Thursday, September 29, 2011

In Solidarity with Insite!!!!

Join COUNTERfit and The Toronto Drug Users Union at South Riverdale Community Health Centre Friday September 30 at 9:30am as the Supreme Court of Canada’s hands down its written decision regarding Vancouver’s Insite. Insite is North America’s first legal supervised safe injection site.  The scientific evidence in support of Insite is undisputable and many, many people’s lives have been saved since it opened its doors in 2003.

Tomorrow we will gather in solidarity with supporters of Vancouver’s Insite and harm reduction activists around Canada and internationally who all agree that people who use drugs deserve the same rights to health and dignity as every other human being. We will either be celebrating the Supreme Court’s decision to support Insite or strategizing ways to organize in resistance.

Location & Time:
South Riverdale Community Health Centre
955 Queen Street East, Toronto
9:30am

See you tomorrow!
COUNTERfit & the TDUU

Thursday, September 1, 2011

Wendy Babcock, our Friend, Ally and a Huge Loss to our Community....

Wednesday August 31, 2011

Wendy Babcock

Community activist, law student, writer, mentor, sister, mother, friend. Born May 29, 1980, in Toronto. Died Aug. 9, 2011, in Toronto of unknown causes, aged 31.

Wendy Babcock had a tough, amazing, terrible, wonderful, all-too-short life. It could even be said that she lived several different lives in her 31 years.
When she died so suddenly, so unexpectedly, a host of diverse people, from sex-trade workers to law students - members of her chosen family - showed up to plan her memorial service, for Wendy had been both a sex worker and a law student.
Wendy's childhood was less than idyllic, and she suffered sexual abuse at a very early age at the hands of a relative. Eventually she went into the foster care system. By eighth grade she had been raped. By ninth grade she had run away, dropped out and, of necessity, become engaged in prostitution to survive.
You'd hardly expect that, before the age of 25, a young woman with her history would have the wherewithal to turn such experiences into something good, but that's exactly what Wendy did. She became a harm reduction worker, a mother and, ultimately, a student at Osgoode Hall Law School.
Wendy's goal was to be in a position to effect real change in the lives of some of the most marginalized people in society. With her uncanny ability to zero in on the fault line of any argument, the wisdom borne of her life experiences, her capacity for critical analysis and her persuasive powers, there can be no doubt that she would have been one hell of a lawyer.
Along her way, Wendy founded the Bad Date Coalition - an interagency network of people who advocate for those working in the sex trade. She won the ear and respect of representatives of the Toronto Police Service and worked with them to ensure that sex workers could and would report assault.
Wendy had a razor-sharp wit mixed with the endearing ability to laugh at herself. She was clever, compassionate and courageous; sweet and sassy, lovely and loving. She was tolerant of everything but intolerance in others; her activism on behalf of transgendered people is but one testament to this.
In 2008, then-mayor David Miller presented Wendy with a Toronto Public Health Champion Award in recognition of her advocacy work, an award she richly deserved.
On Sept. 15, Wendy's life will be celebrated by a huge gathering of her friends and colleagues. We will continue her work to fight stigma and discrimination, and toward social inclusion for all, in her memory.
Her son was the most important person in Wendy's world, and she wanted him to be as proud of her as she was of him. Those who knew and loved Wendy are confident that, in a few short years when he's old enough to realize the profound impact his mother had on so many lives, he will be justly proud.
By Holly Kramer, Wendy's friend and colleague.