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The AIH Transcript for July 7, 2020

Hosts: Nil Koksal and Chris Howden

Prologue

NIL KOKSAL: Hello. I'm Nil Koksal, sitting in for Carol Off.

CHRIS HOWDEN: Good evening. I'm Chris Howden. This is As It Happens.

[Music: Theme]

CH: Tonight:

NK: As she was saying. A Nova Scotia MP pushing for gun control and a deeper look at the links between misogyny and mass killings says since speaking out she's been hit with a wave of abuse and violent threats.

CH: Insult and injury. Charges against a Halifax mother whose trip to Walmart ended in a violent confrontation with police are withdrawn. She tells us how the effects of the incident linger for her and her daughter.

NK: Hisham al-Hashimi was assassinated yesterday by unknown gunmen in Baghdad. A friend remembers the Iraqi political analyst who was not afraid to upset the powers that be to shape a better Iraq.

CH: The writing may be on the wall for a controversial mural at the University of Kentucky. We speak to an artist whose work responds to the murals depiction of slavery about why she wants it to stay.

NK: Lives before laces. That's been the women's roller derby motto during this pandemic, and it turns out the sports winning strategy has other major leagues taking notice.

CH: And big fang theory. A man in Australia finds himself attacked by a deadly snake as he's driving down a highway. And then the snake discovers it has bitten off more than it can chew. As It Happens. The Tuesday Edition. Radio that assumes he had his thumb on the scales.

[Music: Theme]

Part 1: Assassination of prominent Iraqi analyst 'a loss for all of Iraqis,' says friend

Nova Scotia MP Harassed

Guest: Lenore Zann

CH: Like many Nova Scotians, Lenore Zann has a lot of questions about the mass killing in her province in April. The Liberal MP represents the riding where 22 people were murdered. She wants a public inquiry to look at the role violence against women played in the attacks. And she supports her party's moves to increase gun control. But since she expressed those opinions publicly, she has faced a torrent of misogynistic abuse and veiled threats. We reached Lenore Zann in Truro, Nova Scotia. And a warning: some parts of this interview are disturbing.

NK: Ms. Zann, I suspect you get emails and sometimes angry emails from constituents all the time. But when did things cross the line from angry to abusive?

LENORE ZANN: I would say they crossed the line right after May 1st when our government announced that we were banning 1500 different semi assault weapons. But then a man who apparently lived in this riding had posted a long, kind of angry rant on Facebook about wanting to be able to get a hold of semiautomatic weapons and that this would ruin those chances. And he put my name in that rant. That particular post was then shared by the gun association members that it went all across North America with my name in it. All of a sudden, I was being bombarded by all of these men who I didn't know. They were all mainly from Alberta, hardly any from Nova Scotia and a lot from the United States. But then a couple of the phone calls that we got in the office, one from a gentleman who said that he was a former RCMP officer and that the streets were going to run with blood, that there was a lot of angry men out there and he was one of them, and being a former RCMP officer he could find out where I lived and where all of my staff lived in a second.

NK: That's just one of many that you received. In terms of volume emails as well, how many do you think you've had to contend with?

LZ: Well, I would say probably thousands between Facebook messaging and emails. But, you know, the actual physical threat. There were only really the two.

NK: We hear a lot about this kind of abuse. But what was it like to be on the receiving end of it and to read and hear what people were threatening to do?

LZ: It's completely unacceptable, especially after we have to put it in context -- three months ago, my staff and I were in shock, the community was in shock, from the shootings and trying to help people deal with that and help grieving people. Then we had, you know, the helicopter went down and a young woman from Nova Scotia was killed who'd been piping for the fallen 22 the week before. Then we had the snowbirds flew overhead to wish us well and make us feel better. And then one of the snowbirds died in a crash. Then a young child went missing. And we were searching here in Truro for the young child by the river. All that ever was found were a little pair of rubber boots. I mean, the community has gone through so much. To be then targeted personally, it is particularly painful. But, you know, I feel really bad for my staff who did not sign up for this. The last one that came through was a post on Facebook. And that particular post said Lenore Zann is a worthless piece of [censor bleep] she's a vile creature, I want her head on a platter, really. And it repeated it about four times. It also said that this person now lives on my street. It mentioned the street, said he watches my house like a hawk. That freaked me out. And all of a sudden, as a woman who lives alone in a big old rambling old house, I didn't even need to lock my doors. Now, I'm going to have to get a security system.

NK: Are the RCMP involved? Are they investigating that threat?

LZ: No. I was advised by a number of friends and family to call the police, which is the local police here, the Truro Police. So I did and I reported it and they said, well, what do you want us to do? Did you want us to speak to this person? And I said, well to be honest, I think that will probably just escalate the situation. So I just want it to be on record in case anything happens. And they advised me to get security for my house.

NK: Are you concerned that other women might need to be protected from this person as well though?

LZ: I have no idea. I don't really know the person. All I know is what he's written about me. But I don't think we should just let people get away with this stuff anymore. I think we need to call it out.

NK: You're telling people, though, to speak out. But why would you not ask the police in your case to act on this man who threatened your safety directly?

LZ: Because they told me there's nothing that they can do. All he's done is post something on his Facebook page and then deleted it. But we have the pictures of it to prove it was there. But he hasn't actually done anything. I don't think it's just about what I'm doing. The fact that men feel they can talk this way to women, it's really out of line. And I believe the Donald Trump factor plays something in it here. But I think it's time that women just say enough is enough -- I'm sorry, but you cannot speak to us this way, it's misogynistic.

NK: What does this all tell you about the kind of work that needs to be done in your province? What specifically would you like to see done now?

LZ: To be honest, I mean, I have been calling for a public inquiry regarding the mass shooting and I have been calling for one aspect of it to be a feminist analysis because the shooter had a history of domestic violence. And what is the connection between private violence and public violence? When somebody is who is abusive in private but then becomes a mass killer. Also, we do need red flag laws, which is something I've talked to Public Safety Minister Bill Blair about. And we do intend to bring forward red flag laws when we get back to Ottawa in the fall. And to be honest, I believe that hatred against women, misogynistic acts, need to be included as a hate crime -- which they are not at this point in time. Women need protection that are still not there. And for people who think that we've come so far, we still have so much further to go, and there are some people who are trying to pull us right back again to where we first started.

NK: Ms. Zann thank you for your time and I hope you stay safe.

LZ: Yes. Thank you so much.

CH: Lenore Zann is the Liberal MP for Cumberland-Colchester in Nova Scotia. We reached her in Truro.

[Music]

Killing of HIsham al-Hashimi

Guest: Lawk Ghafuri

CH: For anyone who wanted to understand the complex politics and history of Iraq, Hisham al-Hashimi was often the first call. The political analyst would always made time to sit down for tea with newly arrived journalists or with the prime minister himself who counted Mr. al-Hashimi as a personal friend. Yesterday, Hisham al-Hashimi was assassinated in Baghdad in what appears to have been a well-planned attack. He knew he was in danger, but he never stopped speaking out about what he thought was best for his country. He advised the authorities about defeating ISIS, but also called out the government for becoming too cozy with some militant groups. Lawk Ghafuri is a Kurdish journalist who was friends with Hisham al-Hashimi. We reached him in Erbil.

NK: Lawk, first of all, I'm so sorry for your loss.

LAWK GHAFURI: Thank you.

NK: How did you learn what had happened, that he'd been killed?

LG: I was in the office. I was working. And suddenly I heard a lot of unconfirmed news that Hisham al-Hashmi has been assassinated. So I started to be really panicking. And at this moment, you think, I met him only six months ago and we were planning to meet again in Erbil to be honest this time. It felt really sad, and at the same time, a lot of madness was inside me that I had to at the same time to concentrate on my work. And the hardest part was when I wrote about his death, which is something I was never expecting to do this.

NK: There's the personal loss, the professional aspect of it as you mentioned just now as well. And then what it means for your country, for Iraq. One person I saw -- because there has been a lot of reaction online on Twitter in particular -- one person said it feels like there's no hope, no hope for Iraq. How would you characterize the significance of losing someone like Hisham?

LG: Hisham was one of the, let's say, Iraqi analyst who was honest, who was very critical about his sources when we used to call them as journalists, like almost all journalists in Iraq has crossed with Hisham. Definitely means a lot for freedom of expression in this country, in Iraq. And freedom of press at the same time. He was a very active writer. He was writing constantly about security and military issues in the country and also as well as tourism ideology. Losing him is a step backward for all of Iraq in this subject. And he was helping not only the journalists, not only activists, not only the Iraqi force, but he was also an adviser to the Iraqi government and also the coalition.

NK: There's also video of him being killed. What does it show?

LG: Oh, well, I have watched the video once to be honest. And it was last night when I had to write about it. And I had to watch the video to describe it for the reader. And it was really painful, I would say, because watching Hisham with his car and there's like two or three motorcycles assassinating him with cold blood and then just leaving with their motorcycles just like so easily...it's just a sad scene to be honest for me. It's like if you are not safe in front of your house, in your neighbourhood, you make almost all Iraqis to feel insecure. It gives you the feeling that exactly as the guy on Twitter said, like there's no hope for Iraq.

NK: As I understand it, Hisham had received death threats in the past. Why do you think he kept speaking out? Why did he think that was important?

LG: I would say Hisham was one of the guys who did not fear any armed groups or any terrorist organization in Iraq. You see how brave he is when he talks about the issues. He's not hiding anything. He only thinks that Iraq is in need of someone who is brave. And I think once he said that -- he said that Iraq is in need of brave voices, he was just giving those words out to just show the big picture of the issue.

NK: Who do you think might be responsible for his death?

LG: I would say that he was criticizing, let's say, groups -- the Islamic State militias and also the Iranian backed militias inside Iraq.

NK: How confident are you that they will, whoever it was, will be brought to justice?

LG: That's the biggest issue, I think, because in the past, Baghdad and all Iraq has seen a lot of assassination attempts and assassination crimes and kidnappings. And I think Hisham al-Hashimi's case is same as them because all of them was trying to give a message to everyone that freedom of expression should exist in Iraq, and they are free to express their feelings and their opinions and their views. I think if Mustafa Al-Kadhimi, the Iraqi prime minister, can detain the perpetrators and bring them to justice, that's a very forward step for Iraq and to more stability.

NK: Hisham was also a husband and a father. What will you remember, though, of him as your friend?

LG: Well we were like drinking tea in a shop close to Tahrir Square, I remember like he asked me how many times I've been to Baghdad and I was like I have lived in Baghdad for six years and my birthplace in Baghdad. He was very happy with this. And he stopped to talk about the beauty of Baghdad. I remember he was talking about how it used to be and how it is now. And I was telling him about my time in Baghdad, how beautiful it was. And I always miss it. And I remember he responded like he said a couple of words, which were really beautiful -- he said Baghdad is not owned by anyone, it is owned by its own people. And he gave me the example of the protesters who were in the Tahrir Square that time. And he was like, this is the proof that we own the city and we own the country. And he was asking me to give those protesters a voice. And I never doubted for second to give them a voice, to bring their voices out to the world.

NK: Clearly, someone who loved his city and his country deeply. Lawk Ghafuri thank you so much for your time.

LG: Thank you very much. It was a pleasure.

CH: Lawk Ghafuri is a Kurdish journalist who was friends with Hisham al-Hashimi. We reached him in Erbil. Mr. al-Hashimi was assassinated yesterday in Baghdad. For more on this story, go to our website: cbc.ca/aih.

[Music]

Roller Derby Distancing

Guest: Erica Vanstone

CH: Workouts are being cancelled. Players are testing positive. And as major sports leagues try to get up and running again during a pandemic, there's a lot of chaos. Except in a sport that usually is chaos: women's roller derby -- where women with cool nicknames race around on roller skates smashing into each other. The Women's Flat Track Derby Association has put together such a concise and safe plan to get back on the rink that other leagues are taking notice like Basketball Canada. Erica Vanstone is the executive director of the Women's Flat Track Derby Association, and we reached her in Philadelphia.

NK: Erica, I hear you're getting a lot of response to these guidelines. Who are you hearing from?

ERICA VANSTONE: We have 800 folks who have requested the plan and it really is varied. A lot of them are roller derby groups. But we've got New York University has asked for them, Newark Ice Hockey Association, Houston Grand Opera. So we really have a wide variety of different organizations who are kind of looking to draw some inspiration from what we did.

NK: And a medieval combat group in Belfast, too.

EV: That was maybe my most exciting find. Yes.

NK: When did you realize that your organization, the Women's Flat Track Derby Association, needed to come out with a guide to playing sports during this pandemic?

EV: Yeah, so we have member organizations or clubs around the world. And so early on during the pandemic, we recognized that the most important thing we could do was just collect information. So we collected information from around the world and we started a taskforce of folks to bring their guidelines from Europe, from Australia and New Zealand. And we realized pretty quickly that the United States was really following behind in sort of the quickness of the information they were able to get out, the consistency of the information from state to state. And so we started to realize that in many ways we would probably be on our own in terms of having to make guidelines that we felt represented our values as a sport.

NK: There are seven tiers in the guide, as I understand it. So if we want to give an example, Edmonton right now is in baseline condition. What does that look like?

EV: So the very first thing that we actually started working on that was actually also the very last thing was the baseline conditions. And that was because we really wanted to try to describe what we felt like was a reasonable amount of COVID in your area to even contemplate beginning to recover your league's operation. So we batted around initially the idea of zero COVID, but we quickly realized I live in Philadelphia, one of my other team members lives outside New York City, and it's quite possible that New York City will never have zero COVID. So the metric of the baseline condition was the most important. And it is five in 10,000 positive cases over 14 days or 50 in a 100,000. And then you also want to make sure that your local government has said, yes, it's okay for folks to be congregating, stay at home orders have been removed. And then there's a roughly 14 day waiting period before folks can step onto the ladder at tier one.

NK: It's not just about playing safely or getting back to playing safely. It's also knowing when to pump the brakes, right, so how does that work?

EV: Yeah. So what we did is at the end of every tier, there's basically a little guide that says knowing when to step back down. And so if you need to return to baseline conditions, that happens if you have one positive case in your league or your members close contact. And then if none of those things happen, you can progress to the next tier.

NK: And you don't green-light fans until tier five. Why is that?

EV: One of the first things that we realized is roller derby is an amateur sport, but it's also very much a community sport. So a lot of our fans are folks who have been involved in the roller derby community for a while. And the idea of putting their lives at risk so that we could play didn't seem ethical and it didn't seem like we could create a plan that would work. There's not ever a level where I feel like we could reasonably know where anyone could walk into a building from. And so therefore, we felt pretty strongly right away that we don't feel like we're going to be able to hold events with the audiences that we had at our 2019 championships in Montreal last November until there is a vaccine for COVID-19. And I think that that's maybe a really scary place for a lot of other sports to contemplate. But we were there pretty early.

NK: An epidemiologist told Wired magazine that your plan around spectators is so good it almost made him cry.

EV: [Chuckles] That was kind of him. He's probably responding to the fact that sports in America in particular, but certainly on a global level, are so focused on returns and not whether they should return. And I think our feelings have always been about the ethics of returning. And so to bring audience members into that conversation seems irresponsible to us from the outset. And I'm not sure that everybody thinks that way. But I also don't know why everybody doesn't think that way.

NK: I think what little many people do know about roller derby, you know, they have images from movies and graphic novels perhaps -- not thinking that it's a group of people sitting around making very, you know, scientific mathematical decisions in a pandemic situation.

EV: I mean, it's unfortunate that those stereotypes exist because roller derby is a community that has a lot of experts and scientists and doctors and every other professional that you could think of. And I think that that's one of the things that makes us such a rich and dynamic sport, is that we are bringing perspective from a bunch of different disciplines. The WFTDA is built very differently as well. We're a democratic sport. We're very much like a players association and a league. And not a lot of sports are built in that way. They create adversarial relationships between owners and players. And so I think you're seeing a lot of those relationships kind of play out in those ways with COVID-19 discussions.

NK: So great to chat with you Erica.

EV: Thank you for having me.

CH: Erica Vanstone is the executive director of the Women's Flat Track Derby Association. She was in Philadelphia. And you can find more on that story on our webpage: cbc.ca/aih.

[Music]

Charlie Daniels

[MUSIC: Leonard Cohen's "Bird on the Wire"]

CH: From his 1969 album, Songs From a Room, Leonard Cohen with the classic "Bird on the Wire" brought hauntingly to life by a sensitive band, including the late multi-instrumentalist, Charlie Daniels. Yes, I do mean this Charlie Daniels.

[MUSIC: The Charlie Daniels Band's "The Devil Went Down to Georgia"]

CH: The same Charlie Daniels, who was a central part of Bob Dylan's band when he recorded Nashville Skyline. The Charlie Daniels, who started his solo career playing Outlaw Country and became the guy who recorded jingoistic tunes like In America, and This Ain't no Rag, It's a flag. In short, Charlie Daniels went through some changes over his life and career. But he sure could play. Mr. Daniels died yesterday. He was 83. He later talked about the subtlety required to play with Leonard Cohen, which was not aside Charlie Daniels explored much after he became a country rockstar. But if he lacked delicacy, he had a lot of generosity, both as a philanthropist and as an entertainer. As he wrote in his memoir, "Walk onstage with a positive attitude. Your troubles are your own and are not included in the ticket price." And every time Charlie Daniels played, he played to beat the devil because audiences demanded it.

[Music]

Part 2: Walmart Charges Dropped

Walmart Charges Dropped

Guest: Santina Rao

CH: Santina Rao can breathe a little easier today. Nearly seven months after she was arrested in a Halifax Walmart, all charges against her have been dropped. But the black mother of two says she's not ready to move on. She will be pursuing civil action against the store and the city. Ms. Rao says she was on her way to pay for a head of lettuce, two lemons, and a grapefruit when Walmart staff and police officers accused her of stealing. The January arrest left her with a broken wrist, a concussion, and bruising. And she was later charged with causing a disturbance, assaulting a peace officer and resisting arrest. The crown has now withdrawn those charges. We reached Santina Rao in Halifax.

NK: Ms. Rao you've said this is not full freedom. Vindication maybe, but not freedom. What do you mean by that?

SANTINA RAO: I mean, I guess I did quote unquote gain freedom from the fact that I'm no longer being charged. But I mean, I feel like the way that -- what we all could gain, you know, freedom and justice that the police officers in Walmart, the Walmart workers, need to be held accountable. What happened that day was wrong. If the Crown believes that the officers involved were within their rights, then, you know, obviously my charges wouldn't have been dismissed like they were today. So yeah.

NK: You were with your baby and your toddler at the time of the arrest back in January.

SR: Yes.

NK: You suffered injuries. How are you feeling now?

SR: I'm all right. I still feel pain every day. If I'm too active with my kids that day, it's really really sore and picking up my son because he's still a baby -- I mean, he'll be two in September and he still needs to be changed. And even though regardless of the fact that my daughter is potty trained, she's so close to me. Yeah. So it was just hard, when my parents have watched them for a period of time they did when this first initially happened, it was like a godsent, honestly, because I don't know what I would have done if I didn't have the extra care. And the physical pain still bothers me to this day. But the mental pain has hurt more than any sort of broken wrist.

NK: You mentioned your daughter. She's a bit older, so I suspect she's processing all of this a little bit differently. How is she dealing with it?

SR: On the outside, looking in -- most people would probably say she is a very happy little girl, you know, and she is. But even all these months later, she still remembers exactly what happened. She brings it up quite often. Even at night, she has night terrors without me -- she still sleeps in bed with me. If I'm upset and I'm in pain, you know, she goes "Mummy the bad police officer hurt you, or if they take me away from you or I lost you." And those are the three that she typically says the whole time, especially "I lost you." And that's just the most heartbreaking thing ever. And I don't really know what to say to her about this. I just tell her that I'm okay now and that we're safe at home.

NK: If we do go back, I know it's difficult but to go back to that day just for a moment. The altercation you had with police that you ended up pushing one of the officers. Take me through what was going through your mind and why you felt you needed to do that?

SR: Well, in that moment in time, I was on the phone with my mother and I had just finished giving my son a bottle and he had fallen asleep in the stroller. And my daughter was in the aisle looking at tiny little play tables when they approached me and they said that we have suspicion of you concealing items. I offered for them to search for my stuff, even though I told them that I did have unpaid merchandise on these, you know. So when that had happened and when he had asked me afterwards for my ID I produced my ID and I gave it to him. But that right there kind of was off putting because, you know, they had approached me for suspicion of theft. I mean, nothing had been conclusive at that point in time.

NK: Just to remind our listeners, you had put some of the items at the bottom of your stroller -- in the netting at the bottom of the stroller.

SR: Yeah. And I offered for them to look through my stuff. I said, look, I just made a purchase. You can look at my receipt. You can look at my bags here that I have on my stroller. You can look in my stroller. You can look at my diaper bag. I even offered for them to escort me to the front of the store so I could make a payment. And they still decided to escalate things anyway. And when the officer in question had asked me if I was still residing at that residence that was printed on my ID, I immediately got upset because that to me felt like a street check. And yes, so that is what originally escalated my emotion. The second take was when they really decided to try and prevent my daughter, that was three years old, coming to me during an altercation where I was visibly upset and being intimidated by multiple fully grown men while we were in the middle of a toy aisle in a department store. Like one minute we're looking at five dollar Barbie dolls and then the next minute I'm being thrown to the ground.

NK: Halifax Police Chief Dan Kinsella has said he wants to, "acknowledge the hurt this incident has caused to all involved." He also says he supports an investigation by the provincial police watchdog, which is under way right now. Are you reassured at all by that?

SR: No. If that was fact, then those two officers in question would not have their jobs and they would have lost their badge and they would have lost their rights as a police officer. There needs to be repercussions 100 percent. If he feels that terribly about what happened, then that is the motive and that's the move on what needs to happen next.

NK: This is all happening at the same time of the Black Lives Matter movement resurging. George Floyd's Death, of course. And we know that more than 50,000 people signed a petition calling for these charges against you to be withdrawn. Do you have a sense that things are changing this time?

SR: Yes and no. Change needs to happen not just over a computer or through a post. It needs to happen through action. The real change comes from everybody actually putting forth that work and that effort to be open, to being educated and to learning. They're not new things. It's old things, you know, about our history. And people need to be aware of that. And they need to be open to wanting to learn about that kind of thing and have those important discussions with their family and their friends and the people in their lives about how our society needs to be working to not have instances like this continue to happen over and over and over again, whether it is police brutality or murder.

NK: Santina Rao thank you so much for your time.

SR: Thank you. Thank you for having me.

NK: Take care.

SR: You as well.

CH: All charges against Santina Rao have been dropped. She spoke to us from Halifax. In a statement today Halifax Regional Police Chief Dan Kinsella said he'll wait for the conclusion of the ongoing investigation by the province's serious incident response team before police determine next steps.

[Music]

Maria Van Kerkhove

CH: More than 200 experts signed the letter about COVID-19. And now a lot of other people are addressing it. You may have heard our interview with Don Milton last night, he's one of the leaders of the group calling on the World Health Organization and other bodies to update their recommendations and to take the possibility of airborne transmission of the virus more seriously. The WHO has been focused on transmission via larger droplets, like when someone sneezes or coughs. Today at a media briefing, WHO officials talked about airborne transmission and acknowledged there's emerging evidence for it. Here's some of what the WHO's Maria Van Kerkhove had to say.

MARIA VAN KERKHOVE: You know, we have been engaged with this group since April and we've had an active engagement with them and with many of the signatories on this through different networks. And as we have said previously, we welcome the interaction from scientists all over the world, from many different disciplines. Many of the signatories are engineers, which is a wonderful area of expertise, which adds to growing knowledge about the importance of ventilation, which we feel also is very important. We have been talking about the possibility of airborne transmission and aerosol transmission as one of the modes of transmission of COVID-19 as well as droplet. We've looked at fomites, we look at fecal-oral, we look at mother to child. We look at animal to human, of course, as well. And so we are producing a scientific brief on summarizing where we are. We've been working on this for several weeks now and we've engaged with a large number of groups, epidemiologists, and clinicians, IPC specialists, engineers, mathematical modellers, to try to consolidate the growing knowledge around transmission. But we have spoken about the importance of all of the different potential modes of transmission. This is a respiratory pathogen. And so it is important that what we know fits into the guidance that we have, which is why a comprehensive package of interventions are required to be able to stop transmission. This includes not only physical distancing, it includes the use of masks, where appropriate in certain settings specifically where you can't do physical distancing and especially for health care workers. So our focus on the use of masks, of course, is for health care workers and to use airborne precautions where you have those aerosol generating procedures. But we're also looking at the possible role of airborne transmission in other settings, particularly close settings where you have poor ventilation.

CH: Maria Van Kerckhove is the World Health Organization's technical lead for COVID-19. She spoke to media today.

[Music]

University of Kentucky Painting

Guest: Karyn Olivier

CH: For years, there have been calls to remove a controversial mural at the University of Kentucky because of its depictions of Black and Indigenous people. And last month, the school said it would finally take it down. But now the school and its president are facing a lawsuit over the decision from Kentucky writer Wendell Berry, who is white. And separately, a Black artist named Karyn Oliviers saying she too wants the mural to stay. Two years ago, Ms. Olivier installed a piece of her own art in the same building as the mural. And she has written that if the mural is taken down, it will mute her work. We reached Karyn Olivier in Philadelphia.

NK: Ms. Olivier, can you describe what the mural at the heart of this controversy depicts?

KARYN OLIVIER: It depicts Kentucky's history and it contains images that are very stereotypical of the time. The images of black slaves working the fields, blacks playing music for the white elite, the one Native American represented is kind of in the forests looks like he's poised to attack a lone white female. So the representations are things that are today what we would call, offensive and racist.

NK: And students for years have been calling for its removal. Where do you sit with those criticisms?

KO: I think things are very complex and complicated. I think there's a obviousness to the placement of the slaves essentially located. I could imagine that can cause pain. It could be a trigger. I think when you see its position, it is a reminder. I think about the time this mural was produced in 1934. I found out recently that there were other murals that were created the same time at the university that were supposed to represent the same thing: the history of Kentucky. And they didn't include any African-American figures or any Native Americans. So in one way, portraying black and brown figures was actually an acknowledgment of our existence, our positioning of the black slaves in this central location underneath the railroad and industry, which was showing, you know, progress. I think in that positioning she was recognizing that slaves built this country.

NK: Years ago, the university put a white sheet over the mural for a time. After that, they called you in to install a complimentary piece. Can you describe your piece to us on what it looks like?

KO: I decided to focus on what was there and how do I use the history of what was there and something in that and reframe it. So all of the black and brown figures that exist in the mural, I decide to reproduce. Replicate the likeness of them and actually install them in the dome ceiling of the building, the memorial hall. Before the figures were inserted, transcribed, into this space, the ceiling was gold leafed. And I was thinking, what would it mean for me to gold leaf a dome ceiling that would have references to sacred paintings? Renaissance and visiting churches. I was also thinking about a dome ceiling. Why is it dome ceiling in a space for higher education? A dome ceiling is from prehistory, it is from Islamic culture. So what would it mean to kind of use this space? So I thought if I reinserted them, if I inserted them in this space, they'll exist outside of the context of white [inaudible] -- exist outside of whiteness. And in that act, they'll have new meanings, a new framework to imagine them.

NK: What did the university say to you when it approached you to do this piece? What did it want to achieve by having your work and the mural in the same building?

KO: I think because the work has had so many repeated ebbs and flow of controversy, they felt what would it mean as a place for higher education to actually dive in? What would it mean to kind of wade in this and actually tackle it? So the idea was that what do you mean to make a work that will be in conversation with this old work? What would it mean to have a work by a contemporary artist, an African-American contemporary artist, that's in conversation with a work by a white artist from the 1930s? For me, I'm always interested in art work serving as a catalyst, serving as a tool. I always wanted to offer a space for discourse. So for me, this fraught and problematic risk with my work, we could kind of dove into the polemics and the complexity and kind of live up to the intellectual pursuits of an institution.

NK: You've said that if the mural does in fact come down, it will mute your work. Tell me more about that.

KO: I mean, the piece will only function -- and for me, I was only interested in functioning with making a relationship. I'm interested in how do we investigate complex layered histories. There's never one history. It's a multiple history. So to me, the idea of my work, the goal of it, it can't exist without the past it's seeking to confront. I'm interested in how do we think about these multiple and simultaneous histories in the present moment? So, yes, the work and function didn't mean that I've taken these anonymous beings and I see them in this divine space as pretty breathtaking. But for me, I wanted to make that exact connection between the subjugated, those who we didn't even consider, those who are beyond below. And all of a sudden, what does it mean to do that shift to maybe name them, name them in another way? So for me, it's pretty critical for it to exist with the work. Without it, it would have to come down.

NK: In announcing the decision to take it down, the University of Kentucky's president says the mural has been a, "roadblock to reconciliation, the spaces we've created for dialog and the work we have commissioned to expand conversation and contextualize art have not worked frankly." How do you respond to that?

KO: I respond in a couple of ways. I feel as though when I finished my installation, that was the moment when the work had to begin. Yes, I took two weeks to make that piece. But the real work had to begin afterwards. And I'm thinking the idea to take down the mural, especially at this moment, we're in extraordinary times where there's more than we can take in, it feels as though the act is just a Band-Aid and we know Band-Aid -- that approach hasn't worked in our country historically. I think the idea of this seemingly good deed, this kind of political correct act that's offered to a small number of, to be honest, members of black community who are upset by the mural, seems as though that quick act is that a disservice for the institution. It runs counter to the goals of an institution, which feels anti-intellectual. So to me, it also sets up this thing about this false choice that if you allow for free speech, you're against racial justice and social justice. And to me, I'm thinking this piece was really about where else can we wrestle with the ideas of what would it mean to hold opposing ideas and realities in one hand? What would it mean for us to try to harness and deal with these frightening histories, frankly?

NK: Karyn Olivier, we will leave it there and we will continue to watch what happens with the mural and your work. Thank you for your time.

KO: You're welcome.

CH: Karyn Olivier is an artist and associate professor of sculpture at Temple University. We reached her in Philadelphia.

[Music]

Mable & Garry Moore

CH: At 1:30 in the morning, Garry and Mable Moore woke up to a crash. Water, mud, and logs were rushing into their home about 200 kilometres north of Prince George, B.C. So they grabbed their granddaughter's small dog, Bean, and escaped through a tiny window. They told the CBC's Daybreak North the rest of the story.

GARRY MOORE: It just literally 35 seconds to get our house full of mud and dirt, gravel and rock. By the time I broke a window out, it was up to our knees.

MABLE MOORE: Our kitchen table -- I got up on the kitchen table to get out the window and our table was floating and bobbing in the water there when I stood on it.

CAROLINA DE RYK: And Garry, you said you had to break that window in the kitchen.

GARRY MOORE: Yeah, with a log that comes close to the house.

CAROLINA DE RYK: So you squeezed out.

GARRY MOORE: Yeah.

CAROLINA DE RYK: What next?

GARRY MOORE: And then down the sidewalk. Out across the lawn, which was no more a lawn -- it's just a mud hole.

MABLE MOORE: Yeah, we were in water pretty much up to our waist.

GARRY MOORE: [Cross talking] Rocks and rocks. And down over the bank, it was 20 feet down to the road, upside down. And my wife comes sliding down with the little dog.

MABLE MOORE: We ran over to our neighbours and I actually ran upstairs at her place. She's like 81 years old, elderly lady. And we hollered and yelled at her and got her out of bed and grabbed her car keys and her car because we didn't have a vehicle. And by that time the water was already starting to come into her yard.

CAROLINA DE RYK: In the midst of this, I know that you said, you know, it was all adrenaline, but did you ever have a moment where you thought you might not come out of this?

MABLE MOORE: Well, kind of. Yeah, because all I could think about was what if another one comes down right away. Like it would have wiped us out. That would have been it.

CAROLINA DE RYK: Have you seen your house since this event?

MABLE MOORE: We've seen pictures of it.

CAROLINA DE RYK: And what does it look like?

MABLE MOORE: There's nothing there.

GARRY MOORE: Just the roof on top of the mud bank.

MABLE MOORE: Yeah, they shortened the walls and the roof is sitting on top of the mud pile, and that's pretty much it.

CAROLINA DE RYK: What's going through your mind when you see that?

MABLE MOORE: I think today it's really starting to skin in. We lived there for 37 years. That's our whole life. We've been married for 49 years. We lived there 37. That's where our kids grew up. That was our home. But...you know what? I'm just thankful that I have Garry and he has me and we have our family and all our friends to help us through this and we'll get through it somehow.

CH: Mable and Garry Moore speaking with the CBC's Carolina de Ryk. The couple were rescued by helicopter and Mr. Moore had surgery for a deep cut on his arm.

[Music]

Jimmy

CH: Now, a timely observation on the 2006 film Snakes on a Plane. There were too many snakes. Being trapped with one deadly snake in a vehicle is sufficient, even if it's, say, a pickup truck. If you don't think that's scary, ask Jimmy -- that's what the Australian police are calling him. Recently, Jimmy was driving on a highway in Queensland when he noticed a snake slithering at his feet. He identified it as an extremely venomous Eastern brown snake. And further identified it as an imminent threat to his life. As Jimmy scrambled to pull over, the snake became upset and began, in Jimmy's words, striking at the driver's seat between my legs. At which point Jimmy struck back using a seat belt and a nearby working knife to fight off and eventually kill his hitchhiker. Jimmy then gunned it toward a hospital, only to be pulled over by police who fortunately accepted his agitated explanation. In a twist happy ending, it turned out Jimmy had managed to get the snake before it got him. And although snakes are a protected species and you are not allowed to kill them, authorities were going to let this one slither. So it may be a low budget premise, but that is a blockbuster. I can tell you with absolute serpenty.

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July 7, 2020 Episode Transcript

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