Book launch: “Nous sommes ingouvernables: Les anarchistes au Québec aujourd’hui”

Robyn Maynard and Shirene Eslami co-authored a chapter in the upcoming anthology on the anarchist movement in Quebec, entitled “Nous sommes ingouvernables - Les anarchistes au Québec aujourd’hui” by Lux Editeur.  The launch will take place in Montreal on March 13th, at Coop Katakombs, 1635 boul. St. Laurent, more information on the launch HERE.

For more information or to order a copy of the book, click HERE

Textes réunis et présentés par Rémi Bellemare-Caron, Émilie Breton, Marc-André Cyr, Francis Dupuis-Déri et Anna Kruzynski

ConStellation: Human Rights Edition 2012

Available now!

The latest issue of Stella’s bi-annual magazine ConStellation is now available!  This issue, researched, edited, compiled, and partially written by Robyn Maynard, explores sex workers human and labour rights in Canada and across other countries.  The issue features a timeline of sex workers rights in Canada, and also focuses on different legal models surrounding sex work including legalization, decriminalization, and criminalization (including the so-called ‘Swedish model’).  It also lends focus to anti-trafficking policies, and the criminalization of HIV, and discusses how this affects sex workers’ rights.  Contact Stella to purchase a copy!

NO BORDERS, NO NATIONS with Nandita Sharma, Robyn Maynard and Jaggi Singh

FRIDAY, NOVEMBER 23, 6pm-9pm
at Café L’Artère, 7000 Avenue du Parc
(south of Jean-Talon, near métro Parc, Montréal)

Featured speaker: NANDITA SHARMA
Nandita is an activist scholar whose research is shaped by the social movements she is active in, including No Borders movements and those struggling for the commons. She is the author of “Home Economics: Nationalism and the Making of ‘Migrant Workers’ in Canada”, as well as the article “Anti-Trafficking Rhetoric in the Making of Global Apartheid.” She is a professor at the University of Hawai’i at Manoa.

The panel will also include presentations by community organizers ROBYN MAYNARD & JAGGI SINGH.  Robyn Maynard will discuss anti-trafficking campaigns as they relate to sex workers and migrants in Canada and internationally.

Sisters (and brothers) doing it for themselves: report from Kolkata

by Robyn Maynard in 2bmag online

Robyn Maynard reports on representing Montréal’s Stella at the Sex Workers Freedom Festival in Kolkata, which took place from July 21-26 as a satellite to the the 19th Annual HIV/AIDS Conference in Washington, D.C. “The HIV/AIDS epidemic has never been purely a neutral public health issue,” she writes, explaining how infection rates have manifest along the lines of structural inequalities within societies, on a global scale.

READ ARTICLE IN FULL

 

Carceral Feminism: The Failure of Sex Work Prohibition

by Robyn Maynard in FUSE Magazine – 35-3/ABOLITION

Anti-prostitution women’s groups — comprised of women morally and politically opposed to the very existence of the sex trade — have a far-reaching influence in the Canadian political climate that can be traced back to the colonization of Canada. While these groups often promote themselves as advancing an abolitionist feminist agenda, prohibitionist feminism is a more accurate descriptor, and will be used throughout this essay. [1] In the present writing, I will argue that the strategies of prohibitionist feminists do not serve the health and well-being of sex workers, but actually result in the criminalization of the very people they purport to protect. In contrast, the arguments in this essay promote a model of solidarity with sex workers, in support of their own movements for health, security and dignity within the sex trade. 

READ ARTICLE IN FULL

No One Is Illegal Radio June 2012: The Quebec Student Strike & Race – Perspectives of Local Activists of Colour

The June 2012 edition of No One Is Illegal Radio focuses on the Quebec student strike, discussing the role of race from the perspectives of local activists of colour.  The podcast focuses on police repression and the strike within the larger context of the role played by police in communities of colour, and also discusses the involvement of visible minorities in the student movement.

Featured interviews:

Neil Kastro of Kabbatang Montreal, a Filipino organization that works with youth to combat racial profiling of the Filipino in Cote-des-neiges.  Neil discusses the repression of the student movement and links this to the continuos police repression of racialized people living in Montreal.

Will Prosper, activist, writer, and member of Montreal-Nord Republik.  Will is the author of the popular article “Minorities and the Student Strike”, here he discusses the role of visible minorities in the student strike both in re
presentation and in reality.

No One Is Illegal Radio in Montreal is hosted and produced by Robyn Maynard and Jaggi Singh.

LISTEN TO THIS PODCAST HERE

Building the Movement for Reproductive Freedom

I will be joining thousands of community and student activists at Hampshire College for the Civil Liberties and Public Policy Conference, participating in three workshops:

Colonized Spaces, Criminalized Bodies, Resistance and Resilience, and Storytelling Our Politics.  More information HERE.