"The COVID-19 crisis has made clearer than ever the flaws in our system, one that prioritizes military spending and global instability over the well-being of our people."
Metro Vancouver’s transit authority, TransLink, just slashed services that tens of thousands of us rely on, including frontline and healthcare workers and ordinary British Columbians who take the bus or SkyTrain to work every day.[1]
As the pandemic builds, most people, led by government officials and policy wonks, perceive the threat solely in terms of human health and its impact on the national economy. Consistent with the prevailing vision, mainstream media call almost exclusively on physicians and epidemiologists, financiers and economists to assess the consequences of the viral outbreak.
The coronavirus pandemic is overwhelming to comprehend. There are now hundreds of thousands of confirmed cases. Tens of thousands have died. Nations are on lockdown as the disease continues to spread. The planet is in crisis.
How did this happen?
What are the underlying political, economic and environmental structures that paved the way for this global outbreak? Where do pandemics emerge from? Is our capitalist way of life biologically sustainable?
The ongoing pandemic epoch has exposed a clear duality marked both by increasingly obvious and blatant inequalities, hypocrisies and systemic failures as well as beautiful, loving and creative responses in the form of mutual aid communities and direct action to save lives.
VANCOUVER -- Homeless activists and their supporters occupied the recently closed North Surrey Recreation Centre for several hours Wednesday night to call attention to the danger the COVID-19 pandemic poses to people living on the streets or in insufficient housing.
Dubbing the occupation the "Hothouse Squat," the group issued a press release saying it planned to occupy the vacant building as a safe place to live during the pandemic.
