frost or frosty, an homage to the Arctic setting where the specimen was found.

Most surprisingly, the team’s evolutionary analysis placed E. itjilik closest to the European species of Epiaceratherium. This indicates that its ancestors likely crossed from Europe to North America via the North Atlantic at some point during the late Eocene period around 33-38 million years ago.

Bio-geographic analyses further revealed a surprisingly high number of rhinoceros crossings over the North Atlantic directly between Europe and North America, some in the last 20 million years. While a finding of such a recent crossing via the North Atlantic has often been considered unlikely, emerging geological evidence tells a different story.

How did rhinos get to the Arctic?

Today, land animals are impeded from crossing between Europe and North America by several deep, wide waterways. The Faroe Islands, Iceland and Greenland are separated by the Faroe-Bank Channel, Faroe Shetland Channel and the Denmark Strait. Between the Scandinavian Peninsula, Svalbard and Greenland are the Barents Sea and Fram Strait. It is believed that land animals could traverse at least one of these areas only up until the Early Eocene about 50 million years ago.

Recent studies, however, are starting to paint a more complex picture of North Atlantic geological change. Estimates for the timing of formation of the various channels that now break up North Atlantic land masses are highly variable.

Mathematical modelling suggests a highland connected Svalbard to northern Europe as recently as the 2.7 million years ago. An array of new data also suggest the Fram Strait was shallow and narrow until the Early Miocene, around 23 million years ago. The Faroe-Shetland channel may have opened between 50 and 34 million years ago, while the Iceland-Faroe Channel and Denmark Strait were submerged later, 34 to 10 million years ago.

This suggests that rhinoceroses could have walked on land for at least part of their journey across the North Atlantic. They could possibly have swum the relatively short distances between land masses but the team hypothesized that seasonal sea ice may also have facilitated their movement.

Seasonal ice

More than 47 million years ago, the Arctic Ocean and surrounding regions were ice-free all year. Ocean cores collected from the Arctic Ocean — samples of mud, sand and organic material drilled from the seafloor — contain evidence of ice-rafted debris during the Middle Eocene, approximately 47 to 38 million years ago. This indicates the presence of seasonal ice.

Another ocean core collected between Greenland and Svalbard also contains ice-rafted debris originating from across the Arctic dating from between 48 to 26 million years ago. What is emerging, therefore, is the possibility that land animals crossed the North Atlantic by a combination of routes formed over land and seasonal ice.

Vertebrate fossils from the islands that once comprised the North Atlantic land bridges are extremely rare. Given that much of the land bridges are now submerged, direct evidence for how animals spread across the North Atlantic may be lost.

Bio-geographic studies like the one conducted by the team at the Canadian Museum of Nature highlight how discoveries in the Arctic are reshaping what we know about mammal evolution. These insights further our understanding of how animals moved across our planet.

Danielle Fraser received funding from the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada (NSERC RGPIN-2018-05305). Natalia Rybczynski, who co-authored the study mentioned in this article, received funding from the W. Garfield Weston Foundation. Mary Dawson, a co-author on the study, received funding for field work from National Geographic.

16 Oscar nods for ‘Sinners’ signals a broader appetite for imaginative Black cinema

2026-02-01T14:17:25Z

When Sinners recently received a record-breaking 16 Oscar nominations, the response was overwhelmingly celebratory, but not uncomplicated.

The nominations capped a year in which the film had already defied expectations at the box office. An original horror film with no built-in franchise, Sinners broke multiple domestic and international records and earned more than US$300 million during its theatrical run.

Critics also responded strongly, praising Ryan Coogler’s direction and the film’s blend of spectacle and social commentary. Those reviews helped cement Sinners as both a commercial hit and a critical success.

Sinners doesn’t resolve longstanding debates about Black recognition or racial equity in Hollywood. However, its nominations arrive at a moment that suggests wider audience interest — and possible film industry openness — to Black films that are culturally specific, formally ambitious and uninterested in proving their importance through suffering alone.

Questions of popular success and excellence

The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences — the group of just over 10,000 film industry professionals who vote on Oscar nominations and winners — has long grappled with how to balance popular success and its self-image as an arbiter of artistic excellence.

In the wake of declining viewership, the academy proposed a new category in 2018 for “Outstanding Achievement in Popular Film.”

The plan was met with significant backlash from commentators who were offended by the implication that commercially successful films couldn’t also be great art. The idea was shelved amid concerns that it would undermine the Oscars’ standards instead of bridging the gap between popular taste and critical recognition.

Sinners is not a traditional prestige drama designed for the awards circuit. It is a piece of work that refuses easy classification, blending elements of horror, musical, Southern Gothic and Black folklore into a form that balances excess and control.

As director Ryan Coogler has said, the film resists categorical conventions, dubbing it “genre-fluid.”

‘Sinners’ official trailer.

Directorial innovation

Coogler’s directorial innovation is central to the cultural significance of the film’s nominations.

Historically, the Oscars have rewarded Black films that conform to a narrow range of familiar narratives. Stories centred on racial trauma, historical injustice, moral redemption or social pathology have been far more likely to receive acknowledgement than films that foreground pleasure and fantasy.

Best Picture winners like 12 Years a Slave and Green Book, along with heavily awarded films such as Precious and The Help, illustrate this pattern, as does Halle Berry’s Best Actress win for Monster’s Ball, a performance structured around sexualized suffering and endurance.

Acclaimed Black films that don’t focus on trauma or suffering have been long overlooked by the academy.

Movies like Do the Right Thing, Eve’s Bayou, Girls Trip and Sorry to Bother You received strong critical and cultural support, but were largely ignored during Oscar voting.

Rather than critiquing those films or performances, this pattern points to how Hollywood taste — reflecting racialized assumptions and values — shapes what kinds of Black stories are recognized as important and deserving of reward.

Black creative achievement and possibility

Sinners does something different. It bends and unsettles the frames that tell audiences how to read a film. Vampires, music, violence, sex and history are woven together in a way that invites audiences in, without stopping to explain or defend each choice.

The film draws on familiar genre esthetics that white audiences recognize (like horror, spectacle, supernatural myth) but it refuses to translate its cultural references or soften its Black specificity.

Viewers unfamiliar with Black Southern folklore, diasporic spiritual traditions or the film’s musical and historical cues may miss things. The film does not slow down to catch them up.

Award bodies’ reception

The film’s success also raises questions about how awards bodies respond when Black creative experimentation gains critical acclaim.

A recent example comes from the Recording Academy. After Beyoncé won Best Country Album in 2025, the Grammys split the category into “traditional” and “contemporary” — a change that expanded recognition while also reintroducing distinctions.

The move echoed earlier controversies around genre-labelling, including debates over the now-retired “urban” category. It also underscored how recognition can be followed by new forms of sorting rather than lasting structural change.

Wider shift in Black creative possibility

The risk is that Sinners is celebrated as a one-off, rather than understood as part of a wider shift in Black creative possibility.

Some conservative responses have framed Sinners less as an artistic achievement and more as an example of cultural overreach, reading its genre play and historical remixing as ideological provocation rather than creative labour.

Alongside this, the film’s record-breaking nominations are likely to be interpreted by some viewers or critics as further evidence of a so-called “woke era” in awards culture, a framing that tends to downplay the craft, ambition and substance of works featuring Black talent.

These reactions reveal ongoing anxieties over who gets to reshape tradition, and how recognition by industry powerbrokers is interpreted when it is attached to Black cultural production.

Reputational weight, star power

Sinners could take these creative risks in part because of the reputational weight behind it.

Coogler’s track record of commercially successful films, combined with the star power of Michael B. Jordan and their history of delivering profitable collaborations, created a level of confidence among funding studios that is rarely extended to Black filmmakers more broadly.

The uneven distribution of that creative latitude and resourcing remains visible across the industry, where many Black directors continue to face funding barriers for innovative or less conventional projects.

Challenging esthetic norms

The academy recently introduced representation and inclusion standards for Best Picture eligibility that require films to meet benchmarks for on-screen representation, creative leadership, industry access or audience outreach to be considered for nomination.

These measures are aimed at expanding opportunities for underrepresented groups, yet they focus on who appears in and works on films rather than on how films innovate or challenge esthetic norms.

As a result, longstanding assumptions about genre bias and what counts as quality cinema are largely unexamined, even as the rules change around how films qualify for consideration.

Works that trust audiences

The recognition of Sinners by the academy points to a widening space for Black films rooted in lived experience, place and history. Similar dynamics are visible elsewhere.

Recent global successes like K-Pop Demon Hunters show that viewers are drawn to genre-blended, culturally grounded stories that stimulate the imagination rather than explain themselves away. These works trust audiences to enter unfamiliar worlds without constant translation.

Sinners belongs to this moment. Its record-breaking nominations expand the range of Black cinema visible at the highest levels of recognition and quietly signal greater room for formal experimentation. The film treats Black creativity as something that can include visual excess, genre experimentation and narrative openness, and still be recognized as artistically rigorous work.

Cornel Grey does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

Introducing our new Science & Technology editor

2026-01-30T18:02:54Z

The Conversation Canada is thrilled to announce Heather Walmsley, one of the founding editors who helped us launch in 2017, is returning to the fold. She was instrumental in establishing The Conversation Canada as an independent source of news and views from the academic and research community. Over the next three years, she edited science, education and health articles and helped grow our news coverage, audience and university membership.

Heather will be our Science & Technology editor, and these two beats are a key part of our mission to share trusted academic knowledge with the public. She comes to The Conversation Canada from the University of Victoria, where she worked for the Office of the Vice President Research and Innovation, raising the profile of health research across campus. She has worked in journalism, research and knowledge mobilization for a variety of media outlets, non-profits and research institutions in the United Kingdom and Canada.

Heather has MA degrees in anthropology and postcolonial literature from the universities of Edinburgh and Sussex, a PhD in science and technology studies from Lancaster University and held a SSHRC Banting Postdoctoral Fellowship in medical sociology at the University of British Columbia.

Her editing expertise, ideas and deep understanding of our mandate will be a boon to the newsroom. As The Conversation Canada matures from a scrappy startup to a trusted non-profit news organization, Heather will be a great asset on the eve of our 10th birthday. We can’t wait until she starts on Feb. 23.

Welcome Heather!

Pierre Poilievre: The most successful unsuccessful leader in Canadian politics?

2026-01-29T21:57:33Z

Nine months after falling definitively short in the 2025 federal election, Pierre Poilievre faced a mandatory leadership review at this weekend’s Conservative Party convention — and passed it with flying colours.

Almost 90 per cent of Conservative Party members voted for him to remain as leader.

That support extends to the broader voting coalition Poilievre has assembled, which continues to stand behind his leadership for the most part. Recent polling suggests that more than three quarters of Conservative voters view him as doing an “excellent” job.

The problem for Poilievre and the party, however, is that among those who did not vote Conservative, the view is starkly different. In that same recent Abacus poll, 62 per cent of non-Conservative voters reported he’s doing a “poor” or “very poor” job.

In a sense, Poilievre is the most successful unsuccessful leader in Canadian politics.

The Justin Trudeau problem

If you count by share of the vote, Poilievre led the party to its best showing in nearly 40 years in last year’s federal election. Brian Mulroney was the last leader of a Conservative party to crack 40 per cent of the vote share across the country. He also got the party to its best share of seats since Stephen Harper’s lone majority victory in 2011.

Poilievre managed to pull together, and even expand, the coalition of Conservative voters, appealing in particular to younger male voters, and was making inroads with labour voters — at least until Donald Trump showed up for his second term as American president.

Thanks largely due to Trump’s threats to make Canada a 51st state, Liberals performed even better in the election. Defying the odds, newly minted Prime Minister Mark Carney led the Liberals back from what seemed like certain defeat, assisted by the emergence of a far more more belligerent United States following Trump’s return.

The Liberals bested the Conservatives in vote share and seat share, cementing Carney’s leadership of the country.

Poilievre’s approach to politics as opposition leader almost certainly influenced the Liberal rebound after Justin Trudeau stepped down — and when an electoral landslide seemed all but assured for the Conservatives.

Because Canadians considered Trudeau a problem, Poilievre’s take-no-prisoners approach paid significant dividends. The Conservatives led the Liberals by an increasingly comfortable margin throughout 2024. Language about the country being broken didn’t seem out of place to those tired of the status quo.

The Donald Trump impact

As soon as Trump made himself the problem, however, most Canadians looked for a much more fulsome response than Poilievre was able to offer. Rather than a leader focused on criticizing Canada, the majority of Canadians above all wanted one who promised to stand up against the American threat.

Similarities between Poilievre and Trump — sometimes rhetorical, other times substantive and sometimes both — deepened the suspicion.

This divisiveness has continued to plague the party in the months since the 2025 election. One Conservative MP has decided to resign and two others have actually crossed the floor to join the Liberals, bringing the governing party within a hair’s breadth of a majority.

Nova Scotia MP Chris d'Entremont cited Poilievre’s leadership style specifically in explaining his decision to become a Liberal, suggesting the Conservative leader was too negative at a time when the country needed solutions-oriented politics.

This remains the quandary for the Conservative leader and the party: everything Poilievre does to secure the support of the more populist wing of the conservative movement in Canada tends to alienate the rest of the country, while any move to the centre risks condemnation from those further to the right.

Poilievre has won over core Conservatives and alienated the rest of the country, including that crucial share of voters necessary to push the Conservatives over the top.

Repelling more than he attracts

There is, to be sure, a path to victory still available to the Conservatives. A resurgent NDP, or some other wobble in Liberal fortunes, could be enough to put the Conservatives over the top next federal election.

They cannot count on such luck, however. Faced with the generational event that is the second Trump presidency, many Canadians are viewing the current Canada-U.S. tensions as an “us/them” existential battle, with other issues pushed into the background.

This week’s premier’s meeting in New Brunswick, for example, focused heavily on national unity. So too did Carney’s meeting with premiers in Ottawa.

This seems likely to persist so long as the U.S. poses a threat to Canadian security and prosperity. And as long as Poilievre presents himself as being sympathetic to Trump’s populist project, Canadians not already in the Conservative column will look to keep him out of the Prime Minister’s Office.

The strong endorsement of Poilievre’s leadership this weekend therefore means a continuation of the status quo: a country that has come together on a question of existential importance, but an opposition leader who divides, repelling more than he attracts.

Stewart Prest does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

Winter changes more than the weather — it changes how we connect. Here’s how to stay socially engaged

2026-01-29T19:49:38Z

Throughout Earth’s history, life in temperate and polar zones has had to contend with the cold and darkness of winter. Across species, seasonal adaptation is the norm. Some animals hibernate, others migrate, and many reduce activity, conserve energy, and narrow their social and ecological range until conditions improve. These strategies evolved over millennia as reliable responses to predictable environmental stress.

Humans are no exception. Seasonal cycles have a deep impact on our psychology and well-being — after all, for most of our evolutionary and recorded history, winter has shaped how we live, work and relate to one another. For our ancestors, food was scarcer, travel more difficult and daily activity contracted due to shorter days. Social life often shifted indoors and inward, and organized around smaller groups, shared labour and mutual dependence.

While modern societies have reduced many of winter’s material hardships, the season continues to exert a powerful influence on human behaviour and well-being.

As a social ecologist interested in human wellness, my research focuses on how our natural and social environments shape our well-being and what we can do to improve our relationships with these environments to maximize our well-being.

In this work, I study the drivers of emotional responses, such as loneliness and eco-anxiety. This work has taught me how inseparably connected we are to each other and to our environments, and one of my key areas of interest is how our social and natural worlds are intertwined.

Understanding how well-being is affected by weather

One area of research that has fascinated me is how humans respond to the weather and day-night cycles of the places they live. For example, research has shown that colder temperatures, greater precipitaiton and shorter periods of sunshine are associated with outcomes such as greater tiredness, stress, loneliness, and poorer life satisfaction and self-rated health.

As such, it makes sense that we are more likely to have depressive symptoms or feel tired and lonely in the winter compared to the spring and summer. Perhaps most concerning, studies of suicide attempts, loneliness and their seasonality indicate that winter weather can contribute to each, suggesting that seasonal shifts in social connection may intensify vulnerability during these periods.

Taken together, I believe this body of work suggests that the most consequential pathway linking winter conditions to well-being may not be weather exposure itself, but its effects on social connection. After all, human beings are fundamentally social animals — we greatly rely on each other for our happiness, health and survival.

Fortunately, the effect of weather on our mood is small and people can overcome it through intentional efforts. Indeed, human beings are incredibly adaptive to their environments, meaning even in poor weather contexts we can find ways to meet our social needs.

Illustrating this, research comparing levels of social isolation across neighbourhoods during cold weather highlights differences in how some communities respond to cold weather, with those choosing more indoor time throughout the day experiencing greater social isolation.

Research also suggests that our personality traits shape how resilient we are to weather changes. Studies such as these underscore that our responses to cold weather can shape its effects on us. Environment is not destiny, if we know how to address it.

So what can we do during the cold dark winter months to stay connected, and therefore happy and healthy? The research consistently shows that staying socially engaged, even in small ways, protects mental health and promotes well-being.

Ways to get connected in the cold

While winter may reduce incidental social contact, connection can be maintained through deliberate routines and low-threshold forms of engagement, including:

• committing to a weekly or biweekly group activity, such as a book club, exercise class, faith-based group or hobby circle

• organizing small, recurring gatherings, such as rotating dinners, shared meals or weekend brunches

• scheduling regular phone or video check-ins with family or friends and treating them as fixed commitments

• integrating social contact into daily activities, such as walking, running errands, exercising or having coffee together

• using daylight strategically by planning brief outdoor meetups or spending time in naturally lit public spaces

• participating in year-round volunteer roles that provide regular contact and a sense of purpose

• enrolling in short-term courses or workshops that create repeated contact over several weeks

• connecting through shared projects, such as creative work, community caregiving or co-hosted events

• initiating contact with others who may also be withdrawing socially during winter

It’s not always easy, but it is worth it

Of course, such activities take time and energy and are not always the easiest to do. Snow-caked roads and reduced sunlight hours can pose real mobility challenges. So while we might want to connect, we are not always able to when we face such environmental barriers.

In fact, one of my favourite findings in the literature is that while people naturally feel inclined to seek out social affiliation in response to cold weather (something I believe to be a survival strategy we’ve inherited from our less technologically equipped ancestors), physical warmth acts psychologically as a satisfactory replacement — even if it lacks the long-term benefits of social connection.

In other words, the modern amenities of space heaters and cozy blankets make it easier for us to isolate — and many of us are happy to enjoy the warmth from these instead of the warmth offered by social connection.

However, knowing the central importance of social connection to well-being, it’s important to not fall trap to these creature comforts. There is not anything wrong with being alone from time to time, but winter is too long a season to spend alone safely.

Intentional effort

In short, we need to recognize that winter weather has a predictable effect on our well-being, and this effect calls for deliberate social adaptation. Human well-being has always depended on the ability to respond collectively to seasonal constraint, and the contemporary winter environment is no different, even if its risks are less visible.

The evidence reviewed above suggests that while the cold, darkness and reduced mobility can heighten vulnerability, their effects are shaped by how individuals and communities organize daily life, social routines and sources of connection. Comfort, convenience and withdrawal may offer short-term relief, but they do not substitute for the protective role of sustained social engagement.

Winter demands intention rather than retreat. By recognizing social connection as a seasonal health behaviour rather than a discretionary luxury, individuals and communities can better align modern living with enduring human needs, reducing risk and supporting well-being across the long months of cold and dark.

Kiffer George Card is president of the Mental Health and Climate Change Alliance and Social Health Canada and has received funding from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council, Health Research British Columbia, Canadian Red Cross, Public Health Agency of Canada, Government of British Columbia, and Canadian Institutes of Health Research for his work related to the social and natural environmental factors shaping wellbeing.

Filing taxes for someone else? Here’s how to do it safely

2026-01-29T19:27:36Z

Filing taxes every year is an important and necessary task in Canada. But for many, tax preparation and filing can be overwhelming. One reason is that tax forms can sometimes be hard to interpret, especially because most people only deal with them once a year.

Another factor is the shift to digital: tax forms are often delivered electronically; tax software has become the preferred method for tax preparation and filing; and the Canada Revenue Agency (CRA) prefers to send all tax information electronically through the CRA MyAccount.

With this digital system, it’s typically necessary to access tax forms and previous Notices of Assessment by logging in to your CRA MyAccount. This can be a barrier for those with less experience using computers and online accounts, such as some older adults.

Many people act as informal tax helpers by filing taxes for older parents, relatives or friends. In fact, half of Canadians filing taxes have someone else do their taxes for them. Of those, one in five reports getting help from a friend or family member acting as an informal tax helper.

This means about 10 per cent of tax filers in Canada rely on family or friends to file their taxes. The CRA has a Represent a Client program that allows informal tax helpers to log in to the CRA MyAccount of the person they are helping to access relevant tax forms. However, a study that I recently conducted with colleauges shows that this mechanism is under-utilized.

How informal tax helpers access CRA accounts

Getting help with taxes can take many forms: hiring an accountant, visiting a tax preparation company, getting help from a volunteer through the Canadian Volunteer Income Tax Program (CVITP) or delegating to an informal tax helper.

Tax accountants, tax preparers and CVITP volunteers have business IDs or Group IDs for accessing CRA MyAccounts of the clients they assist. Similarly, informal tax helpers can sign up with CRA’s Represent a Client program to get RepIDs, which are ID numbers provided by the CRA to people whose identity is verified by having their own CRA MyAccount.

As an example, having a RepID allows me to access my daughter’s CRA MyAccount to get her Notices of Assessments, download tax forms and use NetFile to file her taxes. I could ask my daughter to log in and download those items for me, but it is faster for me to do it, as I know what forms I’m looking for and where to find them.

The Canada Revenue Agency’s ‘Represent a Client’ landing page. (Canada Revenue Agency)

Having a RepID does not give access to everyone’s tax records. A link needs to be established between the helper’s RepID and the CRA MyAccount of the person they are assisting. This can be done by uploading a signed form from the taxpayer or by sending an authorization request through the CRA system, which the taxpayer must approve.

The risks of sharing login credentials

In our study, we investigated CRA delegation mechanisms. We conducted a semi-structured interview study with 19 participants, including older adults, formal tax volunteers and informal tax helpers, to understand the challenges and experiences of tax delegation.

We found that only one informal tax helper used a RepID. Most either did everything using paper forms provided by the person they are helping, or they accessed that person’s CRA MyAccount using that individual’s credentials to log in.

In some cases, informal tax helpers may actually be setting up the CRA MyAccounts for the people they are helping, which means they know the login credentials. This violates the terms of service of the CRA MyAccount — you are not supposed to share your password with anyone.

While informal tax helpers are providing a valuable and helpful service to their friends and families, using a person’s credentials to access their CRA MyAccounts is problematic.

When an informal tax helper knows someone else’s CRA login credentials, they could log in as that user, change the mailing address and banking deposit details, and then make bogus tax and benefit claims. In this case, the CRA has no way to tell that it is someone else logging in and taking actions on behalf of the taxpayer associated with the account.

However, if an informal tax helper uses a RepID to access someone’s CRA MyAccount, the CRA knows exactly who is doing what. They don’t allow informal tax helpers to change the mailing address or bank deposit information, which goes a long way to preventing tax fraud.

Make tax help safer with a CRA RepID

If someone is helping you file your taxes, ask them to get a CRA RepID. It’s a quick process for them, and then they can access tax forms in your CRA MyAccount safely. This way, the CRA will know when it is them signing in to your account versus you, and your helper will only be able to access the appropriate functions.

The Canada Revenue Agency’s Represent a Client web page. Two levels of access are available, and neither allows the editing of critical details like bank deposit information or client address. An expiry date can also be set so that access does not have to be granted indefinitely. (Canada Revenue Agency)

Most informal tax helpers are honest, helpful people and they shouldn’t have to impersonate you to get your taxes done. Using the CRA’s Represent a Client system provides legitimacy to informal tax helpers and safety for those getting assistance.

With the tax deadline of April 30, 2026 approaching, if you plan to have someone assist you with tax filing, it’s a good time to check with them to make sure they use a RepID to access your CRA MyAccount. Doing this early can help avoid last-minute stress, ensure your tax return is filed accurately and give you confidence that your information is secure.

Celine Latulipe receives funding from NSERC.

Why drug approval in Canada should not rely on foreign regulators

2026-01-29T19:12:42Z

Without much fanfare, Health Canada announced in the Canada Gazette Part 1 on Dec. 22, 2025 that it was beginning a 70-day consultation period on using the decisions of foreign drug regulators such as the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) and the European Medicines Agency (EMA) to approve new drugs in Canada.

If the proposal is approved, Health Canada will evaluate reports from the other regulators, and provided those reports are satisfactory and that the drugs met certain conditions (for example, the drug being considered by Health Canada has the same strength, dosage form, route of administration, medicinal ingredient and indications as the foreign drug), the new drug will be approved.

This announcement appears to be a continuation of the federal government’s Red Tape Review launched in July 2025. According to a report on this initiative, Health Canada’s rationale for this change is that “industry stakeholders have indicated that they face undue burden due to overlapping or unclear regulatory requirements, complex regulatory approvals, and onerous reporting and information demands” and have “raised concerns about the time it takes to get products to market.”

Health Canada states that “enhanced international regulatory alignment reduces burden for industry and can support increased health product submissions to Canada” and increase the number of new drugs available to Canadians.

These views reflected in the Red Tape Review align with those of the pharmaceutical industry. In its 2025 pre-budget submission to the federal government, Innovative Medicines Canada (IMC), the main pharma industry lobby group, said that “reliance on trusted foreign regulatory reviews where appropriate…will streamline drug approvals and enable Health Canada to be a global regulatory leader.”

Faster drug approvals would also mean a shorter timeline to revenue generation for drug companies.

Benefits need to be evaluated

On the surface, this sounds like a reasonable initiative; countries with strong regulatory systems can draw on each other’s strengths so that tasks are not unnecessarily duplicated. In Canada’s case, our resources and capacity are limited compared with those of other leading regulatory authorities like the FDA and the EMA.

But before Canada starts using decisions from other jurisdictions, there is a need to evaluate whether this new way of approving drugs is actually going to be beneficial.

Australia has been using such a system since 2018. One of the benefits touted by the Australian government was that new drugs would be submitted faster to the Therapeutic Goods Administration (TGA), the equivalent of Health Canada.

But comparing the gap in the timing of submissions to the FDA and the TGA since Australia began using foreign regulator decisions doesn’t provide any convincing evidence that this has actually happened.

My new study, currently under peer review, looks at the 29 drugs that have so far used the Australian system. Twenty-two of those drugs have been evaluated by one or more organizations that look at how much additional therapeutic value new drugs provide compared to existing therapies. Sixteen of the 22 offered only minor new gains and just two were a major benefit.

FDA standards and approval pathways

The U.S. approves more new drugs than Canada does. But a recent study that compared Canada and the U.S. found that many drugs available in the U.S., but not north of the border, already had existing alternatives that are therapeutically and chemically similar. The small number of drugs that were unique to the U.S. were not very clinically important.

Some industry observers think the standards that the FDA uses to approve new drugs have been declining over the past 15-20 years.

The FDA has increased its reliance on what are called expedited drug approval pathways in recent decades. These allow drugs onto the market with lower levels of evidence. Although they were initially designed for drugs that treat rare conditions or life-threatening illnesses that don’t have effective treatments, researchers have found that these expedited pathways are being increasingly used for drugs that may not be innovative.

If Canada were already using foreign decisions, aducanumab (brand name Aduhelm) might have been put on the market in Canada as a treatment for Alzheimer’s disease. In the U.S., the FDA approved aducanumab despite a lack of evidence that it would benefit Alzheimer’s patients, and despite and the negative vote of 10 of the 11 members of the FDA’s advisory committee — the 11th member abstained — and the subsequent resignation of three of the committee members. The manufacturer eventually pulled Aduhelm from the U.S. market because almost no doctors were prescribing it.

Different regulatory cultures, different decisions

We also need to think about the consequences of the homogenization of drug approval standards. Homogenization ignores the development of different regulatory cultures in different jurisdictions that arise from networks of individuals who produce regulatory policy, determine testing standards and ultimately decide on market access for new drugs.

When presented with essentially the same evidence, the FDA and the EMA often make different decisions about oncology drugs. A 2020 study found frequent discordance between the FDA and the EMA. Another study compared the approval of 42 cancer drugs between 1995 and 2008 by the FDA and the EMA, and showed that in almost 50 per cent of cases, there was a discrepancy between EMA and FDA decisions.

So far, there is no evidence to back up the claim that using decisions made by foreign drug regulators will lead to faster access to newer and better drugs. Before Canada proceeds down this pathway, Health Canada needs to show that it will improve public health.

Between 2022-2025, Joel Lexchin received payments for writing a brief for a legal firm on the role of promotion in generating prescriptions for opioids, for being on a panel about pharmacare and for co-writing an article for a peer-reviewed medical journal on semaglutide. He is a member of the Board of the Canadian Health Coalition. He receives royalties from University of Toronto Press and James Lorimer & Co. Ltd. for books he has written. He has received funding from the Canadian Institutes of Health Research in the past.

Artemis II: The first human mission to the moon in 54 years launches soon — with a Canadian on board

2026-01-29T12:10:25Z

The crew of the new NASA moon rocket Artemis II at the Kennedy Space Center, including Jeremy Hansen of the Canadian Space Agency, on the far right. From left: Reid Wiseman, Victor Glover and Christina Koch. (NASA)

It’s been 54 years since the last Apollo mission, and since then, humans have not ventured beyond low-Earth orbit. But that’s all about to change with next month’s launch of the Artemis II mission from the Kennedy Space Center in Florida.

NASA has announced that — due to a liquid hydrogen leak discovered during the wet dress rehearsal on Feb. 3 — the launch of Artemis II has been moved up to March 6.

It will be the first crewed flight of NASA’s Artemis program and the first time since 1972 that humans have ventured to the moon. Onboard is Canadian astronaut Jeremy Hansen, who will be the first non-American to fly to the moon and will make Canada only the second country in the world to send an astronaut into deep space.

NASA announced that due to a liquid hydrogen leak discovered during the wet dress rehearsal that they are postponing the launch of Artemis II to the March launch window, which begins March 6th.

I am a professor, an explorer and a planetary geologist. For the past 15 years, I have been helping to train Hansen and other astronauts in geology and planetary science. I am also a member of the Artemis III Science Team and the principal investigator for Canada’s first ever rover mission to the moon.

NASA’s Artemis II SLS rocket and Orion spacecraft secured to the mobile launcher at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida. (NASA)

What will the mission achieve?

NASA’s Artemis program, launched in 2017, has the ambitious goal to return humans to the moon and to establish a lunar base in preparation for sending humans to Mars. The first mission, Artemis I, launched in late 2022. Following some delays, Artemis II is scheduled for launch as early as a week from now.

Onboard will be Hansen, along with his three American crew-mates.

This is an incredibly exciting mission. Artemis II is the first time humans have launched on NASA’s huge SLS (Space Launch System) rocket, and the first time humans have flown in the Orion spacecraft.

SLS is the most powerful rocket NASA has ever built, with the capability to send more than 27 metric tonnes of payload — equipment, instruments, scientific experiments and cargo — to the moon. The Orion spacecraft sits at the very top and is the crew’s ride to the moon. The Artemis II crew named their Orion capsule Integrity, a word they say embodies trust, respect, candour and humility.

An infographic produced by NASA showing the different parts of the Orion spacecraft. (NASA)

What will Artemis II crew do in space?

Following launch, the crew will carry out tests of Integrity’s essential life-support systems: the water dispenser, firefighting equipment, and, of course, the toilet. Did you know there was no toilet on the Apollo missions? Instead, the crews used “relief tubes.”

If everything looks good, the Artemis II will ignite what’s known as the Interim Cryogenic Propulsion Stage — part of the SLS rocket still connected to Integrity — to elevate the spacecraft’s orbit. If things are still looking good, the Orion spacecraft and its four human travellers will spend 24 hours in a high-Earth orbit up to 70,000 kilometres away from the planet.

For comparison, the International Space Station orbits the Earth at a mere 400 kilometres.

Following a series of tests and checks, the crew will conduct one of the most critical stages of the mission: the Trans-Lunar Injection, or TLI. This is the crucial moment that changes a spacecraft from orbiting the Earth — where the option to quickly return home remains — to sending it on its way to the moon and into deep space.

The Artemis II mission’s 10-day ‘figure-eight’ trajectory. (NASA)

Once the Integrity is on its way to the moon after TLI, there is no turning back — at least, not without going to the moon first. That’s because Artemis II — like the early Apollo missions — enters what’s called a “free-return trajectory” after the TLI. What this means is that even if Integrity’s engines fail completely, the moon’s gravity will naturally loop the spacecraft around it and aim it towards Earth.

After the three-day journey to the moon, the crew will carry out perhaps the most exciting stage of the mission: lunar fly-by. Integrity will loop around the far side of the moon, passing anywhere from 6,000 to 10,000 kilometres above its surface — much farther than any Apollo mission.

To quote Star Trek, at that most distant point, the Artemis II crew will have boldly gone where no (hu)man has gone before. This will be, quite literally, the farthest from Earth that any human being has ever travelled.

International effort to explore the moon

That a Canadian astronaut is part of the crew of Artemis II is a testament to the collaborative international nature of the Artemis program.

While NASA created the program and is the driving force, there are now 60 countries that have signed the Artemis Accords.

On Jan. 26, 2026, Oman became the 61st nation to sign the Artemis Accords. (NASA)

The foundation for the Artemis Accords is the recognition that international co-operation in space is intended not only to bolster space exploration but to enhance peaceful relationships among nations. This is particularly necessary now — perhaps more than any other time since the Cold War.

I truly hope that as Integrity returns from the moon’s far side, people around the world will pause — at least for a few moments — and be united in thinking of a better future. As American astronaut Bill Anders, who flew the first crewed Apollo mission to the moon, once said:

“We came all this way to explore the moon, and the most important thing is that we discovered the Earth.”

This is an updated story following NASA’s Feb. 3 announcement that it’s postponing the Artemis II aunch until the March launch window, which begins March 6.

Gordon Osinski founded the company Interplanetary Exploration Odyssey Inc. He receives funding from the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada and the Canadian Space Agency.

How Canada and Sweden are redefining northern security and co-operation

2026-01-28T18:08:21Z

For many years, co-operation between Canada and Sweden was often viewed through a narrow lens — defence procurement. Discussions about fighter aircraft, technical specifications and military benefits tended to dominate attention.

Yet focusing only on defence equipment obscures a deeper shift now under way. What began as a technical defence relationship has gradually evolved into broader strategic convergence rooted in shared geopolitical interests, mutual economic benefits and a common understanding of the North.

As a researcher in Canadian studies, I am particularly interested in Swedish–Canadian relations as both countries seek to to strengthen the resilience of their political and economic systems.

This evolution in the relationship hasn’t happened overnight. It’s developed incrementally through political dialogue, institutional trust and shared security concerns.

It also comes after Canada signed a contract in January 2023 to acquire 88 Lockheed Martin F-35A Lightning II fighters from the United States and has committed funds for 16 of them.

The Canadian government is reconsidering the remaining portion of the planned purchase amid ongoing tensions with the U.S., but American officials have warned that cancelling the deal could require changes in bilateral air defence co-operation and lead the U.S. to assume a greater operational role.

But at the same time, Ottawa is examining a Swedish offer of 72 Saab Gripen jets and six GlobalEye aircraft.

Political alignment

Recent developments suggest that Canada–Sweden co-operation is no longer best understood as a transactional arrangement. Instead, it reflects a sustained effort by two northern democracies to strengthen long-term co-ordination in an increasingly unstable global environment.

The foundations of Canada–Sweden defence co-operation lie in longstanding exchanges on military aviation, joint exercises and technological collaboration. Although fighter aircraft discussions, including on the Gripens, are a visible part of this relationship, collaboration has increasingly extended beyond procurement.

Joint training in Arctic and cold-weather operations and interoperability in air operations and command-and-control systems now play a growing role in the Euro-Atlantic and northern European security landscape.

Sweden’s accession to NATO in 2024 has reinforced these dynamics, creating new opportunities for co-ordination between Canada and Sweden within the organization’s planning, exercises and capability development.

Canada’s lack of a Swedish aircraft purchase hasn’t curtailed defence co-operation, but redirected it toward political alignment on shared threats, Arctic and Baltic security and the institutional frameworks required among allies in northern environments.

High-level engagement

In 2023, Canada and Sweden marked 80 years of diplomatic relations. This anniversary highlighted the depth and continuity of the bilateral relationship and served as a reminder that present day co-operation builds on decades of political trust.

High-level political contacts in recent years have further elevated the relationship.

Interactions among ministers responsible for foreign affairs, defence, industry and energy have framed co-operation around defence-related industries, technological sovereignty, innovation ecosystems and Arctic governance. This points to a maturing partnership in which security, industry and research policy are increasingly connected.

What stands out is that discussions have focused less on single contracts and more on long-term reliability, institutional compatibility and shared priorities.

These include security in the High North, collective defence within NATO and closer industrial and technological ties among advanced democracies with similar economic systems.

State visit

This broader relationship took on new political weight during the Swedish state visit to Canada in November 2025.

King Carl XVI Gustaf and Queen Silvia led the visit and were accompanied by senior Swedish cabinet ministers, including Ebba Busch, deputy prime minister and industry minister, and Defence Minister Pål Jonson.

The three-day visit combined ceremonial diplomacy with strategic and economic dialogue. Several Swedish companies participated in business and innovation events.

During the visit, Canada and Sweden formalized a strategic partnership framework covering security and defence co-operation, Arctic affairs, trade, innovation and the green and digital transitions.

The visit, which included meetings in Ottawa and engagements with research and technology experts, underscored that bilateral relations were no longer limited to defence but were expanding into long-term political co-ordination.

The Rodinia metaphor

Busch has on several occasions used an unusual metaphor to describe relations between Canada and the Nordic region: Rodinia, the ancient super-continent that once linked what are now parts of North America and northern Europe.

Although geological in origin, the reference serves a political purpose. It frames present co-operation as a reconnection rather than something new. It situates Canada–Nordic relations within a longer narrative shaped by comparable northern environments, natural resources and innovation systems influenced by climate and geography.

Such historical imagery helps place industrial and strategic co-operation within a broader sense of continuity. In this perspective, partnership does not depend on a single defence decision but on structural similarities and long-term shared interests across the North Atlantic and Arctic regions.

Changing economic and security landscape

Canadian leaders are increasingly emphasizing co-operation with like-minded middle and advanced economies, as Prime Minister Mark Carney did in his recent widely acclaimed speech in Davos.

These economies include Nordic countries in areas like clean energy, critical minerals, digital innovation and security. The argument is that countries with compatible institutions, technological capacity and a commitment to rules-based international co-operation can enhance their influence by acting together.

Seen in this light, Canada and the Nordic states are not peripheral powers but form part of a northern cluster with expertise that is highly relevant to global challenges.

Energy transition in cold climates, Arctic infrastructure, resilience in sparsely populated regions and defence in harsh environments are areas where their experience carries weight.

Northern resilience in an unstable world

Taken together, these developments point to a redefinition of Canada–Sweden relations. Defence co-operation is still important, but it’s being increasingly embedded in a wider framework that includes industrial collaboration, Arctic research, academic exchange and political co-ordination.

This reflects a broader shift in how strategic partnerships are built. Trust, institutional compatibility and shared outlooks now matter as much as contractual outcomes.

What started as talks about fighter jets has become a broader discussion about northern resilience and how democracies on the edges of great power competition can improve their security and prosperity by working together instead of relying on others.

Canada and Sweden are not simply discussing equipment. They are shaping a model of partnership based on long-term alignment, one that could prove more enduring than any single procurement decision.

Christophe Premat is director of the Centre for Canadian Studies and a professor of Francophone cultural studies at Stockholm University. He acknowledges having taken part in events organized by the Embassy of Canada in Sweden at which representatives of the Swedish Armed Forces were present. He received funding from the Nordic and Baltic Cooperation through the Nordplus educational grant for the years 2020–2022. With the support of this grant, he created an introductory online course in Canadian Studies (https://doi.org/10.17045/sthlmuni.15329100.v1) which is given each summer. He has recently participated in interviews commenting on the political situation in Canada.

Men are embracing beauty culture — many of them just refuse to call it that

2026-01-28T18:04:14Z

Just weeks after the premiere of popular gay hockey romance series Heated Rivalry, star Hudson Williams’ extensive skincare routine has gone viral. In a now-viral video for The Cut, the 24-year-old walks viewers through his “five-step Korean beauty routine.”

His multi-step regimen includes a close shave, a cleanse, pore-minimizing treatments, a “super-glowing” toner and serums targeted toward “rejuvenating” the young star’s face and body.

The nearly 20-minute routine, replete with self-deprecating humour and an ironic bent against vanity, has amassed some 500,000 views (and counting), almost 2,000 comments and 36,000 likes on YouTube alone.

Williams’ routine, and its public broadcast online, is emblematic of a wider shift in our highly visual and virtual culture among men. From style guides and intensive workout routines to recommendations for skin and hair, men are investing in their appearance.

But, in a curious contortion, they’ve called their work on the face and body anything (and everything) but beauty.

Understanding beauty’s cultural force

As a researcher studying the cultural force of beauty and its various presentations online, I take questions related to appearance and attractiveness seriously.

I look to taken-for-granted trends online — images and advertisements as well as viral video clips — and their reception among audiences to understand how young people engage with and respond to beauty, and the various privileges and penalties it commands.

Beauty’s cultural force has long weighed upon women, who have been invited to modify their appearances in step with challenging, often contradictory, beauty norms. But in a recent and curious shift, beauty norms and appearance pressures have intensified among men.

‘Heated Rivalry’ star Hudson Williams breaks down his skincare routine for ‘The Cut’

The rise of men’s beauty habits

Men’s bodies are increasingly visible in product advertisements and mainstream campaigns, with a surfeit of cosmetics targeted toward men.

Mundane investments in skincare and grooming are not uncommon, with young men especially doubling down on their efforts to refine the face and body through multi-step routines not unlike Williams’.

Driven at least in part by social media influencers and the rise of platformed figures who dialogue around the importance of looking good, “freshening up” and keeping sharp, men are investing in their appearance as women long have.

Alongside these investments, boys and men are enjoined to bulk up to achieve a muscled and well-defined look. Widely followed influencers and celebrities alike echo the call, endorsing a range of compound exercises to improve one’s physique and “science based” changes to boost growth.

The drive toward muscularity is demanding, with many recommendations touting the importance of rigorous diets and intensive exercise regimes.

In the name of beauty

While some recommendations are innocuous enough, men have entertained more extreme, sometimes dangerous practices to modify and refine the appearance of their face and body.

Sometimes called “looksmaxxing,” a term capturing efforts that enhance men’s appearance, practices like “mewing” and the far more dangerous exercise of “bone-smashing” are often endorsed to promote facial harmony and a stronger jawline.

The preponderance and popularity of these appearance-focused practices online have produced what medical researcher Daniel Konig and his colleagues describe as an “almost pathological obsession” with attractiveness, with significant consequences for boys and men.

Public reporting on men’s relationship to their appearance indicates that a growing number of men are suffering from body insecurity and lower esteem, manifesting in the rise of muscle dysmorphia, a body-image disorder focused on a perceived lack of physical size or strength.

In a similar vein, the United Kingdom’s Sexualization of Young People report indicates that online, boys are increasingly under pressure to “display their bodies in a hyper-masculine way showing off muscles and posturing as powerful and dominant.”

Why men resist calling it beauty

In my ongoing research with young people enrolled at the University of Toronto and MacEwan University, I am documenting a similar set of pressures.

The young people I’ve spoken with insist that while appearance weighs heavily on everyone, men are increasingly subject to the demands of a culture preoccupied with looking good.

For the boys and men I speak with, social media platforms, and the celebrities and influencers who populate them, are a particularly thorny topic. They invite an intense sense of comparison between men and their physiques and, for many, a feeling of not quite being good enough.

Still, few describe these pressures in terms related to beauty per se. As a historically feminized domain, beauty has been derided as frivolous and unimportant. But as many men are coming to find, the truth is far more complex. Beauty returns rewards to those who are thought to possess it or, perhaps, to those who are willing to pay for it.

Selling beauty to the masses

Men represent a growing and lucrative ground on which to sell products and services designed to optimize their appearance.

This previously untapped market segment is ripe for commercial exploitation, with an increasing number of men making spending on beauty products and services.

In 2024, market researcher Mintel reported that more than half of men use facial skincare products, with members of Gen Z accounting for the greatest share of growth in skincare products — especially “high-end” and “clean” products.

It’s estimated that the global market for men’s beauty products, including skincare and grooming, will exceed US$5 billion by 2027, adding to the industry’s already striking US$450 billion evaluation.

Men’s interest in more costly and intensive beauty treatments is also on the rise. The American Academy of Plastic Surgeons reports that a growing number of men are pursuing body augmentation and cosmetic surgery, as well as non-invasive procedures like dermal filler injections and facial neurotoxins like Botox.

Under both knife and needle, beauty’s cultural force is sure to be felt.

Jordan Foster receives funding from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada.

Why Iran keeps turning off the internet during mass protests

2026-01-28T15:29:26Z

What began on Dec. 28 in Tehran as a revolt against economic hardship and the collapse of the national currency quickly spread across dozens of other Iranian cities and provinces. People from diverse socioeconomic, religious and ethnic backgrounds joined what has become the largest anti-regime protest since the 1979 revolution.

Chants of “death to the dictator” and “death to Khamenei” echoed far beyond Tehran’s Grand Bazaar. As a response, the government shut off all internet services, leaving roughly 92 million Iranians in a digital blackout since Jan. 8.

The protests are not an isolated eruption but the latest chapter in a continuous cycle of uprisings from the 1999 student movement, the Green movement of 2009, the protests of 2017 and the bloody November of 2019, the “uprising of the thirsty” in 2021 and the Woman, Life, Freedom uprising of 2022. Each was driven by different grievances but united by a deepening crisis of legitimacy and governance.

For authoritarian regimes, internet blackouts are a powerful political tool of repression that conceal state violence.

Violence justified for ‘security’

As the protests spread, the regime responded by unleashing lethal violence on the streets. Security forces fired live ammunition and pellet guns at demonstrators, deployed tear gas, carried out mass arrests and raided medical facilities where injured protesters were being treated, including hospitals in Illam and Tehran.

Arrests have surpassed 40,000, while estimates of the death toll vary widely, with reports suggesting that tens of thousands have been killed during the most intense days of repression. In cities such as Rasht, witnesses documented massacres as protesters attempted to flee security forces.

At the same time, state media outlets and senior political and judicial officials labelled protesters “terrorist agents” serving the United States and Israel, rhetoric that helped legitimize extreme violence in the name of national security.

The internet blackout as political strategy

Plunging millions of people into digital darkness was not a security precaution but a deliberate strategy used to disrupt collective action, prevent the documentation of state violence and control what both domestic and international audiences could see.

Mobile data, broadband connections and even phone lines were cut across the country, leaving families unable to contact loved ones, protesters cut off from one another and the outside world largely blind to events inside Iran. This was neither an unprecedented move nor a temporary security response. Iranian authorities have repeatedly restricted or disabled internet and telephone access during periods of sociopolitical unrest.

Under blackout conditions, the internet is not simply a space for expression, it is vital infrastructure that allows for information to flow.

By fragmenting connectivity, the state does not need to erase every image or silence every voice. It only needs to prevent a shared public record from forming. Violence becomes harder to document, deaths harder to count and accountability easier to evade.

Diaspora activism under blackout conditions

Outside Iran, this enforced silence prompted a wave of digital mobilization.

Iranians in the diaspora and their allies turned to platforms such as X and Instagram, circulating the hashtag #DigitalBlackoutIran to draw global attention to the shutdown and the escalating repression inside Iran. The hashtag became a way to make absence visible, revealing that the lack of images, videos and updates was itself the product of deliberate regime suppression and crackdown.

As the blackout continues, what’s at stake is not simply connectivity but the ability to bear witness. The struggle over internet access in Iran is therefore a deeply political one: it’s a struggle over who’s allowed to narrate, who’s allowed to be seen and whose suffering is allowed to register as real.

This use of #DigitalBlackoutIran didn’t emerge in vaccuum. It drew on previous movements and uprisings in Iran, where independent journalists are tightly restricted and repressed, public dissent is criminalized and uprisings are often followed by violent crackdowns and information blackouts.

When people cannot safely gather, publish or speak openly, and when documentation is actively disrupted, hashtags become a way of speaking out and of preserving what might otherwise disappear.

They allow dispersed users to find one another and construct a shared narrative of what’s happening. In this sense, hashtags function as a tool for mobilization and advocacy and as living archives of protest, keeping a record of repression and resistance alive when the state seeks to fragment, deny or erase it.

Yet the very visibility that gives hashtag activism its power also makes it vulnerable under authoritarian rule.

In Iran, the regime does not rely solely on blocking platforms or cutting access. It also actively manipulates online conversations from within. Alongside internet shutdowns, blocking social media platforms and filtering news websites, the state deploys co-ordinated networks of pro-regime accounts, often referred to as a “cyber army,” to disrupt protest hashtags.

These accounts flood hashtags with abusive and degrading language, disinformation and conspiracy narratives. The aim is to make participation emotionally, psychologically and socially costly.

This strategy reflects a broader shift in how autocratic regimes manage dissent online. Rather than silencing opposition, they increasingly seek to dominate digital spaces by overwhelming them, blurring truth with falsehood, intimidation with debate and visibility with noise.

The communications blackout and the disruption of online space point to the same reality in Iran: both operate as deliberate strategies of repression embedded in the regime’s broader architecture of control and discipline.

Under these conditions, the role of Iranians in the diaspora, along with sustained international media coverage, becomes critical not only in countering the silencing of dissent within Iran, but also in resisting the systematic erasure, distortion and fragmentation of the country’s ongoing history of defiance.

Niloofar Hooman does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

Scientists have identified unique sounds for 8 fish species

2026-01-28T13:27:07Z

Have you ever wished you could swim like a fish? How about speak like one?

In a paper recently published in the Journal of Fish Biology, our team from the University of Victoria deciphered some of the strange and unique sounds made by different fish species along the coast of British Columbia.

Researchers have known for centuries that some fish make sounds, and the ancient Greek philosopher and scientist Aristotle even mentioned fish sounds in his writings. However, our understanding of which sounds are made by which fish species is extremely limited because it is difficult to pinpoint where a sound comes from underwater.

To accurately identify which sound is made by which fish, our team deployed an underwater acoustic localization array at sites in Barkley Sound, B.C. The localization array was designed by our project collaborator, Xavier Mouy, and it allowed us to precisely triangulate sounds to specific co-ordinates.

Using this triangulation and paired underwater video recordings, we were able to tie fish sounds to the correct species. We identified more than 1,000 fish sounds during our study, and successfully tied those sounds to eight different rocky reef fish species: copper, quillback, black, canary and vermillion rockfish, as well as lingcod, pile perch and kelp greenling.

We were particularly excited to identify sounds for canary and vermillion rockfish since these species had never been documented making sounds.

Differentiating fish sounds

We also wanted to investigate if different species sounds were unique enough to be differentiated from each other. We created a machine learning model using 47 different sound characteristics, like frequency (how high- or low-pitched the sound is) and duration (how long the sound is), to understand the unique differences in species calls.

For example, black rockfish make a long, growling sound similar to a frog croak, and quillback rockfish make a series of short knocks and grunts. The fish sound model was able to predict which sounds belonged to which species with up to 88 per cent accuracy. This was surprising and exciting to our team since many rocky reef fish species are very closely related.

Some fish species are known to make unique sounds during specific activities like courtship or guarding territory. Our research found that many species are also making sounds while fleeing from other fish.

For example, the copper and quillback rockfish both make significantly more grunting type sounds while being pursued by larger fish. We also documented sounds made during feeding activities and during aggressive activities like chasing.

Using sounds in future research

We also used stereo cameras in our research which allowed us to measure the length of the fish. We found that smaller fish make higher frequency (pitched) sounds than larger fish, which means scientists may eventually be able to estimate how big a fish is just by listening to its sounds. This discovery could be used in conservation in the future because estimating fish size is an important tool for effectively managing fish populations.

Our team plans to apply this research to improve marine conservation efforts. Now that we understand fish species sounds can be differentiated, there are many exciting possibilities for developing these acoustic tools into monitoring methods.

We can create species-specific fish sound detectors that will tell us where fish live without disturbing them. This has important implications for future conservation efforts, and the techniques we used can be adapted by scientists all over the world to decipher other fish calls.

Going forward, our team plans to develop a method of counting fish using acoustic recordings by examining the number of calls each species makes.

We also plan to compare the fish sounds we collected in Barkley Sound to fish calls made in other areas of British Columbia to see if fish have unique accents or dialects.

Using underwater sound recordings to study fish is highly beneficial. It is minimally invasive and acoustic recorders can collect information for months or years in hard to access or low visibility locations underwater. With more development, underwater acoustic monitoring could become an important new tool for conservationists and fisheries managers.

Darienne Lancaster has received funding from the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada (NSERC) and Fisheries and Oceans Canada Competitive Science Research Fund (CSRF). She is affiliated with Fisheries and Oceans Canada.

Geopolitics will cast a long shadow over the 2026 Milan Cortina Winter Olympic Games

2026-01-27T20:29:59Z

This winter’s Olympic games will not be a normal international sporting event. A cloud of geopolitical tension looms over the Milan Cortina Winter Olympics, as well as the upcoming FIFA Men’s World Cup.

The tension escalated after Prime Minister Mark Carney’s speech at the World Economic Forum, where he spelled out his vision for a new world order for middle powers. It stood out starkly against United States President Donald Trump’s own speech at Davos, where he continued expressing his interest in acquiring Greenland from Denmark.

As a result, the 2026 Winter Olympics will likely disrupt the International Olympic Committee’s stated goal of sport bringing the world together under one banner in unique ways. Rather than muting political conflict, the Games may amplify it.

The politics behind Olympic host nations

The unifying mission of the Olympics already sits uneasily alongside previous debates over the morality of hosting the Games in repressive states. For decades, critics have argued that such regimes use the Games to improve their global image and advance their political and economic goals.

International sports events provide widespread media coverage and brand exposure. That spotlight is particularly attractive for authoritarian and repressive regimes seeking legitimacy on the world stage.

Access to a western audience provides these states with the opportunity to “sportswash” their legitimate authority through a carefully curated image.

Repressive regimes have increasingly pursued this strategy. Research shows that the share of international sporting events hosted by autocracies fell from 36 per cent in 1945-88 to 15 per cent in 1989-2012, but has rebounded to 37 per cent since 2012.

Sportswashing and the Olympic bargain

Sportswashing involves the use of sport to redirect public attention away from unethical conduct. In the case of international sporting events, the aim is typically to improve the reputation of the host nation by using the immense popularity of sport to “wash” away scrutiny linked to human rights abuses or democratic backsliding.

Sportswashing can also work to establish broader global acceptance of repressive regimes, particularly when western institutions accept their wealth and acquiesce to their goals.

International sporting organizations also stand to gain from this arrangement as well. Authoritarian hosts are more likely to acquiesce to demands to build costly, single-use sport facilities, as they do not face the kind of democratic backlash that could arise after using public funds for an event that carries little public benefit.

In some cases, these regimes have even been willing to bribe officials to gain the votes necessary to win bids to host these sporting events.

From sportswashing to nationalism

There is often a symbiotic relationship between repressive regimes and international sporting organizations. However, the Milan Cortina Games are unlikely to serve up the sportswashing narratives we have seen recently. Instead, the political stories of the 2026 Winter Olympics are likely to be more explicitly nationalist.

Sport is a powerful vehicle for national rhetoric. It can reinforce a person’s social identity or how they see themselves in relation to others by encouraging people to see themselves as a member of a team or country, and celebrating victory as a collective success or interpreting defeat as a symbolic loss.

Sport also possesses powerful symbolism that can be exploited to great affect in forming a coherent national identity. In this way, sporting events can reinforce national identity as an objective symbol that connects to primitive forms of national ideology.

Political tensions heading into Milan Cortina

In the lead-up to the 2026 Winter Olympics, a series of geopolitical flashpoints has intensified political tensions surrounding the Games. These include the U.S. invasion of Venezuela, Trump’s desire to annex both Greenland and Canada and his ongoing trade disputes with traditional allies.

Whether it’s tension between the European Union and the U.S. or between Canada and the U.S., there are many story lines that can serve as galvanizing moments for nationalist rhetoric.

The 4 Nations Face-Off, won by Canada a year ago, demonstrated how quickly Canada and the U.S. can mobilize Canadian nationalism amid tense trade negotiations. Any Olympic ice hockey matchup between the two countries will feed into the national imagination of both countries and their political leaders.

Denmark and the U.S. are also in the same group in the men’s ice hockey tournament, meaning they are guaranteed to play each other in the round-robin phase.

The men’s ice hockey tournament at the 1980 winter Olympics in Lake Placid, N.Y., served as a pivotal moment in the Cold War. When the underdog U.S. beat the favoured Soviet Union Red Army team, it was deemed the “Miracle on Ice.”

Given Trump’s threats against Greenland, a Danish territory, the Olympics matchup between the two teams could serve as Denmark’s own “miracle on ice” moment.

A medal table ripe for political spin

Beyond ice hockey, this is shaping up to be a Winter Olympics the U.S. is likely to perform quite well in. Traditional winter powerhouses Norway and Russia are both facing scandals or exclusion.

Norway, the all-time leader in medals in Winter Olympics history, is facing a massive cheating scandal in ski jumping but is generally a powerhouse in the nordic sports and skiing events. Russian athletes remain barred from competing under their national flag due to the war in Ukraine and are only permitted to participate as vetted Individual Neutral Athletes.

Trump is likely to make a big deal about any strong American performance, framing any success in contrast to both the EU and Canada.

During his second term in office, Trump has welcomed numerous athletes to the White House and publicly linked sporting success to national strength. He celebrated American participation at the Ryder Cup golf tournament and the 4 Nations Face-off, even when those contests ended in U.S. defeats.

A successful Winter Olympics could therefore provide political capital at a sensitive moment. Amid his attack on Venezuela and stated goal of acquiring Greenland, major soccer countries and EU powerbrokers — including France and Germany — have started to tentatively reconsider their participation in the 2026 Men’s World Cup, hosted in large part by the U.S.

But first, the 2026 Winter Olympics will serve up a menu of matchups that stand to serve the nationalist goals of Trump, Carney and leaders across the European Union.

This is a corrected version of a story originally published on Jan. 27, 2026. The earlier version said the 1980 Olympics took place in Salt Lake City, Utah, instead of Lake Placid, N.Y.

Noah Eliot Vanderhoeven does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

Air pollution crosses borders, and so must the policies aimed at tackling it

2026-01-27T20:12:37Z

Parts of India, including the capital Delhi, were once again covered in thick smog recently as toxic pollution from industry and crop-burning engulfed the region. Even though India’s National Clean Air Programme has advanced clean air action, air pollution remains a reoccurring problem.

Reliably protecting public health will require tighter co-ordination across orders of governments and departments. Air pollution is shaped by different economic sectors, weather, geography and siloed institutions. Single-sector fixes alone, like pausing construction or banning older vehicles, are unlikely to deliver system-wide change.

That’s why our team conducted a study to map air quality governance in India as an interconnected system, linking the parts that determine what gets measured, what gets enforced, what gets funded and what persists beyond city boundaries.

In addition to the authors of this article, our research team included Christoph Becker and Teresa Kramarz from the University of Toronto, Om Damani and Anshul Agarwal at the Indian Institute of Technology Bombay and Ronak Sutaria from the environmental consultant Respirer Living Sciences.

Our goal was to identify leverage points in current governance where shifts could deliver the greatest pollution-related health benefits.

If we want clean air to be a public service, we need pathways for communities to participate meaningfully. Our research argues for steady funding and training to build community monitoring literacy so accountability and action persist beyond political cycles.

Developing hyper-local monitoring

One hopeful example comes from the city of Bengaluru in the south of the country.

In this case, community groups installed monitors near schools and hospitals, using the data to spotlight the problem and seek court-mandated enforcement — underscoring the need for clear pathways to use community-generated data in enforcement.

The efforts by the communities aren’t meant to be a substitute for government enforcement. The point is to empower communities and give them a real choice in a system where they have very little voice.

The government monitors air pollution to track pollution levels over time and across locations, and to evaluate whether policies and enforcement are improving air quality.

Although India does need to scale monitoring capacities and make them equitable, we already have enough data streams from satellite observations, reference-grade monitors and low-cost sensors.

The real governance gap is in how these data streams can be used for action: standards for calibration in local conditions, quality assurance and control, and protocols for integrating evidence into enforcement and planning.

We recommend certification and quality assurance and control protocols for hyper-local monitoring so agencies can rely on the data for decisions and enforcement.

Cities elsewhere in the world have treated hyper-local monitoring as more than an awareness tool. In London, the Breathe London programme deployed hundreds of sensors alongside existing reference-grade monitors under a defined quality-assurance framework.

This data played a critical role in identifying street-level pollution hotspots, evaluating traffic interventions and assessing the impacts of policies such as the city’s Ultra Low Emission Zone. Indian governments can learn from this example.

When data is standardized for defined-decision contexts, it enables decision-making.

Governing the airshed

Air pollution does not respect regional or city boundaries. Yet, the National Clean Air Programme often assigns actions to cities, even when cities cannot control a large share of the pollution they face. For example, even when Delhi tightens local restrictions of cars or construction, at least a dozen coal-fired power plants near the city continue to operate without key pollution filters.

This is why we need governance at the airshed scale. An airshed is a region where local weather and geography, such as mountains, influence how air and pollutants move.

Governments must look at how air pollution spreads in an area, then develop rules for co-ordinating across jurisdictions. That means setting out clear roles for different departments, establishing shared data standards and creating dispute-resolution mechanisms so co-ordinated efforts can address the issue effectively.

Right now, the Clean Air Programme is centred on cutting the level of particulate matter in the air by roughly 20-30 per cent. A more actionable approach is figuring out which sectors are driving the airshed pollution — namely transport, construction, industry, power, waste and household fuels — and what sector-specific targets and timelines would actually lead to healthier air.

India’s Commission for Air Quality Management (CAQM), for example, was created specifically to put airshed-level management into practice across state and jurisdictional boundaries under the National Clean Air Programme.

The hardest part is assigning enforceable responsibilities across ministries (like power, transport, agriculture, industry, urban development) at the national, state and local levels, as well as across states.

For instance, agencies like CAQM (and NCAP more broadly) can take airshed-wide pollution inventories (estimates of how much pollution comes from different sources and sectors across an airshed) and translate them into short-term, sector-by-sector targets for each ministry, with deadlines and clear accountability.

Rewrite the objective to protect health

In our paper, we recommend expanding regulatory goals to include public health protection, in addition to meeting particulate matter targets. Putting health at the centre can shape governmental priorities, pushing agencies to focus first on the sources people are most exposed to.

As Ronak Sutaria, the founder and CEO of Respirer Living Sciences and a co-author of our study, told us:

“Air pollution isn’t an environmental statistic; it’s a public-health emergency that shows up in asthma, heart disease and hospital admissions. When we map air quality at the neighbourhood level and link it to health outcomes, clean air can move from a promise to a right — because communities can see what they’re breathing and what it means for their health, and that changes what polluters can get away with.”

A health-first objective also pushes governance toward equity, because exposure burdens are unevenly distributed across different segments of the population.

This an opportunity to align clean-air action with climate goals, while the up-front costs for mitigation are almost always offset by avoided health costs and higher productivity.

Airsheds differ, and so must actions to clean up the air. The value of systems thinking is that it offers a common way to understand what is limiting progress locally and design governance that fits local realities.

The authors do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

Book Talk: Q&A with a psychologist who argues ‘guilt is a helpful emotion, not a harmful one’

2026-01-27T14:59:12Z

Guilt is often treated as a feeling to turn away from, something that is detrimental to our pursuit of happiness. But Chris Moore, psychologist and professor in Dalhousie University’s department of psychology and neuroscience, argues that guilt can be a powerful force for accountability, repair and healing. In his new book, The Power of Guilt: Why We Feel It and Its Surprising Ability to Heal, Moore challenges popular assumptions about guilt and explains why this uncomfortable, even painful, feeling may be one of our most socially useful emotions.

The Conversation Canada: From an evolutionary perspective, why does guilt exist at all? What function does it serve?

Chris Moore: Guilt is a complex set of emotions. One of those emotions is fear for the health of a relationship. Second is empathy. If you do something to hurt somebody else, you feel sadness for them. Then third is remorse — the wish that we hadn’t done it. Those three emotions combined into a cocktail is guilt.

Human beings are arguably the most social of all species, and social networks depend upon healthy relationships between individuals. You have to have mechanisms for keeping social networks healthy because, inevitably, there’s going to be conflict. Guilt is one of those mechanisms. It serves to motivate the individual to repair relationships that are important to them. Psychopathic individuals don’t feel guilt, for example, and the corollary of that is that they tend to have dysfunctional relationships.

TCC: You distinguish between shame and guilt. What is the difference, and why is the distinction important?

CM: Guilt is feeling bad about something that you did (an action), whereas shame is feeling bad about yourself (being a bad person). Shame is more person-focused; guilt is more action-focused. And if you think about what those emotions are for and how they motivate our behaviour, they can have different effects.

If you feel guilt because you performed a bad action, then you can work to heal that by reaching out and apologizing, for example. Shame makes people shy away from relationships because they feel like they’re a bad person. Shame is much more destructive, particularly for relationships.

TCC: You argue that guilt is not a harmful emotion. How so? Why, then, has guilt developed such a bad reputation?

CM: The ultimate point of guilt is to motivate us to try to heal our relationships. That’s why guilt is good for us if we act on it honestly and with genuine motives, although it feels bad. But I do want to emphasize that there are two sides. The antidote to guilt is forgiveness from the other person.

There are a number of reasons for its bad reputation. One is that it feels bad, and so we don’t want to experience it. We may try to ignore it, or we may try to push it away or not act on it. Additionally, it’s often associated with objectively bad things — things that have been deemed to be bad actions by society, whether that’s through religion or through the law. The notion of guilt under the law, for example, is that you’ve done a bad thing and that you need to be punished for it. That is a negative connotation.

TCC: What should we do with guilt when we feel it in the moment? Lean into it? Question it?

CM: Certainly lean into it. I do want to emphasize, however, that guilt is a gut reaction, so we also need to interrogate its accuracy. Do we really have responsibility in the situation for the harm that has come to the relationship that we care about? That’s especially important in situations where other people may be inclined to take advantage of our guilt through guilt-tripping, or what is called guilt induction.

Have you done all that you should do in the context from which the guilt arose? If you have, then you need to be able to let go of the guilt. That is an important part of it because people who are very guilt-prone — people-pleasers or people who score very high on agreeableness — tend to feel guilt a lot. It may not always be justified, but that doesn’t mean that they don’t feel it.

TCC: How do power dynamics in families shape how guilt is experienced?

CM: The origin of guilt, according to Freudian psychoanalytic thought, is that the child first feels guilt in relation to their parents — something that they did which led to anger from their parents. Guilt can arise when there’s an asymmetry in power, but if you’re feeling guilt all the time in the context of a particular relationship, then it may not be you.

That can happen in child-parent relationships, particularly when parents have a very strong sense of filial obligation, which means that the children should be doing what the parents say they should be doing. And if they use guilt to achieve those ends, that can quickly lead to resentment as the child ages into adolescence and adulthood. That is quite a toxic situation for child-parent relationships, and it can lead to estrangement. Estrangement is obviously very unfortunate, but the question becomes: is it for the best?

TCC: How does guilt intersect with collective responsibility such as historical guilt tied to colonialism?

The term “collective guilt” was popularized after the Holocaust in the context of German guilt. Collective guilt has two aspects. “Objective collective guilt” can be thought of as a legal form of guilt. For example, after the Second World War, Germany accepted its collective guilt for the Holocaust and paid reparations to the state of Israel for what was done to the Jewish population. But then there is also the “subjective collective guilt,” which is the guilt that individual people may feel because of their identification with the group that did the damage.

Interestingly, subjective collective guilt can occur in people who have no individual responsibility for those acts. There was a great increase in German guilt in the 1970s in the generation born after the Second World War, for example. There is no clear antidote for subjective collective guilt. There’s nothing you can do, ultimately, that will lead to forgiveness because there’s nobody who can actually act on behalf of the group that was oppressed to offer that forgiveness. There are a number of writers, for example, who have written on white guilt, in relation to racial issues, being dysfunctional.

There’s no point in continuing to harbour collective guilt if you’ve done all that can be done. Now, determining whether you’ve done all that can be done … that is complicated.

This interview has been condensed for length and edited for clarity.

The Conversation Canada does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

New study: Some crimes increased, others decreased around Toronto supervised consumption sites

2026-01-26T20:29:04Z

There have been more than 53,000 opioid-related deaths across Canada since 2016. As part of public health efforts to reduce these deaths, many cities offer overdose prevention and supervised consumption sites.

These centres allow people who use illegal drugs to do so under the supervision of a person trained to reverse opioid poisonings. They also offer clean drug use equipment, safe disposal of used equipment and take-home naloxone, a drug that can reverse the effects of opioid overdose.

Between 2020 and 2025, 48 overdose prevention and supervised consumption sites operated in Canada. While studies show they can reduce mortality and health service use for people who use drugs, they are controversial.

People opposed to these sites worry they increase local crime and disorder by attracting drug-related activity like theft, assault, open drug use and hazardous discarded equipment. In Toronto, opposition to the sites increased after a woman was killed near one in east-end Toronto in 2023. The facility later closed after the Ontario government mandated sites within 200 metres of schools or daycare be shuttered.

Recently, our team at McGill University published a study looking at the association between these sites and crime near nine Toronto locations.

For this study, we used publicly available data from the Toronto Police Service and looked at the five major crime indicators (assault, break and enters, auto theft, robbery and theft over $5,000), as well as thefts from motor vehicles and bicycle thefts. These geo-coded data included all incidents reported at the offence or victim level.

What we found

We looked at the number of crimes within 400 metres of a site in the three years after they were opened, and compared that with the number of crimes expected for each neighbourhood had the sites not begun operating. To determine that figure, we accounted for the trends in crime occurring in each neighbourhood in the three years before the sites opened.

In other words, we looked for changes in crime trends as well as crime spikes immediately after sites were opened. We reported our findings for each site, and summarized results across all nine sites.

The results were mixed. The sites were not consistently associated with changes in local crime.

Summarizing the situation at all sites, we found they were associated with a 50 per cent increase in break and enters, and it would take approximately 34 months to return to levels normally expected around the sites. Meanwhile, monthly trends in robbery, theft over $5,000 and bicycle theft declined after sites were implemented.

There were also site-specific associations. Assaults rose about one per cent faster than expected per month near the South Riverdale and St. Stephen’s sites. While that may seem like a modest increase, after three years, assaults were approximately 43 per cent higher than expected in these neighbourhoods. At the same time, the Regent Park site was associated with declines in assault, robbery and bicycle theft trends.

More research needed

While our study provides more insight into how overdose and supervised consumption sites impact their surrounding areas, it also has its limitations. We cannot explain why crime increased near some sites but declined at others. We couldn’t look at changes in open drug use, discarded equipment or mental health act apprehensions because of data availability and quality issues or a lack of geo-co-ordinates.

Nevertheless, our results match what other researchers have found when looking at the associations between sites and crime. In the United States, a 2021 study found that reports of assault, burglary, larceny theft and robbery decreased in the area near one site.

In New York, some researchers have found overdose prevention sites did not cause significant increases in crimes. Other research, however, did find that there was an increase in property crimes near a supervised consumption site.

Here in Canada, recently published research found that there was not a significant change in the rate of fatal shootings and stabbings near supervised consumption sites in Toronto.

Our findings also corroborate what people have observed locally – crime can increase following the opening of overdose prevention or supervised consumption sites. But it doesn’t always.

Instead, the relationship between these sites and crime is complicated. Further research needs to focus on understanding why crime declined in some neighbourhoods but increased in others. These distinctions can help policymakers and public health service providers understand what works, where and why. This is crucial if we are to continue to work with communities.

Dimitra Panagiotoglou receives funding from the Canadian Institutes of Health Research and Health Canada.

Canada’s new Grocery Code of Conduct is here, but don’t expect any instant price drops

2026-01-26T17:30:54Z

Canada’s Grocery Code of Conduct came into full effect as of Jan. 1, 2026. Governed by an independent organization, the code sets out guidelines for dealings between retailers and suppliers.

It’s intended to provide transparency and predictability in the relationship between food retailers and their suppliers. All five of Canada’s largest grocers — Empire, Loblaw, Metro, Walmart Canada and Costco Canada — have registered with the code.

The code sets out specific objectives: to contribute to a “thriving and competitive grocery industry,” promote trust between grocery value chain stakeholders, allow for informed business decisions and provide an effective and fair dispute settlement mechanism.

That dispute resolution mechanism, administered by the Office of the Grocery Sector Code of Conduct (OGSCC), is intended as a last resort. The possibility of mediation may encourage parties to resolve disagreements informally before they escalate to formal adjudication.

In addition, the OGSCC will publish an annual report highlighting key trends, challenges, recommendations for code improvements and anonymized case studies of disputes, without naming specific companies.

Was the code ever about food prices?

Public discussion of the code was often conflated with a desire to reduce food prices. While food price regulation is not part of the code, it has been raised in wider discussions about food price inflation.

Statistics Canada data shows that food prices continued to rise across the country in 2025. Prices increased by 3.4 per cent across Canada’s 10 provinces and three territories between May 2024 and May 2025.

Concerns about food price inflation have been longstanding. In 2023, the federal Standing Committee on Agriculture held a meeting to investigate the issue. Members questioned Walmart Canada CEO Gonzalo Gebara and Galen Weston, then president and CEO of Loblaws (and now chair of the board).

Liberal MP Heath MacDonal asked Gebara:

“What do you say to us when we’re seeing the hesitation of Walmart to sign on to the grocery code of conduct? How do we relay that message back to our constituents, who, over the past couple of years, due to all the items and many of the issues you talked about, have been facing a lot of challenges, including the price of groceries?”

While this question does not explicitly tie the code to food prices, many interpreted this, and other statements, as suggesting the code might lower food prices.

Could the code raise prices?

Some industry leaders, however, have suggested the code could increase prices. For example, Weston says he was hesitant to participate in the code due to fears that prices would go up.

The mechanism of potential price inflation is relatively straightforward. The code discourages certain charges and states payment schedules should be negotiated. If grocers lose some benefits due to the limitations of the code, it will cost them money. In such a scenario, it is difficult to imagine that grocers would forgo money from consumers by lowering prices.

Walmart and Loblaws, who were originally resistant, eventually accepted the code after further negotiations. Loblaws’ new president, Per Bank, said the company was content with the revised code and no longer felt it would raise prices. It is worth noting, however, no one has said the code will reduce prices.

Some observers have suggested the code could lower food prices over the longer term. But they were commenting about the benefits of lower charges to suppliers and the potential for investment and innovation in the Canadian food processing sector. These indeed may be long-term benefits, but they’re not written into the code and would take time to materialize.

Are there any benefits to consumers?

There will likely to be some indirect consumer benefits. A more predictable and transparent relationship between retailers and their suppliers could increase choice for consumers by reducing the barriers to new product introduction.

Price stability and predictability make life easier on suppliers and could help sustain Canadian food processors. A loss of food processing capacity in Canada would lead to increased prices.

The code would also help smaller retailers with less bargaining power. By limiting the concessions large grocers can extract from suppliers, it narrows the gap between big and small chains and makes smaller grocers more viable. This is especially important in under-served neighbourhoods where limited retail options restrict consumer choice.

What actually drives food prices?

Food price inflation is primarily driven by supply-side factors and, to a lesser extent, demand. Between Jan. 1 and Dec. 31, 2025, food prices rose by four per cent — faster than the rate of general inflation. Much of that increase was driven by sharp price rises in beef (16.8 per cent), coffee (30.8 per cent), and sugar and confectionery (12.5 per cent).

Beef and coffee prices have been affected by the increasing frequency and severity of extreme weather events. Beef cow herds are at their lowest point in almost 40 years, due in part to drought in Western Canada and the midwestern United States. High beef prices have also pushed consumers toward other proteins, such as pork and chicken, which saw smaller price increases. Turkey prices remain relatively flat, providing an option for those feeling protein price pressure.

Coffee prices tell a similar story. Extreme weather and disease pressures have reduced yields in producing regions and led to increased prices.

Sugar and confectionery prices increased largely due to tariffs. The U.S. already had protection for its sugar industry, but introduced significant new tariffs on Brazil, Argentina and Columbia, raising organic sugar prices and pulling conventional sugar prices up with them.

Canada responded with reciprocal tariffs, increasing prices here. While some of the tariffs have been reduced, there remains considerable uncertainty. Notably, despite the 12.5 per cent annual increase in prices, prices for sugar and confectionery fell by 4.1 per cent in December 2025.

What comes next?

Canada has experienced significant food price inflation, but the drivers are largely external to and outside the scope of the Grocery Code of Conduct.

While the code may enhance transparency, fairness and competition in the grocery sector, it is not a tool for controlling or lowering grocery prices directly.

But there is room for optimism about grocery costs. The rate of food price increases will slow and we might see some price reductions. Beef cow herds are expected to recover over time, which should ease prices. Beef prices went down marginally in December by 0.2 per cent. Weather remains unpredictable, but in the absence of new extreme events, supply issues should improve and prices should ease for those commodities.

These changes, however, will not be due to the Grocery Code of Conduct, though they will be welcome nonetheless.

Michael von Massow does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

Ontario’s Bill 33 raises serious concern about campus equity and student rights

2026-01-26T15:11:37Z

Ontario’s Bill 33, passed in November 2025, could change how post-secondary admissions decisions are made, as well as how student fees are managed and what campus services they fund.

Each year, tens of thousands of university and college applicants come from communities that are historically underrepresented in higher education.

These policy changes could shape who gains access to programs, supports and opportunities for success.

The Council of Ontario Universities (COU) and many other educational groups and advocates and students have raised serious concerns about how the bill reaches into educational affairs. Some note that the bill comes at a time when there are ongoing public debates about institutional independence and decision-making.

The provincial government says Bill 33, which it termed the Supporting Children and Students Act, will make education more transparent and consistent. The law affects school boards, colleges and universities.

For us as scholars whose combined expertise spans strategic planning, equity, anti-oppressive forms of education and learning accessibility, the bill’s reach into admissions raises serious concerns about equity and student rights.

Discussion of ‘merit’

A section of the bill “requires colleges of applied arts and technology and publicly assisted universities to assess applicants based on merit and to publish the criteria and process to be used for assessment into programs of study.”

Greater transparency in admissions is positive. But if merit is defined too narrowly, it could block diverse pathways to post-secondary admissions that recognize different kinds of achievement, leaving out students from marginalized communities.

If merit is defined too narrowly, it could block diverse pathways to post-secondary admissions. (Saforrest/Wikimedia Commons), CC BY-SA

Studies in professional and medical education show that relying only on grades can miss other signs of potential, like life experience, community work and meeting the needs of society.

Grades seem objective, but they depend on many factors like family income and access to school and community resources — along with teacher and parent expectations and how much time students have to study while balancing work, family, community and other responsibilities.

Students from low-income, Black, Indigenous, rural or otherwise marginalized communities often face big challenges even before applying to college or university. These challenges reflect longstanding gaps in income and education.

Bill 33 doesn’t explain what “merit” means. Without a clear definition, admissions could end up favouring students who already have advantages. New rules will soon define how merit is measured, and these rules will be very important. If they don’t protect equity-focused pathways, the law could make existing gaps even worse.

Student fees and risk to campus services

Fair admissions are only part of the story. Bill 33 also changes how student fees are handled. These changes could harm students from marginalized communities.

Student groups have raised strong concerns about how Bill 33 could affect ancillary fees and the services they fund.

According to the Ontario Undergraduate Student Alliance, “ancillary fees are democratically approved by students, for students.” These are extra student fees that fund essential services such as food banks, wellness centres, accessibility programs, cultural programs, transportation and safety programs. These services could be at risk if the province gains more control over how fees are defined and charged.

In 2019, student groups successfully challenged Ontario’s Student Choice Initiativ. Through this measure, the province tried to limit ancillary fees but the court ruled it didn’t have the legal authority to do so at the time. Bill 33 responds to that ruling by changing the law itself, giving the province clear authority to regulate student fees.

The Canadian Federation of Students in Ontario has warned that focusing on fee oversight may distract from deeper problems in higher education, including chronic underfunding and high tuition costs.

Could weaken student-led supports, harm equity

Under Bill 33, the government can decide which fees can be charged and under what rules. Most universities clearly list how ancillary fees are used. For example, at McMaster University, these fees help fund transit passes, wellness services, career supports and refugee student programs.

How fees are managed is closely linked to the government’s broader oversight of universities, linking financial decisions to questions of accountability, governance and whose voices are heard in decision-making.

Student groups have long played a key role in raising equity concerns and ensuring local needs are addressed. If more decisions are made at the provincial level, student voices could carry less weight unless students are clearly included in new rules and decision-making processes.

Looking ahead: Equity is not automatic

As universities begin to apply Bill 33, students and faculty may notice changes in how admissions decisions are explained, how student fees are handled and how transparency rules are used.

These changes will not look the same at every campus. Their impact will depend on how the rules are interpreted and whether universities make equity a clear priority in their policies.

While the law may seem neutral, its real impact will depend on how it is put into practice and whose experiences are considered.

Ensuring equitable access to higher education requires careful planning, enough funding and meaningful input from students, faculty and communities most affected by these changes.

Equity will not happen by chance. It will depend on the choices universities and policymakers make now, and on whose voices are heard in those decisions.

With KPop Demon Hunters, Korean women hold the sword, the microphone — and possibly an Oscar

2026-01-25T13:46:39Z

When I was a child in South Korea, the New Year often began with a familiar song: “Kkachi Kkachi Seollal.” Seollal refers to the Lunar New Year, one of Korea’s most important family holidays, and kkachi means “magpie,” a bird associated with good fortune and joyful beginnings.

Singing the song, we believed, would invite pleasant guests into the home. For my siblings and me, those guests were usually our grandparents — and their arrival marked warmth, continuity and belonging.

Decades later, I now live in Canada, where distance has made such visits from my home country rare. Yet it feels as though the magpie has arrived again — this time on a global screen.

Netflix’s animated film KPop Demon Hunters, which follows adventures of a fictional Kpop girl group (Huntrix) whose members hunts demons by night, now has an Academy Award nomination for Best Animated Feature and Best Original Song. This follows recent Golden Globe wins.

The film, created by Korean Canadian Maggie Kang, has musical production by Teddy Park and is voiced by Korean American actors such as Arden Cho, Ji-young Yoo and Audrey Nuna.

I’m interested in how KPop Demon Hunters marks a new phase of the Korean Wave. In this phase, folklore and women’s musical labour come together to challenge how Asian stories have long been sidelined in western media.

KPop Demon Hunters, like the success of some other recent popular Korean cultural production in the West, reflects diasporic creativity, notes scholar Michelle Cho, whose research focuses on on Korean film, media and popular culture.

Folklore as cultural authority

One of KPop Demon Hunters’s most striking features is its unapologetic use of Korean symbols. The demon hunters wear gat — traditional horsehair hats associated with scholars during Korea’s Joseon dynasty — while battling demons alongside the tiger, long regarded as a guardian spirit of Korea. These elements function as assertions of cultural authority.

Historically, western film and animation have often relegated Asian characters to stereotypes or erased them altogether through whitewashing.

By contrast, KPop Demon Hunters places Korean folklore at its narrative centre. The gat evokes dignity and discipline; the tiger represents protection and resilience. Together, they counter the lingering assumption that mainstream entertainment led by Asian characters is somehow niche or inferior.

By using distinctly Korean imagery — such as the satirical minhwa art style of the film’s Derpy Tiger — the movie firmly anchors itself in a specific Korean context that cannot be generalized or mistaken for a broad, pan-Asian esthetic.

For many in the Korean diaspora — including myself, who grew up rarely seeing people like me centred in mainstream media — this visibility carries emotional weight.

Research in media and cultural studies shows that representation matters not only for how groups are seen by others, but also for how people understand their own place in society. Seeing Korean symbols treated with respect offers a quiet but powerful form of cultural validation.

A matrilineal line of survival

One of the film’s powerful moments is the opening montage. Through a rapid succession of shamanic figures, flappers and disco-era performers, the sequence offers what can be read as matrilineal homage to female Korean musicians across generations.

As writer Iris (Yi Youn) Kim notes, citing a lecture by Asian American studies scholar Elaine Andres, this lineage echoes the real-life story of the Kim Sisters, often described as Korea’s first internationally successful female pop group. After losing their father during the Korean War, the sisters were trained by their mother, the renowned singer Lee Nan-young — best known for the anti-colonial song “Tears of Mokpo” — to perform at U.S. military bases as a means of survival.

The Kim Sisters perform ‘Fever’ on the Ed Sullivan show.

The Kim Sisters later became regular performers on The Ed Sullivan Show, captivating American audiences while navigating racist expectations that framed Asian women as approachable, non-threatening and exotic.

Symbolic labour of representing a nation

The fictional group Huntrix inherits this legacy. Like the Kim Sisters, they are expected to embody discipline, professionalism and national representation.

For example, the film shows the group grappling with perfectionism and the intense discipline demanded of them, often maintaining polished public performances while suppressing personal vulnerability to fulfil their dual roles as idols and protectors. On a meta-narrative level, Huntrix is framed as a cultural representative through the use of Korean folklore imagery, like the gat and the tiger.

As “cultural diplomats” both on and off the screen, Huntrix carry not only entertainment value but also the symbolic labour of representing a nation to a global audience.

By embedding this lineage into a mainstream animated film, KPop Demon Hunters acknowledges that KPop’s global success rests on decades of women’s labour, sacrifice and negotiation with western power structures.

Beyond soft power

The film’s success arrives amid the continued expansion of the Korean Wave across global media.

South Korean cinema and television have already reshaped international perceptions through landmark works such as Parasite and globally streamed series like Squid Game. Netflix has publicly committed hundreds of millions of dollars to Korean content, signalling that this cultural shift is structural rather than fleeting.

KPop Demon Hunters demonstrates how Korean popular culture now moves fluidly across media forms — music, animation, film and streaming — while retaining cultural specificity. Its reception challenges the persistent assumption that stories rooted in Asian experiences lack universal resonance.

Recognition alone does not erase inequality, nor does it dismantle the racialized hierarchies built into global media industries either. But sustained visibility can matter. Studies suggest that repeated exposure to multidimensional, humanized portrayals of marginalized groups helps reduce racial bias by normalizing difference rather than exoticizing it.

Holding the sword and the microphone

While the film grows out of cultural histories shaped by U.S. military presence and Cold War politics, it reshapes those influences through diasporic storytelling that centres Korean voices and perspectives.

The magpie’s promise has finally been kept. Korean characters are no longer merely “pleasant guests” or supporting figures in someone else’s narrative. They are protagonists — holding the sword, the microphone and perhaps, one day, an Oscar.

Recently, I found myself rewatching KPop Demon Hunters while eating kimbap and instant noodles, the same comfort foods the characters share on screen. The moment felt small, but meaningful.

It reminded me of something one of my students once said: seeing this level of representation allows those who have long felt wounded by exclusion to finally feel seen.

Hyounjeong Yoo does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

How to include fossil fuel communities in Canada’s clean energy transition

2026-01-25T13:46:20Z

Fossil fuel-dependent communities in Western Canada sit at the centre of Canada’s energy decisions. A just and inclusive clean energy transition will depend on how well governments listen to these communities and how fast they deal with the forces working to slow down energy decarbonization.

When it comes to the energy transition, public discussion tends to focus on emissions targets and policies to achieve them. These are important, but they’re just one aspect of the issue. In the oil- and gas-producing regions of Western Canada, conversations and concerns centre on livelihoods, identity and a nagging doubt: does anyone in power grasp rural realities?

Our ongoing research across the region — based on large citizen surveys, focus groups with municipal leaders and analysis of disinformation — highlights that emotions, narratives and perspectives of communities sit at the heart of Canada’s energy transition politics. As we mark the United Nation’s International Day of Clean Energy today, these voices demand attention before divides deepen further.

Focus groups with municipal staff from 10 oil- and gas-producing communities in British Columbia and Alberta revealed a delicate balancing act. They’re actively pursuing diversification — geothermal projects, hydrogen pilots, tourism expansion, data centres, manufacturing hubs, even rare-earth mineral processing — but most of these efforts build around, rather than beyond, oil and gas.

For many communities, the industry isn’t just jobs. It’s the economic engine funding hospitals, schools, arenas, roads and the very existence of their towns. Abstract talk of an energy transition can feel threatening when it overlooks this.

An Alberta official captured the fear bluntly:

“If you took oil and gas out of our community, I would suggest that there would be no hospital. There would be no schools. There would be no town. The only reason our community exists is to service the oil and gas industry.”

Deep emotional divides

Our 2025 survey of 3,400 residents in non-metropolitan communities across British Columbia, Alberta, Saskatchewan and Manitoba helps explains why climate policy ignites public backlash.

Affective climate polarization, which describes the emotional distance between those who support and oppose climate policy, rivals partisan left-right divides in intensity. These emotional climate identities help explain differences in support for climate policy that ideology alone can’t capture — particularly on the political right, where views on climate action are more diverse.

Policy design nuances are critical but complicated by affective polarization. Clean technology mandates and renewable electricity requirements tend to draw broader backing than carbon taxes, which are generally less popular and spark fierce resistance from right-leaning citizens.

Bundling climate policies with just transition measures, such as government-funded training for new jobs, community-owned energy, low-carbon incentives and public transit, can boost support for carbon pricing among the less polarized. However, for those with stronger emotional commitments, these just transition supports are often ineffective and can even trigger backlash.

Climate policy details matter less to people who score high on affective climate polarization. This helps explain why climate policy debates remain so deeply politicized: when emotional attachments to climate identities are strong, people respond more to elite cues and identity-based judgments than to policy design itself.

Municipalities grapple with limitations

Municipal officials battle structural voids. Officials in northeastern B.C. and Alberta juggle economic ambitions and governance limitations. They craft economic strategies and chase low-carbon investments, while being hamstrung by thin staffing and permitting delays stalling projects for years.

The sharpest barrier to the clean energy transition is the absence of coherent, regionally tailored visions from other levels of government. Federal clean growth plans promote critical minerals and hydrogen. Provincial strategies mix liquefied natural gas with renewables.

Locally, these strategies ring hollow — they seem contradictory and urban-centric. A municipal official in B.C. we spoke to decried a “one-size-fits- all” approach, citing propane-powered electric vehicle chargers in -40 C winters: “How do you gain the support … when even the province isn’t actually addressing” regional realities?

We’ve found that public attitudes differ by age, with youth embracing climate sustainability but veterans of oil-tied lives viewing transition as a “hard sell.” Without a common vision recognizing municipal governance limitations, community leaders hesitate on bold plans, wary of backlash in towns deeply connected to the promise and precarity of oil’s boom–bust cycles.

These tensions are being wilfully intensified by the fossil-fuel industry’s propaganda machine, which uses bad-faith arguments to suggest that climate policies and fossil-fuel communities are at odds.

These arguments often ignore the potential for a well-managed energy transition to improve public health, foster regional development and increase community resilience in these regions.

These are not the only narratives the fossil-fuel industry is using to slow climate action. Our research on Canada’s climate delays shows that fossil-fuel propaganda is being used to falsely portray Canadian oil as low-emissions, to urge Canada to wait for others to act first and to claim that climate policies are more detrimental to workers more than climate change.

Fostering a just energy transition

Governments must engage in genuine listening. Fossil-fuel communities aren’t barriers, but key participants in all energy transition risks and benefits. Co-creating policies with them rather than imposing top-down visions can help grow jobs, revenues and services in Western Canada.

Engagement with communities must also be emotionally attuned. Overcoming climate polarization means restoring trust via local messengers, consistent follow-through and deliberative forums like public assemblies.

At the same time, governments must confront misinformation and propaganda. They can step in with policies that challenge disinformation legally, regulate ads and fund community energy transformations beyond fossil fuel extraction.

The International Day of Clean Energy spotlights promise. In Western Canada, it also spotlights peril. The energy transition’s success hinges on centring fossil fuel communities as protagonists, not peripherals — turning the transition into a shared opportunity.

Ekaterina Rhodes receives funding from Canada First Research Excellence Fund as part of the University of Victoria-led Accelerating Community Energy Transformation Initiative.

Megan Egler received funding from the Canada First Research Excellence Fund as part of the University of Victoria-led Accelerating Community Energy Transformation Initiative.

Rowan Hargreaves received funding from the Canada First Research Excellence Fund as part of the University of Victoria-led Accelerating Community Energy Transformation Initiative.

Samuel Lloyd receives funding from the Canada First Research Excellence Fund as part of the University of Victoria-led Accelerating Community Energy Transformation Initiative. He also received funding from the Pacific Institute for Climate Solutions for a research project that inspired one of the papers included in this article.

DNA evidence: A double-edged sword that can actually deny justice for some wrongfully accused

2026-01-25T13:46:08Z

Jon-Adrian (JJ) Velazquez, a New York man who spent half his life in prison for a crime he didn’t commit, recently sued New York City and its police for US$100 million for his wrongful murder conviction. Velazquez may be known by film buffs for his role in the Oscar-nominated film Sing Sing.

Velazquez may be entitled to millions in compensation if he can prove his factual innocence, typically through DNA evidence at the crime scene. Alas, such evidence is often not available.

The United States has paid almost US$4 billion in damages and settlements to 901 people who have been exonerated of crimes since 1989. This history of wrongful convictions is a warped form of American exceptionalism that I document in my new book Justice for Some: A Comparative Examination of Miscarriages of Justice and Wrongful Convictions .

Proving innocence

Proven factual innocence is a powerful, populist idea. It’s easier to understand and more widely accepted than concepts such as miscarriages of justice, conviction safety or judicial error, which are used to address wrongful convictions in many other countries, including England, Canada and countries in continental Europe.

These more generous approaches used outside the United States better respect the fundamental principle of giving people the benefit of reasonable doubt about their guilt.

It’s very difficult to prove factual innocence. In 2016, a New York court held that Velazquez had failed to prove his innocence despite many weaknesses in the case that led to his 2000 murder conviction.

By 2016, two eyewitness who identifed Velazquez as the person who killed a retired New York police officer had recanted. Some witnesses had initially identified the perpetrator as a Black man with long braided hair; Velazquez is Hispanic and had very short hair. Some said the perpetrator used his right hand to shoot the victim; Velazquez is left-handed.

Consistent with the popular appeal of proven factual innocence, Velazquez was freed in 2021 not by the courts but by New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo, with President Joe Biden apologizing to him the following year. They were responding to investigative reporting and new DNA testing that excluded Velazquez from a betting slip that the killer touched.

The fact that politicians who may have been hoping for re-election were ahead of the American courts in exonerating Velazquez reveals a lot about the decline of the rule of law in the United States.

DNA exonerations

Prominent American lawyers Peter Neufeld and Barry Scheck, the founders of the Innocence Project, argued 26 years ago that DNA exonerations were largely a matter of luck. They predicted in a 2000 book that DNA exonerations would eventually dry up as police only use DNA testing in the small minority of crimes where the perpetrator leaves biological evidence at the crime scene.

Scheck and Neufeld may have been overly optimistic about the competence of American police and prosecutors in their book. Post-conviction, DNA-based exonerations, like Velazquez’s, continue to this day.

DNA is a double-edged sword: it offers compelling evidence of innocence while simultaneously raising the threshold for overturning wrongful convictions. In the U.S., the wrongfully convicted are often expected to prove their innocence through DNA, even though many crimes leave no biological evidence and existing samples are frequently mishandled or unavailable. DNA, in short, serves only a fraction of those wrongfully convicted.

Mass imprisonment in China and the U.S.

The country most closely resembling the U.S. in its insistence on proof of factual innocence is the People’s Republic of China.

Like the U.S., China typically remedies miscarriages of justice only after multiple court proceedings. Intervention by politicians also plays a critical role in obtaining justice for the wrongfully convicted, as it did in the Velazquez case. China has also begun providing more generous compensation to those who can prove their factual innocence.

In both countries, generous compensation for the few who can prove factual innocence risks legitimizing unjust systems that harshly punish the many, including those with wrongful convictions but no meaningful path to justice.

American legal reformers have proposed that a right to claim factual innocence should be added to international law. I argue in Justice for Some, however, that proof of factual innocence would have regressive implications in many other parts of the world that correct miscarriages of justice without such onerous proof. In short, factual innocence would provide justice for fewer people.

Factual innocence spreads to England

Countries other than the U.S. and China are not immune from the populist appeal of factual innocence.

Since 2014, England has required proven innocence for compensation. This has drastically reduced compensation payments. It’s even resulted in the denial of compensation to people like Velazquez who have been exonerated by DNA.

Victor Nealon spent 17 years in a British prison after being convicted of attempted rape. His lawyers eventually discovered an unknown person’s DNA on clothing that had not been disclosed by investigators, and his conviction was quashed.

Nealon took his compensation claim to the European Court of Human Rights. It ruled in a divided decision that states can require proven innocence without breaching the presumption of innocence. In essence, this allows the wrongfully accused to be denied compensation without regard to the fundamental legal principle that people are presumed innocent until proven guilty. Factual innocence requirements can spread from compensation to appeals from convictions.

Those who can prove their innocence deserve justice — but justice should not be limited to them alone. Proven innocence rations justice too narrowly.

It may be the best that mass-incarceration societies like the U.S. and China have to offer. But even though factual innocence is popular and easy to grasp, applying this standard broadly across liberal democracies would likely have regressive effects.

Kent Roach is affiliated with the Canadian Registry of Wrongful Conviction. His book received funding to assist in it being published in open access from the Jackman School of Law at the University of Toronto.

#GoodVibesOnly: The shared emotions we don’t quite name

2026-01-25T13:46:04Z

Our contemporary lives are saturated with vibes. You buy an ambient lamp to set a vibe, scroll through shopping sites selling “Tuscan vibes” or walk into a room and instantly sense this party has a buzzing vibe.

Yet when someone asks where the vibe comes from, the answer gets slippery. Is it in the light? Not quite. The light blends into the room, mixing with voices, colours and furniture. It’s not just one thing. Vibe is elusive. It spreads, permeates and connects. It’s in the relationship between things — how people, sounds and materials work together to create a shared feeling.

This is where literary and philosophical thinkers come in. For decades, they’ve explored such elusive sensations — the collective moods that organize everyday life even when we can’t quite name them.

Thinking seriously about vibe reveals something crucial: feeling is a shared form of knowledge shaped by environments — a human experience that may matter more as technology advances.

Long before vibes had a name

The word itself is quite recent. According to the Oxford English Dictionary, vibe appeared in the 1960s as U.S. slang shortened from vibration as a way of describing the emotional charge a person or place gives off.

To say something “has a vibe” is to say your body has vibrated to it in a particular way. It’s not just a thought but a physical adjustment: the space, sound or presence around you has moved you, subtly shifting how you feel.

Philosophers, of course, have long been interested in this same experience, though they called it by a different name. Long before vibe entered everyday speech, thinkers used words like atmosphere or ambience to describe the shared feeling that fills a space and shapes our response to it.

Vibe, in this sense, updates an old philosophical question: how does the world around us make itself felt, not just known?

One of the first modern critics to take this question seriously was Welsh cultural theorist Raymond Williams, who coined the phrase “structure of feeling” in 1954. Williams argued that every historical moment has its own emotional texture; the felt sense of what it’s like to live in that time.

It isn’t a single mood but the background hum of experience that connects people before they can describe it. Think of the buoyant optimism of the 1950s or the political turmoil of the 1960s, similar to what we’re experiencing now. We can sense the mood immediately.

For Williams, this “structure of feeling” made art and culture matter. They recorded not just what people thought but what life felt like.

The business of engineered feeling

A few decades later, German philosopher Gernot Böhme gave this idea a physical body. In The Aesthetics of Atmospheres, he argued that atmosphere is something we encounter, not imagine.

Walk into a cathedral, a café or a store, and the air itself feels different. Your senses are triggered and combine to shape how you experience the ambience. Atmosphere, as Böhme sees it, exists in the space between object and subject, sound and listener, light and body.

Companies and marketers understand this better than anyone. They don’t simply sell objects, they sell worlds of feeling.

Step into a boutique and you’re greeted not by bright displays but by a carefully tuned vibe. The air swirls with fragrance as a salesperson asks if you’d like to sample one. By answering, you fall into the illusion that the perfume alone produces your feeling, when in fact it’s the entire composition — soft jazz, the scent of citrus wood — that moves you.

We are enveloped in these designed environments, and we know that the same scent wouldn’t move us the same way elsewhere.

Brands no longer sell perfume or soap so much as an atmosphere of belonging. They offer a shared world we learn to recognize and desire through our senses. This commercial atmosphere reminds us that our emotional lives are increasingly shaped by design.

Why sensing atmosphere remains human

As artificial intelligence grows ever more capable of performing the tasks we once called creative — writing, composing, painting — it also changes how we think about perception itself.

If machines can analyze patterns and generate words or images, what remains distinctly human may not be our ability to produce things but to feel them. Catching the tone of a voice, noticing how light shifts across a face or sensing the vibe of a room are forms of knowledge no algorithm yet replicates.

That doesn’t mean AI and feeling must be opposites. As we outsource more of our labour to artificial systems, the art of cultivating and interpreting atmosphere may become even more essential.

Learning to name a mood, to notice how spaces and technologies shape emotion, could be one way we stay alert to what connects us as human beings. If AI teaches us efficiency, vibe-thinking teaches us sensitivity. It reminds us that meaning doesn’t live only in data or design but in the air between us — the moods we co-create, the atmospheres we learn to share, the vibe.

Lei Yu does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

Academy Awards 2026: How ‘Hamnet’ will help me lead Shakespeare classes about ‘Hamlet’s’ Ophelia

2026-01-22T18:58:32Z

In 'Hamnet,' Shakespeare's wife, Agnes, (Jessie Buckley) is a healer. (Agata Grzybowska/2025 Focus Features LLC)

When I teach Shakespeare’s play, Hamlet, many students love the character Ophelia, and so do I. But the play seems to silence her just when readers need to know more about how she sees the world and her place in it — especially the young women in my classes.

After all, as Shakespeare critics have noted, Ophelia is a young woman who is bossed around by her brother and her father and slut-shamed and violently rejected by Hamlet — the prince who said he loved her.

Over the centuries, Ophelia appears frequently in popular western culture — recently in the Taylor Swift song of the same name, just as Ophelia imagery is referenced on Swift’s Life of a Showgirl album cover.

Hamlet‘s Ophelia goes mad in the wake of her father’s murder. She ends up falling into a brook and drowning, according to the weirdly poetic account delivered by Queen Gertrude:

“There is a willow grows aslant a brook,

That shows his hoar leaves in the glassy stream;

There with fantastic garlands did she come

Of crow-flowers, nettles, daisies, and long purples …”

Finally, Maggie O’Farrell’s novel Hamnet, and the Hamnet movie that she wrote with director Chloé Zhao — now nominated for eight Academy Awards — have given me something important to share about Ophelia the next time I teach Hamlet.

Trailer for ‘Hamnet.’

Hamnet imagines origins of ‘Hamlet’

Hamnet, novel and movie, tells a compelling story about the origins of the play Hamlet in Shakespeare’s life as O’Farrell and Zhao imagine it, focused on the passionate relationship between Shakespeare and his wife and the tragedy of their son Hamnet’s death from plague at age 11.

The film draws on sparse historical details, such as the name of Shakespeare’s wife Agnes (aka Anne Hathaway) and the known death of one of their children.

The film shows us the shattering grief they felt — and envisions Hamlet as a gift of remembrance for the dead Hamnet, a gift that seems strong enough to begin to heal the broken love between Agnes and William.

But in the book and the movie, the potential healing a work of art can catalyze has roots eleswhere: Agnes’s art of natural healing. From her late mother, a woman said by the locals to have been a “forest witch,” Agnes learned how to gather the flowers and herbs that grow in the forests near Stratford and how to concoct them into medicines able to heal the sick and broken bodies of her neighbours.

Regardless of the historical implausibility of Hamnet, could it possibly tell us something about Hamlet that we don’t already know?

In my analysis as a Shakespeare scholar, the film can open up a new way of seeing, loving and standing up for Ophelia, precisely by seeing Ophelia in dialogue with Hamnet’s Agnes.

Face to face with Ophelia

To understand that story, let’s consider that the theatre Shakespeare and his company made in London around the turn of the 16th century is what I am calling a “thinking machine.”

This idea emerges from collaborative interdisciplinary research I’m doing that brings Shakespeare into conversation about social, environmental and political upheaval and explores the convergence of art, science, technology and human experience.

Why a machine? Like large language models (LLMs) today that train on huge archives of digital data, Shakespeare’s play-making didn’t just draw on previous plays, but also on literary, political and legal language, street talk, sermons, songs — the whole textual and spoken ecosystem of his time and the textual works of earlier ages.

However, unlike LLMs, which use predictive logic to generate what word should follow what word to generate a text, Shakespeare’s plays are human-made mechanisms with meanings that grow larger over time and more complex by way of the creative, networked intelligence of actors and many other interpreters.

Hamlet, itself drawing on a vast trove of literary and cultural works, has generated a multitude of different performances, different critical accounts and thousands of other works of art. The works Hamlet has inspired have also been able to loop back and bring to light aspects of the play that have passed unremarked in earlier interpretations.

Ophelia as healer

Eighteenth and 19th-century Germans, for example, took up Hamlet as a play about their own struggles toward nationhood. Ferdinand Freiligrath wrote a poem “Hamlet” (1844) with the line “Deutschland ist Hamlet.”

John William Waterhouse 1894 painting ‘Ophelia.’ (Wikimedia)

That new way of thinking about the play took root across many European nations. It even ended up giving voice to 20th-century Québecois aspirations toward nationhood in Hubert Aquin’s novel Prochain Épisode.

Hamnet, like other interpretations of Shakespeare’s work, can help advance our understanding of Ophelia, a character who has been at the centre of much feminist scholarship across fields for at least the past 40 years and has been a central concern in theatrical, literary and visual art for far longer.

Taylor Swift’s ‘The Life of a Showgirl’ album cover references earlier artistic depictions of Ophelia. (Wikimedia)

Maggie O’Farrell’s Agnes, brought to life on-screen by Zhao in Hamnet, can begin to bring forward stronger readings of the role of Ophelia.

Building on earlier readings that amplify studies of corruption and governance, we might consider how Ophelia, like Zhao’s Agnes, also sets out to be a healer, but a healer of souls and of the nation itself.

In the play’s Act 4, Opelia’s “mad” talk, heard by ordinary people in the streets, is already stirring the people up against the corrupt monarchy.

Fighting moral disease

The “mad” Ophelia uses herbs and flowers to get at the moral disease that has infected Denmark. Like Hamlet, she is bent on bringing healthy nationhood back to Claudius’s “rotten” state.

The flowers and herbs she offers to the king and queen and to her brother Laertes, or simply imagines she is offering, include, among others, rosemary “for remembrance,” pansies “for thoughts,” and rue, “herb of grace.” They are medicinal drivers of reflection and repentance and offer rich opportunities for symbolic analysis.

But the king and queen don’t heed what the poor “mad” girl has to say, and the play ends with spectacular show of killing and dying. Both Ophelia and Hamlet fail to save Denmark from corruption and death. It is a tragedy, after all.

Let’s consider then that Gertrude’s weird poetic narrative about how Ophelia died was only the first attempt to tell her story.

It falls to me, my students and you to tell it more truthfully for our time — and Hamnet offers a pathway forward.

Paul Yachnin receives funding from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada.

Blaming ‘wine moms’ for ICE protest violence is another baseless, misogynist myth

2026-01-22T17:16:24Z

Following the recent shooting of Renee Good by an agent for Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) in the United States, the Donald Trump administration’s latest narrative suggests that “deluded wine moms” are to blame for the violence in ICE-related demonstrations in Minneapolis and across the country.

This mother-blaming is nothing more than an old trick with a new spin.

Organized gangs of ‘wine moms’

A Fox News columnist recently wrote that “organized gangs of wine moms” are using “antifa tactics” to “harass and impede” ICE activity. In the opinion piece, he claimed that “confusion” over the what constitutes civil disobedience is what “got 37-year-old Renee Good killed.”

Similarly, Vice-President J.D. Vance called Good a “deranged leftist” while a new acronym, AWFUL — Affluent White Female Urban Liberal — has appeared on social media.

In framing protesters like Good, a mother of three, as confused, aggressive and “delusional,” this narrative delegitimizes and pathologizes maternal activism.

This strategy aims to divert blame from the U.S. government and its heavy-handed approach to immigration — which has resulted in yet another slaying of a protester by ICE agents in Minneapolis, this time a male nurse who was reportedly coming to the aid of a female demonstrator — while also drawing on a centuries-old strategy of blaming mothers for social problems.

What makes a ‘wine mom?’

The term “wine mom” emerged over the last two decades as a cultural symbol of the contemporary white, suburban mother who turns to a nightly glass of wine (or two) to cope with the stresses of daily life.

The archetype goes back much further, reflected in literature, film and television characters, such as the wily Lucille Bluth of Arrested Development.

A clip from ‘Arrested Development’ featuring Lucille Bluth’s fondness for boozing.

Yet, this motif is less light-hearted than assumed: a recent systematic review reveals a strong link between maternal drinking and stress, especially for working mothers.

While it would be easy to view problematic drinking as another example of maternal failure, it is important not to. Here’s why.

Mother-blame in history

Throughout history, mothers have found themselves in the midst of what American sociologist Linda Blum calls a “mother-valor/mother-blame binary.”

When behaving in accordance with socially acceptable and desirable parameters — that is with warmth, femininity and selflessness — mothers are viewed as “good.” When mothers violate these norms, whether by choice, circumstance or by virtue of their race or class position, they’re “bad mothers.”

Mother-blame ultimately reflects the belief that mothers are solely responsible for their children’s behaviour and outcomes, along with the cultural tendency to blame them when things go wrong. Yet, as Blum points out, “mother-blame also serves as a metaphor for a range of political fears.”

Perhaps the most striking example of this is the suffrage movement, which represented a direct challenge to patriarchal notions that women belonged in the domestic sphere and lacked the intelligence to engage in political discourse.

Suffragettes in the United Kingdom — many of them mothers — occasionally used extreme tactics, such as window-smashing and arson, while women in the U.S. obstructed traffic and waged hunger strikes.

These activists were framed as threatening to not only the establishment, but also to families and the moral fabric of society.

Ironically, despite the fact that women’s entry into politics led to increased spending and improved outcomes related to women, children, families and health care, scholars have found that mother-blaming was as common after the women’s movement as it was before.

Contemporary mother-blame

Beyond political matters, contemporary mother-blame is rampant in other domains.

Mothers have been blamed for a wide variety of their children’s psychological problems, including anxiety, depression and inherited trauma. In media and literature, mothers are often blamed for criminality and violence, reflecting the notion that “mothers make monsters.”
When children struggle in school, educators and administrators may blame the mother. Mothers risk being called “too passive” if they don’t advocate for their children or “too aggressive” when they do.

Similarly, the “crazy woman” or “hysterical mother” is a well-known trope in custody law, and mothers may be blamed even when their children are abused by others. Mass shootings? Mom’s failure. The list goes on.

By setting up mothering as a high-stakes endeavour, the cultural norm of mother-blame also serves to “divide and conquer.”

In my sociology research, I found that mothers on Facebook worked to align themselves with like-minded “superior” mothers, while distancing themselves from perceived “inferior” mothers. This feeds into the cultural norm of “combative mothering,” which pits mothers against each other.

An old trick with a new spin

The “wine mom” narrative builds on this historical pattern of mother-blame. It is meant to trivialize, delegitimize, divide and denigrate mothers who are, in fact, well-organized and motivated activists concerned for their communities.

While there are legitimate concerns around maternal drinking as a coping mechanism, the “wine mom” label has begun to represent something different. Mothers are reclaiming the title to expand their cause.

As @sara_wiles, promoting the activist group @redwineblueusa stated on Instagram: “They meant to scare us back into the kitchen, but our actual response is, ‘Oh, I want to join!’”

We should acknowledge that rather than causing societal problems, mothers have a long history of trying to fix them, even if imperfectly. Mothers like Renee Good are no exception.

Darryn DiFrancesco does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

Health and competence are shaping Trump’s presidency. What about his predecessors?

2026-01-22T14:54:56Z

One year into U.S. President Donald Trump’s second term, questions about his health and competence are as pervasive as the gilt sprawling through the Oval Office.

These questions grew even louder following his rambling speech this week at Davos, where he repeatedly referred to Greenland as Iceland, falsely claimed the United States gave the island back to Denmark during the Second World War and boasted that only recently, NATO leaders had been lauding his leadership (“They called me ‘daddy,’ right?”).

Do swollen ankles and whopping hand bruises signal other serious problems? Do other Davos-like distortions and ramblings — plus a tendency to fall asleep during meetings — reveal mental decline even more startling than Joe Biden’s in the final couple of years of his presidency?

This is not the first time in White House history that American citizens have had concerns about the health of their president — nor the first time that historians like me have raised questions.

The experiences of Trump’s predecessors remind us of the dangers inherent in the inevitable human frailty of the very powerful.

Presidents with physical health issues

Frailty can entail crises in physical health like William Henry Harrison’s 1841 death from pneumonia 32 days after his inauguration or Warren G. Harding’s heart attack and death in 1923.

Frailty can also involve weaknesses in brain function, which impact the capacity for analysis and problem-solving.

Bodily trauma can have obvious effects on presidential competence. Sometimes it’s a temporary impact, as with Dwight D. Eisenhower’s 1955 heart attack and recovery. But sometimes it’s permanent: Woodrow Wilson never recovered his capacities after an October 1919 stroke, with White House leadership languishing for 18 months under his wife’s gatekeeping until his death.

In other cases, the effect of physical ailments on competence was less clear — and therefore debatable. Franklin D. Roosevelt’s heart problems during the Second World War grew serious enough to contribute to his April 1945 death. Did they also compromise his mental capacities during the controversial Yalta Conference?

Did John F. Kennedy’s undisclosed Addison’s disease and medication regimes affect his ability to navigate major challenges like the Cuban Missile Crisis or Vietnam?

Mental health concerns

There have also been debates about the possible competence consequences of the behavioural tendencies and mental health conditions of several American presidents:

• Did Abraham Lincoln’s bouts of deep depression affect leadership capacities during multiple Civil War crises, including the Union defeat at Chancellorsville in May 1863 or during cabinet conflicts?

• Did Theodore Roosevelt’s impulsivity help shape what even his secretary of state once privately called the “rape” of Colombia in order to build the Panama Canal? (Harvard psychologist and philosopher William James said Roosevelt was “still mentally in the Sturm und Drang period of early adolescence”).

• Did Richard Nixon’s periodically high stress levels and alcohol consumption influence his decision-making on the Cambodian incursion of 1970 or the Watergate crisis?

Questions and concerns about Trump’s physical and mental health, then, aren’t unique — even if the causes for concern are far more numerous than they were for previous presidents.

The impact of physical health on competence seems the less urgent of worrisome issues. While the Trump presidency as a whole has been notoriously prone to dishonesty, exaggeration and avoidance, the current medical team seems to be offering reasonable transparency.

Tests have been identified — for example, an October 2025 CT scan to assess potential heart issues — and relatively non-alarming diagnoses have been offered (“perfectly normal” CT scan results; common “chronic venous insufficiency” is responsible for swollen ankles).

More troubling is Trump’s mental health — both his full cognitive capacities and his psychological profile.

Cognitive issues?

In 2018 and 2025, Trump was given the Montreal Cognitive Assessment (MoCA) a screening tool for possible dementia. Despite the president’s claim to having “aced” the test, his score has not been revealed.

Numbers matter here. Out of a maximum 30 points, scores below 25 suggest mild to severe cognitive issues.

Of equal importance, the MoCA provides no insight into markers of mental competence, like reasoning and problem-solving. Well-established test batteries cover such ground (the Wechsler Adult Intelligence Scale is widely used), but Trump has not likely worked through any. (Neither, to be sure, have any predecessors — though none have raised the concerns so evident in 2026.)

Unofficial diagnoses of personality characteristics also fuel debate about Trump’s competence and mental health. The scale of the president’s ego is a prime example of concern.

Psychological issues?

On one hand, in the absence of intensive in-person assessment, psychiatrists are understandably reluctant to apply the label of “narcissistic personality disorder” (NPD) as defined by the American Psychiatric Association’s Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM). On the other hand, many observers are also understandably struck by how Trump’s behaviour matches the DSM’s checklist of symptoms for the disorder.

The president clearly displays the grandiose sense of self-importance seen as a primary marker. Trump’s “I alone” and “I could shoot someone on Fifth Avenue” boasts of earlier years have grown exponentially by 2025-26. He’s depicted himself as pope or “King Trump” bombing protesters.

More serious are his endless and false claims that he won the 2020 presidential election, that he has the right to torch constitutional norms like “due process” that are enabling ICE abuses in Minneapolis and elsewhere, and that he can disregard the need for congressional approval on policies like reducing cancer research and other health programs.

Trump’s declaration that only “my morality” will determine his defiance of international laws and standards (as in threats to Greenland and Canada and his actual invasion of Venezuela) are also deeply troubling, especially given serious questions about that morality in terms of the Jeffrey Epstein files.

Psychiatrists also associate NPD with a sense of open-ended entitlement. Comic examples emerge: rebranding the (now) “Donald J. Trump and John F. Kennedy Center,” his lack of embarrassment in relishing the absurd FIFA Peace Prize or María Corina Machado’s surrender of her Nobel Peace Prize.

Brazenness

Trump’s willingness to trample upon rights within the U.S. and his apparent eagerness to disrupt and dismantle the building blocks of the post-Second World War international order are also possible signs of psychological problems.

He is equally brazen in fostering the wealth of his family and friends: for example, accepting emoluments like multi-million dollar donations for a White House ballroom that will surely be given Trump branding (to compete with the Lincoln Bedroom?) and using Oval Office prestige to turbo-charge massive real estate and financial ventures.

The Trump family’s World Liberty Financial cryptocurrency enterprise “earned” more than $1 billion in 2025, after all.

Against the backdrop of the looming mid-term elections, Trump’s ever-compounding ego and appetites remain of burning concern — along with his overall physical health and mental competence. Other presidents faced similar questions even without the current storm of scandals and extremes.

Will Trump relish the distinction of leaving his predecessors in the dust on this front too?

In the past, Ronald W. Pruessen has received funding from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada.

How the ocean’s hydrothermal systems made the first life on Earth possible

2026-01-22T13:58:43Z

A black smoker hydrothermal vent at a water depth of 3,300 meters in the Logatchev Hydrothermal Field on the Mid-Atlantic Ridge. (Zentrum für Marine Umweltwissenschaften, Universität Bremen), CC BY

Our planet is unique for its ability to sustain abundant life. From studies of the rock record, scientists believe life had already emerged on Earth at least 3.5 billion years ago and probably much earlier.

But how a habitable environment developed, and how the very first life emerged on the early Earth, remain puzzling. One of the big challenges for Earth to be habitable in its infancy was the weak solar energy it received.

Astrophysical models indicate that the sun had only about 70 per cent of its current luminosity when the Earth was born around 4.5 billion years ago. That would have resulted in Earth’s surface being frozen until around two billion years ago.

Nonetheless, scientific investigations indicate the Earth had warm oceans and habitable environments as early as 4.4 billion years ago. This contradiction is known as the faint young sun paradox.

Solving this paradox and the generation of the first life both involve a key chemical compound — ammonia. But the source of ammonia on the early Earth before biological nitrogen processing emerged remains unknown.

Colleagues in China and my research group at the University of Alberta recently published our study of minerals deposited from hydrothermal fluids in oceanic crusts drilled from the South China Sea basin. We discovered that mineral-catalyzed chemical reactions in underwater hydrothermal systems can produce the necessary ingredients for a habitable world and life on Earth.

Hypothesis of the origin of life

An explainer on hydrothermal vents (Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution)

Earth’s first life is hypothesized to be generated by a series of abiotic processes, also known as abiogenesis. Under this hypothesis, the building blocks of the first life were synthezised on Earth from basic inorganic compounds by abiotic reactions, or were brought to here by meteorites.

In 1953, American chemist Stanley Miller, then a graduate student working with Nobel Prize laureate Harold Urey at the University of Chicago, discovered production of amino acids in his experiments simulating lightning in an early-Earth atmosphere composed of water moisture and several gases (methane, ammonia and hydrogen molecules).

These life-building blocks could subsequently deposit into the ocean for life development. This ground-breaking discovery by Miller implied that abiogenesis of life on Earth is possible.

Gases like methane, ammonia and hydrogen were not only essential compounds for synthesis of organic matter in Miller’s experiments. They are also key ingredients to establishing a habitable environment on early Earth.

They have all been proposed as potential contributors, either directly as greenhouse gases or indirectly as amplifiers of other greenhouse gases, to warm up early Earth’s surface under the faint young sun.

Where did these gases come from?

A problem, though, is that these gases were not the primary components on early Earth’s surface in the first place. Instead, the dominant forms of carbon and nitrogen were carbon dioxide and dinitrogen.

That means the very first step toward making Earth habitable and generating the first life had to be inorganic reactions to turn carbon dioxide into methane and dinitrogen into ammonia, also known as abiotic carbon and nitrogen reduction reactions.

Where and how did these reduction reactions take place?

The world’s ocean floors contain abundant hydrothermal systems where cold seawater flows into deep oceanic crust and subsequently mixes with ascending magmatic fluids. The mixed hot fluids are emitted back through hydrothermal vents such as black smokers or white smokers.

Along this pathway, water and dissolved components can react with primary minerals in the oceanic crust to produce secondary minerals and other byproducts. Methane and dihydrogen, formed by mineral-catalyzed abiotic reduction reactions during this process, have been widely observed in the emitted hydrothermal fluids.

Therefore, underwater hydrothermal systems have been considered as the most likely incubator for habitable environment and the origin of life.

A brief overview of the role hydrothermal vents play in starting life on Earth. (TED-Ed)

Searching for evidence

Yet there still exists a missing piece in this picture: the abiotic reduction of dinitrogen has not been confirmed to occur in hydrothermal systems. Scientists have searched hard for evidence of this reaction, abiotic ammonia, but have had no luck so far.

The ammonia (mostly in its dissolved form, ammonium ion) that has been detected in hydrothermal fluids collected from active vent mouths turned out to be mainly biological and not abiotic in origin.

The relatively small amount of abiotic ammonium there might be can easily be concealed by the large amount of biological ammonium in seawater. It is impossible to avoid seawater contamination while collecting submarine hydrothermal fluid samples.

However, secondary minerals deposited from hydrothermal fluids can lock some ammonium into their internal structures and protect it from being contaminated by shallow seawater and mixing with biological ammonium. Therefore, studying secondary minerals in the deep oceanic crust can better unravel the ammonium source and producing mechanism in the deep hydrothermal systems.

However, such samples are not easily to collect. The International Ocean Discovery Program has made tremendous efforts to drill deep into the oceanic crust to collect samples. Luckily, a set of secondary mineral samples were discovered in a 200-metre drill core from the South China Sea.

A missing piece of the puzzle

For our study, we looked into a specific chemical feature, namely nitrogen isotopes, for the ammonium locked in the hydrothermal minerals.

Nitrogen has two isotopes with atomic mass 14 and 15, respectively. Mineral-catalyzed abiotic dinitrogen reduction strongly prefers to use the one with an atomic mass of 14. That results in a unique nitrogen isotope signature in the ammonium it produces.

Our results are consistent with this isotopic signature. This demonstrates production of ammonia or ammonium by abiotic dinitrogen reduction in underwater hydrothermal systems.

This discovery adds a missing piece of puzzle to our theories about the origins of life on Earth. These underwater hydrothermal systems at the bottom of the ocean enabled the first-step reactions of all life-constituting elements on our planet.

Long Li receives funding from Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada.

When young adults can’t afford independence, family expectations fill the gap — from China’s ‘leftover women’ to Canada’s pressured youth

2026-01-22T13:37:04Z

I met Lufang Chen, a 30-year-old bank clerk based in the Fujian province of China, in 2016, after she had married a man she initially turned down years earlier. Although she preferred to remain single, and he was not her type anyway, she gave in to avoid the label “leftover woman.”

The derogatory and stigmatizing term “leftover woman” — or Sheng nü in Chinese — is used to describe one’s social status and refers to women in their late 20s and beyond who have never married. The label suggests these women have failed to “sell” themselves on the marriage market at the “best” time and have therefore become leftover products that are depreciating rapidly.

At the time I was conducting interviews for my book on the lived experiences of these women — Leftover Women in China: Understanding Legal Consciousness through Intergenerational Relationships — released last August, Chen told me she married out of an obligation to live up to parental expectations:

“I only got married to free my parents from the pressure imposed on them by gossipy, nosy relatives, as well as to ease their worries about my future. After all, my parents have sacrificed so much and are always ready to do everything for me.”

Chen was especially grateful to her parents for buying her an apartment when she could barely cover her living expenses. Her parents were also prepared to provide child care once, not if, she had a child.

What this story reveals is not simply a cultural expectation around marriage, but how parental financial support can reshape the autonomy of young adults.

Structural forces and family dynamics in China

In recent decades, the extreme unaffordability of housing in urban China has made it almost impossible for young adults to purchase a home without financial support from their parents. Meanwhile, as inflexible work schedules and overtime have become the norm, grandparenting has become crucial to ensuring young adults can focus on their careers.

Leftover Women in China demonstrates how the downflow of family resources — from the older generation to the young, including housing and child care support — results in a sense of guilt and provides the justification for parental intervention in marital decisions.

This phenomenon ultimately reduces effective communication among family members and marginalizes the desires of young adults.

Many of these so-called “leftover women” don’t feel it’s appropriate to openly discuss or negotiate marital choices and childbearing with their parents. Instead, a sense of guilt prompts these daughters to focus on perceptions of parental expectations that prioritize their parents’ desires and often go even beyond what their parents explicitly request.

Canadian classrooms reveal family pressure

Eventually, as a university professor, I noticed this type of parent-child interaction also appears in the West, including Canadian society.

Take students’ academic performance and career decisions, for example. I observed a strong sense of guilt and desire to repay parents, especially among students of mine whose parents have endured hardship or offered unconditional support.

Students from immigrant families have frequently mentioned pressure to succeed academically. When I asked about their motivations, they often responded by saying they want to live up to parental expectations. This sense of duty seemed especially strong among students whose parents were highly qualified professionals in their home countries and now work long hours in manual or unskilled labour to provide for their families.

As Vivian Louie, professor of urban policy and planning at Hunter College, suggests, immigrant parents’ sacrifices often motivate their children to excel academically. This is also supported by a socio-legal study on responsibility, love and guilt in Latino mixed-status families.

Over the years, many students have told me their parents don’t need to explicitly ask them to pursue a lucrative career, nor have they necessarily discussed it with them. Instead, students pick up cues from societal and community perceptions of success to make their parents proud.

When parental support becomes essential

This phenomenon, however, is not limited to students with immigrant backgrounds. A sociological study on career decisions of Harvard law students reveals that students from low-income or working-class backgrounds frequently felt that failure to obtain a lucrative position would let their families down due to the financial sacrifices their family members have made for them.

The more I spoke with my students, the more I realized that Canadian young adults are facing increasing parental intervention in particular due to the persistence of inflation and housing unaffordability.

More of them than ever before are living with their parents well into their 20s to reduce costs. For many, this has become a necessity rather than a choice.

According to a 2025 Statistics Canada report, financial support from parents for down payments has become both crucial and widespread among young homeowners. In British Columbia, for example, average parental financial support for a first-home down payment exceeds $200,000.

It’s true that collectivist culture in Chinese society contributes to the desire for “leftover women” to meet parental expectations and prioritize their needs and interests. But my observations in Canadian classrooms suggest that parental financial support — combined with the sacrifices they make for their children — can also cultivate guilt among young adults in individualist cultures like Canada.

Qian Liu receives funding from the International Development Research Centre and the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council.

Mark Carney’s Davos speech marks a major departure from Canada’s usual approach to the U.S.

2026-01-21T22:37:03Z

It was a moment of global clarity. Prime Minister Mark Carney’s speech to the world’s political and economic elite gathered in Davos this week described global realities, past and present, with a candour and nuance rarely heard from a serving politician.

The message was twofold.

First, Carney made clear that the world has changed, and the old comfortable ways of global politics are not coming back. Those who wait for sanity to return are waiting in vain. We are in a world increasingly shaped by the threat and the use of hard power. All states must accept that reality.

Despite this, Carney’s second and more hopeful message was that while the globally powerful may act unilaterally, others — notably “middle powers” like Canada — are not helpless.

By finding ways to co-operate on areas of shared interest, states like Canada can pool their limited resources to build what amounts to a flexible network of co-operative ties. Taken together, they can provide an alternative to simply rolling over and tolerating whatever great powers like the United States dole out.

There’s also little choice in the matter if countries want to remain independent. As he eloquently put it: “If we’re not at the table, we’re on the menu.”

From ‘elbows up’ to capitulation and back

The speech represented a remarkable departure from Canada’s usual approach to its relationship its neighbour to the south.

For all the talk of “elbows up” during the 2025 federal election campaign, the Carney government has been somewhat ambivalent since then. It’s placed its hopes in achieving a renewed trading relationship and normalized relations with the U.S. through a combination of good faith negotiations and a steady stream of conciliatory gestures on issues that seemed to matter most to U.S. President Donald Trump.

That resulted in Canada committing significant funds to combat a largely non-existent fentanyl trafficking problem and to meet American demands for increased military funding. At times the conciliation verged on placation, as when Canada unilaterally ended relatiatory tariffs on American goods to no discernible effect.

This strategy clearly was not working, however, as Carney made clear in Davos.

While neither America, nor Trump, were mentioned by name, there’s no doubt who’s driving the dramatic global changes Carney was describing. At times the veneer became very thin as Carney reiterated Canada’s support for the sovereignty of Greenland as a territory of Denmark.

In fact, the speech was remarkably blunt in its rebuke of America’s foreign policy during Trump’s second term, drawing attention, as others have, to how U.S. actions leave almost everyone, including Americans, worse off.

Trump’s response

That not-so-subtle barb was not lost on the audience, either in the room or across the Atlantic in the White House.

Trump wasted little time in firing back in the manner and style the world has become accustomed to. During his own address to the World Economic Forum the next day, Trump delivered a rambling and at times confusing speech.

He reiterated his intent to annex Greenland while confusing the island multiple times with neighbouring and also sovereign Iceland, and he took time to single out Carney by name.

“Canada lives because of the United States,” he said. “Remember that, Mark, next time you make your statements.”

The comments provided helpful proof of Carney’s argument, demonstrating the naked threat of power by the American president to coerce its neighbour and ostensible ally. It revealed the kind of “gangster” mindset we see often from Trump, as he effectively said: “Nice country, Mark. Be a shame if something happened to it.”

Critique of past

As blunt as Carney’s assessment of the present was — that the rules-based, liberal international order has faded away — in some ways his critique of the past was even more remarkable. The prime minister spoke with a candour one wouldn’t expect to find at the podium at Davos.

Effectively, Carney correctly characterized the old order as one defined as much by its hypocrisy as by its rules. He acknowledged that countries like Canada benefited from a system in which rules are applied unevenly, and superpowers continue to shape outcomes.

This idea, along with the need to look ahead in order to survive a new order, appeared to underpin Carney’s exhortation not to mourn the rapidly vanishing old order.

Carney clearly hopes a new system may emerge that is not only more resilient to diverse and unpredictable threats, but is more honest and just.

By finding common ground on shared issues, middle powers can act in accordance with their own values and interests, instead of deferring to the proclaimed values of global power that are frequently violated in practice. Power will always matter, but it doesn’t have to be all that matters.

History in the making?

Carney’s Davos remarks were powerful by any measure. But will he back up his words with action in the months and years ahead?

His speech was met with a rousing standing ovation, and has justly received plaudits from around the world for its clear-eyed description of a less forgiving world order and its vision for how states like Canada can continue to thrive within it.

Whether it proves a speech for the ages, however, depends on what happens next. If Canada is serious about charting a new path, distinct from the great powers of the world, it must do more than talk. Acts like deploying symbolic forces to Greenland if necessary will show a seriousness of purpose. Canada cannot expect others to stand with it if it doesn’t stand with them.

Similarly, Canada must reject schemes like Trump’s “board of peace,” a thinly disguised attempt to replace institutions of global governance with a body composed by and serving at the president’s whim.

Carney has captured the world’s attention with this speech. There’s a lot hanging on what he does with that attention.

Trump’s annexation of Greenland seemed imminent. Now it’s on much shakier ground

2026-01-21T20:24:34Z

Looking at headlines around the world, it seemed like United States President Donald Trump’s annexation of Greenland was imminent. Buoyed by the success of his military operation to oust Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro, Trump ratcheted up his rhetoric and threatened tariffs on any nation that opposed him.

Adding insult to injury, he openly mocked European leaders by posting their private messages and sharing an AI-generated image of himself raising the American flag over Greenland.

But behind these headlines a different story has emerged that has likely forced Trump to back down on using military force against Greenland and to drop threatened tariffs against Europe.

Trump’s military threats had toxic polling numbers with the American public. His Republican allies openly threatened to revolt. European countries are sending reinforcements to Greenland, hiking the costs of any potential invasion. And Europeans started to contemplate what economic retaliation might look like.

Far from being inevitable, Trump’s Greenland gambit is now on shaky ground.

No good options

Trump has three options to take control of Greenland: diplomacy, money and military force. The latest diplomatic talks collapsed as Greenland and Denmark’s foreign ministers left the White House in “fundamental disagreement” over the future of the territory.

Simply buying the territory is a non-starter. Greenlanders have already said the territory is not for sale, and U.S. Congress is unwilling to foot the bill. That’s left military force, the worst possible option.

It’s difficult to convey in words just how stunningly unpopular this option is with Americans. A recent Ipsos poll found that just four per cent of Americans believe using military force to take Greenland is a good idea.

To put that in perspective, here are some policies that are more popular:

Billionaires should pay less tax (five per cent)
Pardoning convicted drug trafficker and Honduran President Juan Orlando Hernandez (13 per cent)
Government book bans (14 per cent)
Stopping the release of all the Jeffrey Epstein files (seven per cent).

If your official foreign policy is less popular than pardoning drug traffickers, then your foreign policy might be in trouble.

Sensing this unpopularity, Trump has already begun to walk back his military threats. Using his platform at Davos, he claimed “I don’t have to use force. I don’t want to use force. I won’t use force.” He also said he and NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte have “formed the framework of a future deal with respect to Greenland.”

It’s too early to tell whether Trump is being sincere. Not long after claiming to be the “president of peace,” he was invading Venezuela and bombing Iran.

The broader point is that if diplomacy has failed, money is a non-starter, and now military action is ostensibly being taken off the table, then Trump has no good options.

The danger of defections

Trump’s political coalition, in fact, is increasingly fragile and in danger of defections. The Republican House majority has shrunk to a razor-thin margin, and Republicans are already signalling a loud break with Trump over Greenland.

Nebraska congressman Don Bacon recently told USA Today: “There’s so many Republicans mad about this … If he went through with the threats, I think it would be the end of his presidency.”

The situation in the Senate looks even worse. Multiple Republican senators have pledged to oppose any annexation, with Thom Tillis and Lisa Murkowski visiting Copenhagen to reassure the Danish government. With enough defections, U.S. congress could sharply curtail Trump’s plans and force a humiliating climb-down.

There’s yet another danger of defection. Senior military officers can resign, retire or object to the legality of orders to attack America’s NATO allies. Just last year, Adm. Alvin Holsey, the leader of U.S. Southern Command, abruptly retired less than year into what is typically a multi-year posting.

Holsey’s departure came amid reports that he was questioning the legality of U.S. boat strikes in the Caribbean. Americans still have a high level of confidence in the military, so when senior officers suddenly leave, it can set off alarm bells.

Creating a tripwire

In recent days, Denmark and its European allies have rushed to send military reinforcements to Greenland. These forces, however, would have no hope of defeating a committed American invasion. So why are they there?

In strategic studies, we call this a “tripwire force.” The reasoning is that any attack on this force will create strong pressure at home for governments to respond. If Danes and Swedes — and other Europeans for that matter — saw their soldiers being captured or killed, it would force their governments to escalate the conflict and retaliate against the United States.

The Trump administration would like to seize Greenland, face no European forces and suffer no consequences. But the entire point of a tripwire force is to deny easy wins and to signal that any attack would be met with costly escalation. It creates a price to invading Greenland for an administration that rarely wants to pay for anything.

The B-word

Amid the Trump administration’s economic and sovereignty threats, people are forced to grapple with what comes next. European governments are already quietly debating retaliation, including diplomatic, military and economic responses.

Chief among these is the European Union’s Anti-Coercion Instrument, colloquially known as the “trade bazooka,” that could significantly curb America’s access to the EU market.

But for ordinary Europeans, a different B-word will come to mind: boycott.

Some Europeans began boycotting U.S. goods last year amid Trump’s trade threats — but never to the same level as Canadians. That could quickly change if the U.S. engages in a stunning betrayal of its European allies. Fresh anger and outrage could see Europeans follow Canada’s lead.

Trump repeatedly threatened Canada with annexation, and it triggered a transformation of Canadian consumer habits. Canadians travel to the U.S. less, buy less American food and alcohol and look for more home-grown alternatives. Despite Canada’s small population, these boycotts have caused pain for U.S. industries.

Now imagine a similar scenario with the EU. In 2024, the U.S. exported almost US$665 billion in goods and services to the EU. It’s one of the largest export markets for the U.S., fuelling thousands of jobs and businesses.

The real danger for American companies, however, is when consumer pressure moves upwards to governments and corporations. European governments and corporations who buy from American giants like Microsoft, Google and Boeing will start to see public pressure to buy European — or at least not American. America’s most valuable corporate brands risk being contaminated by the stigma of the U.S. government.

Will he, won’t he?

None of this will stop the Trump administration from trying. Trump’s own words — that there is “no going back” on his plans for Greenland — ensure he’s backed himself into corner.

The more likely scenario seems to be starting to play out — Trump will try and then fail. His threats to annex Greenland will likely be remembered next to “90 trade deals in 90 days” and “repeal and place” in the pantheon of failed Trump policies.

The tragedy here is not simply a Trump administration with desires that consistently exceeds its grasp. It’s that the stain of betraying America’s closest allies will linger long after this administration is gone.

Eric Van Rythoven does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

Ending dementia stigma could change its trajectory: Cancer’s history shows why

2026-01-21T19:35:30Z

At a recent party, another guest, a nurse, asked what I do for a living. I explained that as a health policy researcher, my work focuses on helping health-care systems co-ordinate care for dementia as effectively as for major conditions like cancer, diabetes or stroke. She stopped me mid-sentence.

“I don’t think you should use cancer as a comparison,” she said. “Cancer doesn’t have the stigma that dementia has. Most cancers can be treated and cured. Dementia can’t. You just can’t compare the two.”

The conversation brought to the forefront that dementia today occupies the same stigmatized, system-neglected space that cancer did half a century ago. And history shows us that stigma, not simply the absence of cures, delays progress.

This article is part of our series The Grey Revolution. The Conversation Canada/La Conversation invites you to explore the impact of the aging boomer generation on Canadian society, including housing, working, culture, eating, travelling and health care … discover with us the upheavals underway, and those to come.

Dementia taboos mirror cancer

Before the 1970s, a cancer diagnosis was widely considered a death sentence. Most physicians did not disclose the diagnosis, despite surveys showing the majority of patients wanted to know. Doctors said they concealed the truth to avoid “taking away hope” and because families preferred that patients remain unaware.

The word cancer itself was taboo. Euphemisms like “a growth” or “the Big C” were used, if the illness was discussed at all. Cancer carried the stain of shame, seen by some as a sign of personal weakness, and still does, particularly in the case of certain types of cancers like lung or liver cancer. Others viewed it as karma or divine punishment. People with cancer were quietly excluded, so much so that obituaries rarely listed cancer as the cause of death.

Sound familiar? It should.

A 2022 Canadian survey of family physicians found that 75 per cent provided care to a patient with cognitive impairment whom they had not yet informed of a diagnosis. The reasons varied: families or patients preferred not to know; clinicians felt they had no meaningful treatment to offer; or they feared “labelling” patients.

We still use dismissive expressions like “senior moment” in reference to symptoms of dementia. The word dementia itself literally translates to “out of one’s mind.” In many cultures, dementia is considered shameful and thought to be the result of witchcraft or punishment for a previous wrongdoing.

And the social exclusion is real. Dementia advocate Kate Swaffer calls it “prescribed disengagement,” the sense that society quietly ushers people with dementia out of public life.

Cancer did not change its stigma entirely because it became curable. It became curable faster because stigma was specifically being addressed and advocacy co-ordinated to push for funding and system change.

Stigma and system gaps preceded cancer breakthrough era

In fact, the first class of cancer treatments — options like surgery, chemotherapy, radiotherapy and early hormonal therapies — were introduced as far back as the 1940s, but their survival benefits were modest, much like the first generation of Alzheimer’s drugs today.

Because stigma around cancer was so entrenched, people avoided screening, delayed seeking help or refused treatment altogether, reinforcing poor outcomes and deepening the stigma.

Subsequent breakthroughs, like targeted therapies and other transformative drugs of the 1990s and 2010s, did change survival dramatically. But they landed in a landscape that had already been reshaped by something else: system co-ordination, focused, public stigma-reducing campaigns and a dramatic shift in cancer research funding.

Advocacy built the foundation for cancer system change

Starting in the 1970s, through co-ordinated advocacy led by advocates like Mary Lasker, governments began large-scale injections of research funds for cancer, built organized screening programs, launched public awareness campaigns, created standardized care pathways and invested in co-ordinating care infrastructure .

Moving cancer out of silence and into public conversations also altered clinical behaviour. Physicians increasingly disclosed diagnoses and encouraged early diagnosis, enabling earlier intervention. Survivorship became part of the narrative. Anti-discrimination frameworks strengthened. Cancer came to be understood through a public health lens rather than a moral one.

By the time highly effective therapies emerged, the system and society was far more ready for them.

Building conditions for change in dementia care

If we want the same for dementia, we need the same foundations: Co-ordinated care pathways with the infrastructure to support it, disclosure norms, national and provincial leadership bodies and ongoing public education campaigns with government backing.

I am an optimist at heart. The fact that my dinner companion now sees cancer as relatively destigmatized is, paradoxically, a sign of hope. It shows how profoundly public understanding can change within a generation.

To shift the stigma means a shift in access to care and the system itself.
Cancer shows us that stigma reduction isn’t accidental. It is created through leadership, investment and system design. Dementia deserves nothing less.

Saskia Sivananthan is affiliated with the Brainwell Institute, a dementia focused policy think tank

Fear at work is a hidden safety risk — and it helps explain why hazards go unreported

2026-01-21T17:42:14Z

Psychological safety — the belief that it is safe to speak up with concerns, questions or mistakes — is widely recognized as essential for organizational learning, innovation and workplace safety.

Yet its absence — interpersonal fear — is rarely examined in investigations of serious workplace incidents. My new research on workplace fatalities, conducted with several co-researchers, suggests this missing factor may help explain why hazards so often go unidentified or unreported.

We surveyed more than 4,600 workers and analyzed thousands of incident reports across five mine sites and over 100 mining and contractor companies. We asked workers: “Why aren’t hazards identified or reported?”

We found that interpersonal fear — the perception that speaking up or challenging the status quo will lead to humiliation or punishment — was one of the strongest predictors of silence. Workers who were more likely to be fearful were also more likely to withhold information.

A pattern we’ve seen before

Our recent findings echo earlier research I conducted following a fatal mining accident near Fort McMurray, Alta., in 2017, when a Suncor employee fell through ground softened by a leaking tailings pipeline and was unable to free himself.

I led a team analyzing geohazards associated with working around oilsands tailings ponds. During a safety workshop that concluded the two-year investigation, my co-researchers and I asked the attendees to answer the same question — “Why are hazards not identified or reported?”

We expected technical responses, but instead, they focused overwhelmingly on human and organizational factors: lack of training, fear, inappropriate risk tolerances, external pressures, cultural inaction and complacency.

The predominance of fear shocked us. Workers described being more afraid of the social consequences of reporting hazards than of the hazards themselves. As a result, they were putting their own lives at risk.

Our newer, larger study confirms this pattern at scale. Using machine-learning techniques, we were better able to identify where fear was most likely to flourish, its organizational causes and consequences and how it undermines companies.

We found management dismissiveness, a lack of managerial action or follow-up and a lack of training were more likely to cause fear — especially among contractors — and suppress hazard identification and reporting.

Fear isn’t limited to the frontline

Employees lower in company hierarchies tend to experience less psychological safety. But senior leaders are not immune to it either. They can encounter situations where raising concerns feels risky, particularly in executive settings where disagreement can be interpreted as “too political,” disloyal or a sign of weakness.

Leadership scholar Amy Edmondson’s research helps explain this dynamic. Her psychological safety matrix shows that fear flourishes when high performance standards are combined with low psychological safety.

In teams with high levels of psychological safety and highly challenging tasks and standards, she found employees are curious and engaged problem-solvers. However, when the same high standards exist without psychological safety (where people believe that they might be punished or humiliated for speaking up), anxiety prevails.

The goal is to have your team experience the first scenario. Because psychological safety operates at the team level, organizations can have multiple teams doing similar high-risk work with dramatically different outcomes, depending on whether people feel safe enough to speak up.

Creating safer systems starts with leadership

Since interpersonal fear is shaped by perception, it doesn’t matter whether leaders believe they are approachable; what matters is whether their teams think they are. If employees are spending more time worrying about managing impressions than operations, hazards go unreported and people are unknowingly put at risk.

Creating safer workplaces requires cultures where speaking up is not punished, dismissed or discouraged. Leaders can start by asking themselves questions: who is least likely to challenge me at work? What information might I not be hearing as a result?

Often, the employees with the most job security, such as union reps or those nearing retirement, are the most honest sources of insight. Listening to these voices is often a good place to start.

Research shows that organizations can improve psychological safety through practical leadership changes. Supervisors who listen, seek feedback, share reasoning behind decisions and are team-oriented instead of self-serving are more likely to create and maintain psychological safety.

Leaders should also pay attention to variations across teams. Useful questions to ask include:

Which teams are feeling fearful?
Which teams are feeling curious and engaged?
How can you create more high-performance teams?

Understanding why some teams feel safer than others can reveal opportunities for improvement.

For leaders, the greatest worry should be whether your employees are afraid to speak up. Be suspicious of “good news only” green dashboards, obsequious agreement or stony silences. Do not punish messengers — rather, embrace their candour as a gift and a sign that your organization is preventing harm.

Lianne M Lefsrud receives funding from the Natural Science and Engineering Research Council of Canada (NSERC), Alberta Justice, WorkSafeBC, Mitacs, Alberta Innovates, and the Lynch School of Engineering Safety and Risk Management endowed funds.

Slanguage: How the use of AI for apologies could cause the ‘Canadian Sorry’ to lose its soul

2026-01-21T17:13:12Z

It is a stereotype that Canadians apologize for everything. We say sorry when you bump into us. We say sorry for the weather. But as we trudge through the grey days of winter, that national instinct for politeness hits a wall of fatigue.

The temptation is obvious. With a single click, Gmail’s “Help me write” or ChatGPT can draft a polite decline to an invitation or a heartfelt thank you for a holiday sweater you’ll never wear.

It’s efficient. It’s polite. It’s grammatically perfect.

It’s also a trap.

New research suggests that when we outsource our social interactions to AI, we are trading away our reputation. Using AI to manage your social life makes you seem less warm, less moral and significantly less trustworthy.

Learning a language is hard, but even native speakers get confused by pronunciation, connotations, definitions and etymology. The lexicon is constantly evolving, especially in the social media era, where new memes, catchphrases, slang, jargon and idioms are introduced at a rapid clip. Slanguage, The Conversation Canada’s new series, dives into how language shapes the way we see the world and what it reveals about culture, power and belonging. Welcome to the wild and wonderful world of linguistics.

The trap of efficiency

In our consumer economy, we love automation. When I order a package, I don’t need a human to type the shipping notification; I just want the box on my doorstep. We accept — even demand — efficiency from brands.

But our friends are not brands, and our relationships are not transactions.

The new study published in Computers in Human Behavior — entitled “Negative Perceptions of Outsourcing to Artificial Intelligence” by British academic Scott Claessens and other researchers — suggests that emotional dynamics follow different rules than those shaping more practical situations. The researchers found that, while we tolerate AI assistance for technical tasks like writing code or planning a daily schedule, we punish it severely in social contexts.

When you use AI to write a love letter, an apology or a wedding vow, the recipient sees a lack of effort instead of a well-written text. In relationships, effort is a strong currency of care.

Less warm, less authentic

You might think you can hack this system by being honest. Perhaps you tell your friend: “I used ChatGPT to help me find the right words, but I edited it myself.”

Unfortunately, the data doesn’t indicate this is much of a solution.

Claessens’ work investigated a “best-case” scenario, where a user treated AI as a collaborative tool, employing it for ideas and feedback rather than verbatim copying, and was fully transparent about the process.

The researchers found that the social consequences of this approach are highly task-dependent: for socio-relational tasks like writing love letters, wedding vows or apology notes, participants still rated the sender as significantly less moral, less warm and less authentic than someone who didn’t use AI.

However, for instrumental or non-social tasks like writing computer code or dinner recipes, this collaborative and honest use of AI didn’t lead to negative perceptions of moral character or warmth, even if the user was still perceived as having expended less effort.

This creates a uniquely modern anxiety for the polite Canadian. We apologize to maintain social bonds. But if we use AI to craft that apology, we sever the very bond we are trying to hold onto. An apology generated by an algorithm, no matter how polished, signals that the relationship wasn’t worth the 20 minutes it would have taken to write it yourself.

Authentic inefficiency

This friction isn’t limited to text messages.

I’ve observed a similar pattern in my own preliminary research on consumer behaviour and AI-generated art. This work was conducted with Associate Prof. Ying Zhu at the University of British Columbian, Okanagan and will be presented at the American Marketing Association’s Winter Conference.

Consumers often reject excellent AI creations in creative arts fields because they lack the moral weight of human intent.

I believe we’re entering an era where inefficiency and imperfection will become premium products. Just as a flawed hand-knit scarf means more than a mass-produced, factory-made one, a clunky, typo-ridden text message from a friend is becoming more valuable than a sonnet written by a random internet language model.

The renowned “Canadian Sorry” is only meaningful because it represents a moment of humility, a pang of guilt, the effort used to find the right words. When we outsource this type of labour, we outsource the meaning too.

So as you tackle your inbox this winter, resist the urge to let the robot take the wheel for every case. Your clients might need the perfect email, but your friends and family certainly don’t. They want to know you cared enough to find the words yourself.

Joshua Gonzales does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

How the U.S. withdrawal from WHO could affect global health powers and disease threats

2026-01-20T19:32:25Z

Hours after Donald Trump began his second term as United States president on Jan. 20, 2024, he signed an executive order to end American membership in the World Health Organization (WHO) after one year. This restarted a process that the first Trump administration initiated in July 2020 but was reversed by Joe Biden.

The withdrawal is set to take effect this week, although WHO officials may not officially accept it because the U.S. has unpaid dues from the last two years. No matter how events play out, the rift signals the start of an uncertain new era in global public health.

In the withdrawal announcement, the Trump administration cited the WHO’s “mishandling” of the COVID-19 pandemic and its inability to remain independent from the political influence of member states. This reflected Trump’s belief that the WHO leadership favoured China in early 2020 by praising its initial COVID response while faulting the U.S. for closing its border to Chinese travellers.

Other observers acknowledged the need for reform of the WHO’s cumbersome bureaucratic structure and criticized its inability to translate scientific research about COVID into useful guidance about masking and social distancing.

Such criticisms should not obscure the WHO’s enormous contribution to global health or how U.S. interests have been intertwined with its successes. Viewed historically, its great strength lies in sustained collaboration rather than short-term emergency response.

Vaccine diplomacy

In my research for Epidemics and the Modern World and its forthcoming revision, I have explored how the U.S. conducted “vaccine diplomacy” in developing countries. After the Second World War, the U.S. discerned an alignment between its strategic objectives and the soft power it gained from campaigns against epidemic diseases and childhood immunization programs.

For example, in 1967, American funding and leadership encouraged the start of the WHO’s Intensified Smallpox Eradication Program (ISEP) in African countries. This work involved collaboration with global rivals such as the Soviet Union, which contributed large quantities of freeze-dried smallpox vaccine.

When the ISEP began, at least 1.5 million people worldwide died from smallpox annually. Only 13 years later, the WHO declared the disease eradicated from nature in 1980. This success encouraged efforts to eradicate polio, which accelerated after 1988 when the WHO launched the Global Polio Eradication Initiative with support from the United States Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and other partners.

Another important collaboration began in 1974 when the WHO and international partners launched the Expanded Program on Immunization to help prevent six childhood diseases (polio, diphtheria, pertussis, tuberculosis, measles and tetanus).

After 1985, the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) invested billions of dollars in the program. Global childhood immunization levels reached 80 per cent by the early 1990s and continued to pay health dividends thereafter.

An analysis published last year in the Lancet estimated that, in the last 20 years, USAID-funded programs had helped prevent over 90 million deaths globally, including 30 million deaths among children.

Dismantling global influence

In public health, as in other arenas, the Trump administration has discarded participation in global alliances and instead sought bilateral agreements with other countries.

By July 2025, the Trump administration had formally dismantled USAID and cancelled funding for more than 80 per cent of its programs. Modelling conducted by Boston University epidemiologist Brooke Nichols suggests the lapsed programs have already caused roughly 750,000 deaths, mostly among children.

The U.S. has also already begun to cede influence over the objectives of global health programs. At the World Health Assembly in May 2025, the U.S. did not sign the WHO Pandemic Agreement intended to foster collaboration among governments, international agencies and philanthropies after the COVID-19 pandemic.

At that same meeting, China pledged to increase its voluntary contributions to the WHO to US$500 million over the next five years. Practically overnight, China will replace the U.S. as the WHO’s largest national contributor and undoubtedly steer priorities in global health programs towards its interests.

Disease monitoring and global threats

A more immediate concern is the disruption to surveillance for ongoing disease challenges and emergent threats.

Since 1952, the WHO’s Global Influenza Surveillance and Response System has provided a platform for monitoring of cases and the sharing of data and viral samples. Information from institutions in 131 countries contributes to recommendations for the composition of seasonal influenza virus vaccines. The U.S. may be left out of this global system, which will hamper efforts to match vaccines to the circulating strains of flu.

The WHO also dispatches response teams around the world for outbreaks of numerous diseases such as mpox, dengue, Ebola virus disease or Middle East respiratory syndrome. The exclusion of American scientists will hamper these efforts and diminish the nation’s capacity to protect itself.

The policy shift in the U.S. poses challenges for Canada both as its northern neighbour and as a strong financial supporter of the WHO. The recent spread of measles within Canada, which resulted in loss of the country’s elimination status, reminds us that disease outbreaks are inevitable but progress in public health is not.

Renewed support of the WHO and other multilateral efforts, although desirable, should be matched by expanded investment in programs for disease surveillance and research, vaccine procurement and public health communication. Federal and provincial governments and the Public Health Agency of Canada will all have roles to play as Canada faces disease threats in a rapidly changing world.

Mitchell L. Hammond does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

Lower tariffs on Chinese electric vehicles could boost adoption and diversify Canada’s trade

2026-01-20T17:26:55Z

Canada has announced an agreement to reduce its 100 per cent tariff on electric vehicle (EV) imports from China to 6.1 per cent. The tariffs will be replaced by an annual import quota of 49,000 EVs in 2026, rising gradually to 70,000 by 2030.

This phased opening is designed to help Canada diversify its supply chain and accelerate EV adoption without relying on subsidies. In return, China will lower tariffs on Canadian canola to 15 per cent by March and remove tariffs on a few other Canadian goods.

The rollback of Canada’s EV tariff wall marks a significant shift in the Canadian trade relationship with China. It also represents a notable de-escalation of trade tensions during a period of intense economic uncertainty, driven largely by protectionist American policy.

It will not, however, reshape Canada’s auto market overnight.

A modest opening with outsized effects

The initial 2026 quota amounts to about 2.5 per cent of total new vehicle sales in Canada, which was just below two million vehicles in 2025. In global terms, it’s also a modest amount, equivalent to only 2.2 per cent of BYD’s estimated 2025 EV sales (2.26 million vehicles) and three per cent of Tesla’s estimated 2025 EV sales (1.65 million vehicles).

For Canada’s struggling EV market, however, the policy change could provide a meaningful boost. The end of the federal Incentives for Zero-Emission Vehicles program in 2025 increased EV prices by roughly eight to 12 per cent. Higher upfront costs slowed demand, and EVs now account for about nine per cent of new vehicle sales, down from 15 per cent in 2024.

By opening the market to innovative EVs from China, the new policy should expand access to lower-cost models and help revive demand. China’s EV market includes more than 100 EV brands, including BYD, which recently overtook Tesla as the world’s largest EV maker.

The new policy also features other major brands like Geely, SAIC Group, Nio and XPeng, with several models priced within at about $30,000. Increased price competition could narrow the affordability gap that has slowed adoption since incentives were withdrawn.

Pivoting to China for diversification

The quota system likely reflects concern within Ottawa that unrestricted access for Chinese EVs could flood the Canadian market and disrupt local manufacturing. A phased opening gives automakers time to adjust and helps consumers become familiar with new Chinese brands.

It may also encourage foreign manufacturers to expand local assembly or partnerships to cater to growing EV demand. The government expects the deal to catalyze Chinese joint-venture investment that will deepen and diversify Canada’s EV supply chain.

The agreement also signals an effort to reduce Canada’s dependence on the United States, which is the destination for about 92 per cent of Canada’s auto and auto parts exports. This shift, however, starts from a very low base.

While China is Canada’s second-largest trading partner, merchandise exports to China were only $29.9 billion in 2024, or about 7.3 per cent of exports to the U.S.

For that reason, the seemingly ambitious target of increasing merchandise exports to China by 50 per cent by 2030 will not materially change Canada’s reliance on the U.S.

It is better understood as one element of a broader strategy to reduce exposure to an increasingly inward-looking and unpredictable partner.

The deal could also complicate Canada’s position ahead of future renegotiations of the Canada–United States–Mexico Agreement. Prime Minister Mark Carney can reasonably argue that import volumes are small relative to total auto sales in Canada and the U.S. At the same time, deeper engagement with China signals alternatives and may modestly strengthen Canada’s leverage.

More EV adoption at lower government cost

The trade opening could support EV adoption at lower fiscal cost. The Incentives for Zero-Emission Vehicles program, which stalled after its funding was exhausted, cost the government $2.6 billion and supported approximately 546,000 EV purchases.

When rebates lapsed, annual EV sales declined by more than one-quarter, falling from 264,000 in 2024 to 191,000 in 2025.

As Canada contends with a growing fiscal deficit, expanding consumer choice through trade may prove more durable than relying on subsidies.

It not only reduces the need for public spending but also reduces the future cost of adoption by putting pressure on incumbents such as Tesla and GM to cut prices to compete with new entrants like BYD.

A wider set of affordable models should lift demand and, as the customer base expands, strengthen the case for faster charging network expansion. This could help Canada return to its mandate of 50 per cent EV sales by 2030 and 100 per cent by 2035, which was recently paused.

Why the quota needs a hard end date

Tariffs and quotas are often framed as temporary protections that give domestic producers breathing room amid competitive pressure. In practice, they can be difficult to unwind because beneficiaries lobby to preserve them.

Canada’s rollback of its tariff wall on Chinese EVs is unusual, precipitated by trade tensions with the U.S. and punishing reciprocal tariffs by China on its canola imports.

Absent similar pressure, the newly introduced quotas could outlive the intended five-year window. Automakers and their political allies will defend them, just as they defended the blanket EV tariffs that denied Canadians of access to affordable EVs.

Canada should explicitly commit to eliminating the quota by 2030. Moving to an open market regime will benefits consumers, strengthens competitiveness and supports environmental goals.

Addisu Lashitew does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

Heated Rivalry: How investment in Canadian content can pay off at home and abroad

2026-01-20T15:03:09Z

Hudson Williams and Connor Storrie in an Episode 6 ('The Cottage') scene of 'Heated Rivalry.' (Bell Media)

In late December 2025, it seemed like everyone went to “the cottage.” This is a reference to the steamy Crave megahit Heated Rivalry. Even The Guggenheim Museum of New York and Ottawa Tourism has jumped on the Heated Rivalry bandwagon.

Heated Rivalry has launched the careers of Texas native Connor Storrie and Hudson Williams, from British Columbia. The actors play hockey rivals-turned-lovers Ilya Rozanov and Shane Hollander.

The Heated Rivalry obsession is widespread, having topped Crave’s No. 1 most-watched spot for weeks and taken global audiences, TV networks and online algorithms by storm.

Storrie and Williams have appeared at the Golden Globes, on The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon and on Late Night with Seth Meyers.

In an era where data-crunching increasingly offers predictions about market-driven success, all this might make viewers wonder if Heated Rivalry has cracked the algorithmic code.

Crave trailer for ‘Heated Rivalry.’

Risk-taking gone right

Was the show a bet on #booktok fans? Heated Rivalry is based on a book that is part of the popular Game Changers series by Canadian author Rachel Reid.

However, as scholars who have examined contemporary TV production, we agree with acting coach Anna Lamadrid that Heated Rivalry would never have been made if left solely to algorithmic analysis.

The standard algorithm-driven approach designed to entice the widest possible audience — typical of U.S. streaming giants like Netflix — would argue the series had limited appeal, no star power and a niche audience.

More likely, as creator Jacob Tierney told Myles McNutt, a professor of media studies, Crave trusted him and his vision. Tierney previously made the popular and award-winning shows Shoresy and Letterkenny.

As Tierney told McNutt, Heated Rivalry was greenlit by Crave but needed additional financing. Tierney approached several studios, but received notes “that would fundamentally change the story, or fundamentally change the tone.”

In a recent CBS interview with Montréal-born actor François Arnaud, who plays older gay hockey player Scott Hunter, Arnaud said he “didn’t think the show could have been made in the U.S.” He said Heated Rivalry was “at a big streamer before” that wanted changes, including “no kissing until Episode 5.”

François Arnaud and Hudson Williams in an Episode 1 scene from ‘Heated Rivalry.’ (Bell Media)

Heated Rivalry is an example of risk-taking gone right at a time when there are calls to cancel international streamers in favour of investing in homegrown film and TV. Its success is also the result of a confluence of industry-level transformations in Canadian production and streaming.

A confluence of conditions

In the 1950s, there were only a few Canadian broadcasters. Content was made by “in-house” crews. Production and distribution companies were operated by government-funded agencies, including the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation and the National Film Board of Canada.

Creative content consisted mostly of news and filmed theatre or dance productions. In the 1960s, pay TV emerged and appetite built for racier variety TV, game shows and talk shows.

By the 1970s, the baby boomer bubble — combined with arts funding and more affordable video and editing equipment — changed everything. Low-cost content for niche audiences proliferated on cable TV.

The Canadian media system moved toward independent production. Production companies were separated from broadcasters, owned and run by different people. But the ability to green-light Canadian-scripted TV shows still depended on acquiring distribution licences from a few major broadcasters.

This triggered funding from the Canada Media Fund and provincial or territorial tax credits, which still finance most productions. To spread financial risk, many dramas were co-productions between Canada and other countries.

By 2005, in the wake of broadband and the growth of more audacious content produced for smaller audiences, Canadian broadcasters shifted to reality (“unscripted”) TV as a relatively inexpensive genre that could draw big audiences.

Still, breakthrough dramatic programs — like Corner Gas (2004-09), Little Mosque on the Prairie (2007-12), Kim’s Convenience (2016-21) and Schitt’s Creek (2015-20) — dealt with the complexity and specificity of Canadian society.

Steamy streaming

Today, several key policy changes and corporate consolidations have brought smaller, riskier and explicitly Canadian projects to the screen.

The Online Streaming Act and the recently updated definition of Canadian content have targeted streaming services like Netflix and Crave to incentivize the production and discoverability of Canadian shows.

Shifts in policy have supported Canadian content, including funding for underrepresented voices. Heated Rivalry’s development ran parallel to recent policy and industry shifts.

Bell Media, the largest Canadian media company, owns CTV and Crave. In March 2025, it acquired a majority stake of United Kingdom-based global distributor Sphere Abacus. This played a key role in Heated Rivalry’s development.

The Canada Media Fund contributed $3.1 million to Heated Rivalry. Culture Minister Marc Miller has also noted in addition to the federal funding, the series received tax credits. Eligible Canadian film or video productions can receive a refundable tax credit.

Bell Media committed to the show budget in March 2025, including a contribution from recently acquired Sphere Abacus.

Sean Cohan, Bell Media CEO, has said the company saw Heated Rivalry as a show that could move the conglomerate “from being seen as a legacy broadcaster to a digital-media content player with global impact.”

The series was shot in just over a month at a budget of less than CDN$5 million per episode and before long, stars Williams and Storrie were whisked away to the Golden Globes.

What’s next for Canadian productions?

Crave is already promoting Slo Pitch starring Schitt’s Creek actor Emily Hampshire and featuring Heated Rivalry’s Nadine Bhaba.

Set to premiere in 2026, this 10-episode mockumentary series follows a queer, underdog softball team. While the show is also about gay sports, it’s in a league all its own — promising “beer, lesbians and baseball.”

Is Crave a beacon of hope for Canadian content? Maybe Canadian producers and distributors can leverage the Heated Rivalry effect to galvanize Canadian and international audiences onto more Canadian-produced intellectual property (IP).

The issue of IP is now a key sticking point in multiple unresolved lawsuits by Netflix, Amazon and Spotify that have been brought to the federal government.

The looming Warner Bros Discovery (Warner Bros, HBO) acquisition by Netflix will directly impact Crave. As HBO Max’s sole Canadian distributor, there’s some worry about what could happen to this lucrative content for the Canadian streamer should Netflix gobble up all of the IP — a major issue for distribution deals and Canadian creatives.

Not to stretch the hockey metaphor too tight, but policy sets the rules of the game. Corporate and government funding bring the players to the rink. Producers and writers aspire to be winning coaches. Audiences want to be on the edge of their seats.

They also want more choices: exploring riskier storylines, meeting new talent and seeing their own lives — and Canadian content — on screen. With Heated Rivalry’s success, they seem to have it all this season.

Daphne Rena Idiz receives funding from the Creative Labour and Critical Futures (CLCF) project.

Claudia Sicondolfo receives funding from SSHRC for Archives in Action and Platforming Leisure and is a Board Member for the Toronto Queer Film Festival.

MaryElizabeth Luka receives funding from University of Toronto Cluster of Scholarly Prominence program (Creative Labour Critical Futures) as well as from periodic competitive, peer-adjudicated Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council funding programs for research in their areas of expertise.