Apr 1, 2016

You are invited to a historic reconciliation gathering at the Queen Elizabeth Theatre, April 22, 2016   • Reconciliation demands that we relearn history and consider how the status quo works against a just future for all. South Africa is overcoming decades of divisions, and in Australia there is tremendous learning about correcting the colonial past. Here...

by Joseph Roberts • The January, 2016, edition of Common Ground contained an article about transforming the Georgia Viaduct into a Reconciliation Bridge, a symbolic link between First Nations and our invading, immigrating European culture. Our Walk for Reconciliation in 2013 drew estimates of 70,000 in the rain across our old Georgia Viaduct, inspiring this...

Apr 1, 2016

A bad deal for Canada, our food and our health by Bobbie Blair   • More than a decade after he was fired from his position as senior scientific advisor at Health Canada for telling the truth, Canadian ‘whistleblower’ Dr. Shiv Chopra is now warning us about a new threat to our health and our food safety: the Trans Pacific Partnership (TPP). In 2004,...

Apr 1, 2016

Think twice about taking heartburn drugs DRUG BUST by Alan Cassels • Warning: this column is for people who are taking (or have been offered) heartburn drugs or are considering treatment for heartburn. In other words: most of us. If you develop heartburn or ulcers, there is a good chance you’ll be offered a prescription from the most effective – and...

Apr 1, 2016

Ideas to Action by Roger Killen • TEDx conferences audiences laugh, learn and walk away with actionable wisdom. Live speakers share innovative optimistic solutions to humanity’s tough challenges and give clear actionable answers to make a difference in our lives. These ideas build aw areness, power attitude shifts, change policies and launch movements that...

Apr 1, 2016

by Bruce Mason • It’s three decades since Vancouver sold its soul. Threw future generations out with dirty False Creek water. If you’re 30-something, you missed the mega-party, so it’s ironic, or pathetic, that you’re now paying more than your fair (pun intended) share of the tab. The more you know about ‘then,’ the better you to understand...

Apr 1, 2016

by John Pranger • Sponsored by the Animal Defense & Anti-Vivisection Society of BC. vivisectionresearch.ca The arrival in Canada each year of monkeys destined for the laboratory shows the entrenched nature of Canada’s R&D community. While the use of animals in medical research and toxicity testing is being scaled back elsewhere in the world – due...

by Claudio Naranjo • In my first English book, The One Quest (1972) – translated from the Spanish La Unica Busqueda – I delved into the subject of the Human Potential Movement. Later, at the Stanford Research Institute, I was a consultant for the Study of Educational Politics Institute and I was entrusted to explore this movement, which had its roots in...

Apr 1, 2016

How it works by Julianne Bien • In her closing address at the UN-sponsored International Year of Light conference in Mérida, Mexico, in February, UNESCO’s (1) Assistant Director-General for Natural Sciences, Flavia Schlegel, stressed the importance of practical, cost-effective light-based solutions for the realization of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable...

Apr 1, 2016

INDEPENDENT MEDIA by Meghan Sali   • Canadians have many reasons to be concerned about the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP), a massive international agreement that, if ratified, will result in restrictive new rules governing our daily lives, from how we use the Internet to how much we pay for medicine. We already know the TPP will extend copyright terms...

Apr 1, 2016

SCIENCE MATTERS by David Suzuki •  When Archduke Franz Ferdinand of Austria was assassinated in June 1914, no one thought, “Uh-oh, World War I is starting.” We only recognize the significance of events in the context of history. I recently had a day like any other except it made me wonder if we’re on the verge of historical change. On March 2, 2016, I...

Apr 1, 2016

NUTRISPEAK by Vesanto Melina • It is the oddest thing that, until fairly recently, the fluid that cows produce to grow their calves to 450 pounds or more in a year was recommended in our national food guides as the basis of an essential food group. It was an assumption on the part of Health Canada and nutritional scientists that humans of all ages require...

Apr 1, 2016

UNIVERSE WITHIN by Gwen Randall-Young •  There comes a time when the pain of holding on becomes worse than the pain of letting go. – Unknown I am thinking of two similar client cases that demonstrate the struggle that can emerge when there has been infidelity in a marriage. I will blend them into one. It starts when she meets a man with whom she thinks she...