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The Current Transcript for November 8, 2021

Host: Matt Galloway

STORIES FROM THIS EPISODE

Prologue

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He was totally silenced and exiled for 20 years, not even can not even write words.

MATT GALLOWAY: Ai Wei Wei knows what it's like to have your art seen as a threat to the state. His father was shunned by Chairman Mao and forced into internal exile for his poetry. AI Weiwei's own provocative work led him to be imprisoned by the Chinese state in 30 minutes. The artist and activist is here to talk about why he thinks Chinese officials are afraid of art and how the world should engage with the nation. He can no longer call home. Also this morning, the pressure on a new minister of national defence to change a culture when it comes to sexual misconduct in the military. And later, do you have a Rubik's Cube? Have you spent hours struggling to get it back to its starting position? If so, you have this man to thank.

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It was very interesting and seeing how to became an icon of creativity, way of thinking, logic and discovery.

MG: Coming up, why Erno Rubik believes his cube can help us approach other complex problems like the pandemic. We start, though, in Glasgow and the final sprint for a climate deal. Good morning. I'm Matt Galloway and this is The Current.

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Young activists in Canada fighting climate change;

Guests: Samira Mohyeddin, Paul Brow

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[Protesting noises]

MG: Tens of thousands of activists marched through the streets of Glasgow this weekend, protesting what they see as a lack of meaningful progress at COP 26 on tackling the climate crisis.

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VOICE 1: My name is Cameron, I am from California.

VOICE 2: My name is Maya and I'm from Texas.

VOICE 3: My name is Ilana and I'm from Uruguay, South America. We are here because it's so important to get out there, to go to the streets, to, like, come here and put pressure on them.

VOICE 1: We're hoping that us being here today creates a sense of urgency and that we're able to create better futures for our children and grandchildren and for the generations to come.

VOICE 2: Change doesn't happen unless you are angry and unless there is a little bit of hope. And if that results in a thousands of people marching for climate, then that's what it has to take.

MG: The Current's producer Samira Mohyeddin is in Glasgow, Samira. Good morning.

SAMIRA MOHYEDDIN: Good morning, Matt.

MG: Tell us what the mood is like there right now.

SAMIRA MOHYEDDIN: Oh, if I had to put it into one word, I'd say pessimistic. And the venue itself speaks to that. So you've got tens of thousands of participants inside and just as many climate activists outside demanding to be heard. The site is actually broken up into two zones. You have the blue zone and the Green Zone, and the blue zone is where the delegates and world leaders and NGOs are. The Green Zone is where the activists are, and it really feels like never the two or twain shall meet.

MG: There have been many promises made in the blue zone. How have those gone over with the activists outside?

SAMIRA MOHYEDDIN: Not well, despite all the promises made about ending deforestation and not financing coal projects. Some of these were also promised in Paris in 2015, and the fact is that these promises and pledges aren't actually binding. So if governments don't deliver on their promises, they can't really be held to account. But despite all this mat, there really is still a sense of hope and urgency, particularly amongst the young. I sat down with three young climate activists who are here in Glasgow from Canada. I asked them to introduce themselves and tell us what first got them into climate activism. Have a listen.

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VOICE 4: My name is Sidney Pond. I am 15 years old. I live in Calgary, Alberta, and I am part of Laura's vs. Her Majesty the Queen, a legal case suing the federal government of Canada in regard to failing to protect the youth against the effects of climate change. For me, I was evacuated from my house when I was seven. I think because of the 2013 flood that affected Calgary, and I've also seen the effects of lots of fire smoke.

VOICE 5: I'm ShatiRamkumar. I'm 25 and I'm the director of communications and policy for student energy. I immigrated with my parents from southern India when I was eight years old, and I feel like the disproportionate impact on climate change in India and my hometown, in my rural village compared to where I live here in Canada, that informs a lot of my work in the climate movement policy.

VOICE 6: [Indiginous speech] Hello, my name is Feddie K. Campbell, and I'm a proud Metis woman who speaks a little bit of Cree, the language that my maternal grandmother spoke. My paternal side is settler Canadian, and I was born and raised on the traditional unceded and surrendered territories of the [unintelligible] Peoples, also known as Kimberley British Columbia. I work for an organisation called Indigenous Clean Energy.

VOICE 4: My first concrete action was to speak to Calgary City Council. When I look back on it today, it seems ridiculous. I was comparing the climate crisis to Harry Potter, so I compared Harry Potter to the youth and the Ministry of Magic to the governments and Voldemort as the climate crisis, and I was 12 then.

VOICE 5: My first action. Believe it or not, was not a protest, but a science fair project. It was when I moved here from India to Canada. I realised, OK, there is not enough public transportation in my city. So at eight years old, I prepared a plan for how Surrey could increase its public transportation in order to reduce our emissions. We haven't quite gotten to the goals yet, but I said when I was in fourth grade.

VOICE 6: So as far back as I can remember, my family has taught me to work to sustain everything that one touches. And so I think from a familiar landscape that started with gardening and working on sustainable food. But when I was about 12 years old, I heard the story of a residential school survivor and I thought, Wow, how could this be? And I started to question everything about our systems from rights to basic. Human rights to environmental rights, to protection of lands and animals, and it was then and there that I did a school presentation on the impacts of environment and environmental degradation to indigenous communities.

MG: These are people who are very young, and yet they've been touched in a really personal way by climate change already. What do they tell you about their experiences so far at the conference?

SAMIRA MOHYEDDIN: It was a really mixed reaction mat because, unlike Shakti and Freddie, Sadie didn't have access to the blue zone. And again, this goes back to the divide happening at the conference. But all three of them were quite passionate about working to see real changes come about at COP26. Here's what they told me.

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VOICE 4: I do think that our leaders need to be very transparent with the negotiations.

VOICE 5: Building on what she said, there was a statistic somebody compiled that there are 11000 observers registered for this cop, but 36 are being allowed to watch the negotiations. Not 360, not thirty six hundred thirty six. So a lot of the observers who have travelled here from around the world, like student energy, like indigenous clean energy, who will hold leaders accountable to what they say, what they don't say, they're not actually being allowed in the negotiations. So that is one stark difference at this cop compared to the last cop.

VOICE 6: And if indigenous communities, if other minority communities don't have not only a seat at the table but are leading those discussions, then we won't go anywhere. You know, we only have a certain amount of time and why not take action that is going to be the most impactful as possible. I'll say this there are indigenous communities all around the globe who have been taking care of the Earth for centuries and passing down that knowledge from generation to generation. And I think that when creating different mechanisms or words or actions and programmes, that those voices should be heard and leading us on the path forward. Well, I am a skier, a hiker, a biker. I live in the natural world and I want with my whole heart to protect it. The natural world is where I feel the most safe, the most at peace, the most at home, and I want to interact with it as my job when I grow up and I want to protect it as much as possible. And whenever I go into the natural world, it is truly my motivation to keep fighting for it. My dad keeps talking about how the general public won't change what they do in the future based off of saving polar bears. But for me, it is truly about saving our natural world and our polar bears, including with that. It's really motivating for me, and it's really, really depressing when I see our leaders thinking that we can keep taking natural resources from the Earth and get away with that for the rest of time.

VOICE 5: I think what keeps me going and my activism is just the reality of feeling like I'm straddling two worlds. I've seen already from afar the changes that my family is facing due to the climate crisis. We come from a rural part of India. We are a farming family who the climate crisis has already affected, how much water is available, what we can grow, the the huge varieties of native plants and seeds and fruits and vegetables that we used to have just a few decades ago are being replaced. And just realising that this really precarious situation that my family and so many millions billions of others are facing is what keeps me going daily in the climate crisis and also my understanding that, OK, I have an extremely privileged position of having grown up in Canada and having access to honestly these really elite spaces like COP26 and other international conferences. And so I need to bring these realities with me and kind of hold leaders accountable.

VOICE 6: It's a lot of pressure and it's a lot of weight for our generation, I think, but also as an indigenous woman, excuse me, getting emotional here, but. It's a responsibility to care take for Mother Earth, the planet that provides for us. So the goal of 2030, I mean, we need everyone really needs to come together as a collective to figure this out. You know, it's a lofty goal, but I will say that it can be done. We have to reduce our annual emissions by half in the next 10 years. Now, nine years, that is, it's huge. But there are amazing examples of this being done and it can be done. So I think on the flip side of that, there's so much hope and the hope keeps me going.

VOICE 5: When I hear 2030, I think, of course, we need to transform our energy system by 2030. And honestly, it's unfortunate that we've been made to wait this long. World leaders, industry, they knew about climate change a long time ago, but we are where we are. And I think what's more important to me than 2030 is the plans that leaders announced to get us there. Net zero is a term that is being thrown around with greater and greater ease by many governments, and it worries me that the short term plans, you know, the difficult decisions the very tricky transitions will have to make are not being announced at the same time as these grand announcements. These big pledges of net zero by 20, 45, 50, 70 that also really depends on what we do in the next year, in the next six months and whether we're able to make those difficult decisions now.

VOICE 6: We have so much to do and as in the past, I am not sure how it's going to go with our leaders because if we come to 2030 and nothing much has been done and leaders are rushing to try and do what they need to do, it won't be enough. It won't be enough unless we start yesterday, pretty much. We need to take this so much more seriously than we are.

MG: And you can really hear the sense of urgency in their voices.

SAMIRA MOHYEDDIN: And hope. Lots of hope here, Matt. Despite the hovering awareness that, well, we've been here before many times.

MG: Samira. Thank you very much.

SAMIRA MOHYEDDIN: Thanks, Matt.

MG: The Current's producer Samir Mohyeddin is in Glasgow for COP26. Paul Brown has been meant to many of these cop conferences. He's the former environment editor for The Guardian newspaper. He is also in Glasgow. Paul, good morning to you.

PAUL BROWN: Good morning.

MG: You hear that frustration from those young people. On Friday, Greta Thunberg called COP a giant PR event. Is that fair, do you think?

PAUL BROWN: Well, I think I would agree with quite that he senses, because there were big announcements at the beginning of this week, which sounded very impressive, and the UK government is being accused of putting out a press release a day to make things seem as if it's doing very well, when in fact, at the beginning of the second week, things are looking quite bleak. And I was quite cheered by the optimism of your young correspondents there. But as someone who's been watching these events for a long time, I'm not feeling quite so hopeful myself.

MG: Tell me more about that. I mean, there's a lot of urgency on the outside. Is that being felt in the inside? Is it business as usual or is this is this cop different, do you think?

PAUL BROWN: Well, there is a difference, which is important in that a huge percentage of the population in all countries of the world now are aware of climate change, not least because of the things that are happening in their own countries to the weather, but also because they realise that their way of life that we, that many people aspire to cannot continue in the way it is. So is a public awareness that wasn't there 20 years ago when I- 30 years ago and I started covering these things. But I think as far as governments are concerned, particularly of the larger nations and Canada is included in that, there is not awareness of how fast we need to go. I mean, there's plenty of, you know, zero by 2050, but where we're going to be by 2030 is a completely open question and the policies are not there to get there.

MG: You mentioned the public perception you had to convince your news desk editor to send you to the first Earth Day summit in Rio. What was that conversation like? I mean, and what was the pitch that you made back then?

PAUL BROWN: Well, basically, I oversee environment corresponds only two years then that I realised that many of these things, like deforestation and so on and the heating of the climate were very strong scientifically, but hadn't been transferred to the political arena at all. And the Guardian newspaper, which I was working for, is a very strong political paper. And Mrs Thatcher had realised that climate change is a problem. And I pitched it on the fact that if Mrs Thatcher thought it was a problem, we ought to be there because although the Guardian is left of centre, I mean, you know, if the Conservatives thought it was a problem, it really was a problem. So I tried that and they thought that the Premier League was more important than the climate, basically.

MG: How has the media changed, do you think? And I mean, does it follow the public perception that the urgency that many people around the world feel is that being matched by how, for example, this cop is being covered?

PAUL BROWN: What I have to tell you that I have never seen so many journalists in my life is this call, I mean, sitting in a room now with possibly. 500 journalists in it. And these are just the print media and not the television and radio people or somewhere else. So I mean, in that sense, it is. But every aspect of journalism now, you know, from fashion to sport, you know, takes a chunk out of the assignment reporting. I mean, when I started, it was a sort of subject that nobody else was interested in. But if you talk to city reporters, anyone know the climate is part of their beat? So there's an awareness and an understanding that it's important to every journalist in every newspaper because climate story crops up every five minutes.

MG: You mentioned a press release a day from the UK government. Has anything surprised you coming out of this cop so far?

PAUL BROWN: Well, what has surprised me a little bit is the anger felt by the developing world and the lack, the feeling that they are not being supported, I mean, now the people at the front line of climate change, they are already losing islands and communities to climate change and sea level rise and from extreme weather events. And they are. Much more angry than I've ever heard them before about the lack of action, the lack of finance, the lack of a means of renewable energy technology transfer, none of these things are happening at the pace they have been promised in Paris and subsequently, and they are beginning to feel that time is running out for them. And that's what I think the conference is heading to on the end of this week. The confrontation between the developing world and the developed world, and I don't think the developed world has so far realised the fact that they lost the sharp end of the rest of the world's anger.

MG: I mean, I guess, given that in the last minute or so that we have, what would you consider to be a good outcome of this conference and what would amount to a failure?

PAUL BROWN: Well, I think first of all, there needs to be a lot of action on finance and there's not been enough financial analysis for something called loss and damage. People want compensation for the damage it's caused. But I also think more action between now and 2030, rather than long distance goals that we've heard so much about practical steps we have we've heard so little about at this conference and we need that before Friday. Otherwise I think it's going to be a failure.

MG: Is your sense that that will happen? Are you optimistic that given the urgency that you've described and the anger that you've described that those who were there in those rooms with those negotiations underway will will appreciate that and make it happen?

PAUL BROWN: What I'm striving to be optimistic when I'm with my news is always tells me on this deal journalistic that honestly, I'm not very optimistic today. The high level segment starts back again tomorrow, and maybe people like Obama can shift things forward, but at the moment it doesn't look good.

MG: Paul, it's good to speak with you. Thank you very much.

PAUL BROWN: All right, thank you.

MG: Paul Brown, former environment editor for the Guardian newspaper, he was in Glasgow. You're CBC News is next, and then I'll be speaking with the renowned artist and activist Ai Wei Wei. We'll talk about his art, his father's art, the link between the two in terms of how they have been treated by the Chinese state and how he wants the rest of the world to engage with China. Ai Wei Wei coming up in six minutes. I'm Matt Galloway and you're listening to The Current on CBC Radio One.

Ai Weiwei on his family's multi-generational fight against authoritarianism

Guest: Ai Wei Wei

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MG: Good morning. I'm Matt Galloway and you're listening to The Current.

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MG: Still to come what some see as an important step toward justice for sexual assault survivors in Canada's military and also Erno Rubik on why his frustrating little cube could help us tackle some of today's big problems. But first, a father's influence on one of history's most acclaimed artists and activists.

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MG: Ai Wei Wei is internationally known for pushing boundaries, his art and activism have made him an irrepressible critic of China's regime, and in a new memoir, he reflects on how his upbringing made him who he is today. It is an upbringing very much shaped by his father and the struggles they endured together. His father was Ai Qing, a celebrated poet. He lived through the Japanese invasion of China Civil War and Revolution. Chairman Mao's deadly cultural revolution in the 1960s was especially hard on him and on the young son, who would also become an artist. This is a story of resilience, a theme we are exploring this season on The Current how a man can survive persecution and emerge as a leading voice on human rights. Ai Wei Wei tells this story in his new book 1000 Years of Joys and Sorrows A Memoir. We've reached Ai Wei Wei over Zoom. Ai Wei Wei. Hello.

AI WEI WEI: Hello.

MG: I want to begin with a poem that your father wrote, it's called Reborn Land: Our great land that was dead now under the bright sky is born again. Hardship is just a memory in its warm chest. There will flow anew the blood of warriors. AI Qing wrote that in 1937, that was 20 years before you were born. What goes through your mind when you hear his words,

AI WEI WEI: That is 80 years past. We have learnt different time today. And it's quite clear to see how pure and how simple in that generation's mind to have the hope for the new China. Today China is still the human rights and the human condition still in many ways in crisis.

MG: Your father sounded like a remarkable man. Tell me a little bit about him.

AI WEI WEI: Well, he is very much represent his generation. He went to Paris when he was 19 and come back to China before he even joined the real motion has had been put in jail because he is a liberal artist. In jail, he become a poet. Then, once he was released after three years to lives, I become very well known as a poet. But that time was a lot of internal struggle. China is fighting with Japan, and he become a refugee on his homeland for about 10 years. He travelled one side, putting on the city, one province to another. And every time he tried to grab a job just a few months he has to escape from Japan's bombing or airplanes. So eventually he'd joined the Communists, Communist force. Years later, it wins the game under the become of the new re-establishment of China.

MG: He always believed in the power of art, he said. You write this in the book The Future of Poetry is inseparable from the Future of Democratic Politics. What do you think he meant by that?

AI WEI WEI: Well, we've got time. China still under strong censorship and he feel the liberation of the cultural and the human mind has to underdemocratic political condition. You know, China never really established that. And even after the new nation established, the situation becomes even worse. He was totally silenced and eventually become a so-called rightist and exiled for 20 years, cannot even write right words.

MG: He wasn't able to pick up a pen for 20 years.

AI WEI WEI: No, he was not to be considered a really [unintelliglbe] act for someone like him to write anything.

MG: You were living with your father as a boy in a place called Little Siberia. What was the purpose of Little Siberia?

AI WEI WEI: Also, area of the [unintelligible], so-called the political prisoners pr someone they don't like, these send us far as possible to the countryside to do labour jobs as re-education and make them disappear.

MG: Describe the conditions that you were living in at the time in Little Siberia.

AI WEI WEI: The situation's pretty harsh, we have to be a whole underground. As a punishment they basically have very limited food or they have to do a heavy, heavy labour job. And then daily he has to face in person insult what he has to say something he never did before, you know, to confess it's a crime. And you know, he was beaten and they insulted all the time.

MG: And you lived in this hole in the ground. I mean, describe what that was like.

AI WEI WEI: It's just dark and is a hole, you know, yeah.

MG: I'd heard you keep a photo of this on your phone.

AI WEI WEI: I have an image, which is someone said to me,

MG: you know, why do you do that?

AI WEI WEI: Well, yeah, you have to have something on the phone. You know, I think it's funny too. Everytime time asking me, you know, what's it like I show them, then people become speechless because they couldn't even find the right words for it.

MG: Well, that's the photo of the hole. That's incredible. It's just a hole in the ground.

AI WEI WEI: Yeah, it's just a hole underground. But you feel safer if you got into there. It's a pretty dry. And there is no rain. Once there is rain, it's really problem because the water all fall to it.

MG: And as a kid, I mean, did you understand what was happening to your father at the time?

AI WEI WEI: No, you know, this is a one, a nation which is so large and there's no other voice. Nobody can tell you any other information. So what hardware or happens to your family is like physical evidence. You know, it's just like physics. You cannot explain why, and it's just the impossible to have another possibility. You know, many people suicide or killed themselves or just cannot- they feel there's no way to be out. My father also cleans public toilet for this 200 [unintelliglbe]. They feel insulted because the job is so dirty and the he was a writer never do this kind of physical work, so he cannot really rest for one day because the job will be double the next day. It's now impossible for him to handle. So he said, You know, I'm 60 years old. I never know who clean my toilet. So why not. I just, you know, if I have this job now, it seems pretty normal for him. You know, he's a man with a big heart. And as[unintelligible], come back from Paris. I really admire him. Very strong, hard in the mind and he's doing a perfect job as someone doing those very insulting works.

MG: What impact do you think that had on you for the rest of your life, that experience?

AI WEI WEI: I still don't know. I think he certainly is not like so only against authority. He never like that. He has his principal and he has his mind, but he's never really like me, really- I don't know. You know, he's very different. So he's quite a humble person. I'm not a very humble person.

MG: You started painting after the Cultural Revolution ended, and in the book, you say that with art, I opened up a space that was new to me. What did art give you when you started creating art?

AI WEI WEI: I think you need a liberty to use some other type of language, you know, not to speak the exact same language, so you have to find your own vocabulary. And art itself is a liberation.

MG: Part of that finding that language was was leaving China and going to New York City. What were you looking for when you went to New York?

AI WEI WEI: Oh, I don't know what exactly I'm looking for, because there's no reference. We only know U.S. is the enemy of China. And I just want to know what's it like to be an enemy of China?

MG: What was it like as an artist to arrive there, I mean, you talk in the book about meeting like Allen Ginsberg.

AI WEI WEI: I arrived there as foreign students and not as artists, so I have a long way to to become some kind of artist. But I did give up after a while, not far behind.

MG: You said you didn't feel like an artist when you arrived there.

AI WEI WEI: No, no. You know, I guess you always can call yourself the artist. So I'm an artist. So nobody ask you what you do.

MG: Did you feel as though you didn't stack up in terms of artists who were there already in New York creating art?

AI WEI WEI: No, I did a lot of paintings, and then every time I have more left to on those paintings, so away on the painting, so you know, after a few times they don't want to make it anymore.

MG: It's kind of amazing to think that I mean, at that time, if people were, you know, rooting through the dumpsters, they would have found Ai Wei Wei paintings.

AI WEI WEI: Till today aI think many artists throw their works away.

MG: You were in America when the protests took over Tiananmen Square and you watched those on CNN. What was that like to watch it on television in the United States?

AI WEI WEI: Well, it's first time you have some hope in China. You're thinking, well, this [unintelligible] can really mean [unintelligible]one more democracy, but not that is doesn't lasting for long. You know, very soon would be crushed by military tanks, and every single barb comes in normal.

MG: What does that do to the hope that you had when you saw those protests begin?

AI WEI WEI: You really become very cynical. You know, when you see what happens in Hong Kong since a year ago, then, you believe no one can really overcome those people. They are so educated, well organised, the peaceful demonstration. And now where are those people? They're either in jail or they escaped. Under the whole world watched it. Nobody really supports them. You know, it's this, you have to become cynical about those things. It's not just happens in China, it's almost everywhere.

MG: Why did you return to China from New York?

AI WEI WEI: I first, I don't think it's a suitable for me to stay in New York. You know, it has been 12 years and I don't think I fit in there. I still feel very lonely. I'm a foreigner and my father was in hospital. So for me in the last chance to go back.

MG: When you return to China, you began to eventually create art that, as your father's art did, got the attention of the authorities that got people paying attention to what you were doing. And you say in the book that in some ways it was inevitable that you would move from being an artist to a social activist. Why was that inevitable, do you think?

AI WEI WEI: From someone who has my growing up experience to understand what my father has been facing and how that generation has been punished and lot memory. I still have unfinished business with China, with authority. And there is a culture. So I have a lot to talk about. So if there is no internet, I will never have a chance. But this internet, I kind of freely speaking for a few years, about three years. That time in China still don't know how to censor a voice like my voice. So I take that opportunity. And yeah, made me becomes today's Ai Wei Wei.

MG: What are some of the things that the authorities did to let you know that they were growing impatient with your activism? I mean, they put up cameras around you, they would follow you. What was it like to live under that kind of constant surveillance like this?

AI WEI WEI: Well, you feel a bit ridiculous. I was telling them, I have no secret. You guys have secret, you know, I even expose myself to the camera above my bedroom to live broadcasting my life. And to this, they tell me, Wei Wei, you have to shut it down. I said, but you want to see all my activities. they say but that should not be done by you. This very strong argument to better. They don't like me to act on guard. And they feel being insulted.

MG: Did you live in fear? I mean, were you fearful as all of this is kind of escalating?

AI WEI WEI: I'm never live in fear, even till the day they arrest me. I never knew fear. I know they're approaching me, I know that anyting can happen to me any moment, but I don't worry about a sense of either fear or danger, something like that.

MG: Describe that day in 2011, when you were arrested.

AI WEI WEI: On the day I was with my assistant on the way to Taiwan. When we go through the border security, me and my assistant being separated and I was being lead to location with my face with a black hood on my head you had like a hood, black hood and was took to secrete area, until they released me for 81 days.

MG: What happened to you over that time?

AI WEI WEI: I think you get all those details in the book. It's very unique training programme. So I think the whole programme to make you believe they are the authority, they can make anything happen to you. You have no way to to avoid it. So of course, they have cleared tactics to intimidate you and tell you the worst situation can happen to you. The problem is you constantly struggle to see if what they said is true or a lie.

MG: How did you stay sane through the whole thing?

AI WEI WEI: I don't know, I guess, if it's too long enough, it can destroy anybody, because this is really psychological torture. I cannot sleep a nine times because a light is always on and the two soldiers standing next to you while lay on bed and look at you. Yeah, but it's really a psychological warfare. So, of course, while being put on this kind of a very vulnerable condition and this happened to you.

MG: Do you see a direct link between what you went through and what your father went through all those years ago?

AI WEI WEI: They're so clearly identical to each other. We almost have same kind of crime, subversion of state power, and both are artist, and I think in many ways it's exactly the same.

MG: This book is is about your own history, but it's about your father's history and the entanglement of that within the history of China. And you say that China rejects memory and refuses to honestly address the task of building a healthy society. What happens if China rejects memory? If things like Tiananmen Square are wiped off the map or the Cultural Revolution is pushed into the dustbin? What what happens then?

AI WEI WEI: Well, China is a state, so there's no clear memory or clear human values being dependent on this to become a very strong nation.

MG: If China were to acknowledge its history, what could happen?

AI WEI WEI: They will not. Not possible there. If they they do that to the China simply will not exist as China today.

MG: Want to ask you about China today. I'm in Canada, and Canada's relationship with China is at a crossroads. Two Canadians were scooped up and held, many people believe arbitrarily for a couple of years. There is great debate about the Olympics and whether countries should attend the Olympics next February. There is talk of genocide in China over the country's treatment of the Uyghurs. How do you think the the world should engage with China now?

AI WEI WEI: I think China or the other parties, they all should be aware of what is the future for humanity. You know, they have to not just point fingers, but to seriously talk about human rights and freedom of speech. The West is not going to do that. They will to enjoy big profit. You know, just look at all those big corporations. They love China. And the politicians just stay there for a few years. China is laughing about the West and democracy. So, you know, what do you expect?

MG: So where does that leave us? I mean, if the world can't separate itself from China and China, as you said, might be laughing at the West, where does that leave that sense of engagement? Should there be any engagement at all? How do you move forward with it?

AI WEI WEI: There is no 'should'. The word never, never give it up a 'should'. There's no such thing as 'should'. We only kind of see the world and we'll still develop. China is still going to be stronger. And the West still losing the ground in arguing with China.

MG: You're a father now. Does your son know of your work? Does he know what you do?

AI WEI WEI: Oh, she knows pretty well. He travel this many times to refugee camps or in Mexico to try to discover what's 43 disappeared students and also go to Brazil to see, you know, the problems with the rainforest. He traveks with me. I try not to emphasise or sense - he is to too small He should have his naiveness or, he should not know too much. I really want to wish him, well, never growng up.

MG: You wish he never grows up?

AI WEI WEI: Yeah, I think it would be the best.

MG: Why?

AI WEI WEI: Because the adult world is not so beautiful. And, you know, as kids, we better to stay [unintelligible]

MG: Ai Wei Wei, it's a pleasure to talk to you, thank you very much.

AI WEI WEI: Thank you.

MG: Take care. Bye, bye.

AI WEI WEI: Bye.

MG: I was speaking with the artist and activist Ai Wei Wei, his new book is 1000 Years of Joys and Sorrows a memoir. Well, coming up after your regional update, it is being hailed as a monumental step for sexual assault survivors and Canada's military. In a moment what the move to the civilian system means for justice, I'm Matt Galloway. You're listening to The Current.

Civilian justice system’s role in investigating military sexual assault allegations; and how the Rubik’s Cube can help us tackle bigger problems like the pandemic

Guest: Julie Lalonde, Enro Rubik

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MG: Hi, I'm Matt Galloway, you're listening to The Current.

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I think it is extremely important that the survivors of sexual misconduct in the military have recourse to these civilian legal system, and therefore I am very committed to implementing this interim recommendation. And secondly, we will wait to see what madam our board decides in her final recommendations. And indeed, if she chooses to make this a permanent solution, then of course we will act on it.

MG: That's the new Minister of National Defence Anita Anand, speaking about a move that she describes as monumental. All military sexual assault allegations past and present, current and historic are to be moved on an interim basis back to the civilian justice system. It follows recommendations by two former Supreme Court justices Louise Arbour and Morris Fish. Joining me now is Julie Lalonde, women's rights activist who also does sexual assault prevention training for the Canadian Forces and the Department of National Defence. Julie, good morning.

JULIE LALONDE: Good morning.

MG: Anita Anand says this is monumental from your perspective. How significant is this decision to move the sexual assault investigations back into the civilian system?

JULIE LALONDE: It is monumental, and I think what's key and what you said, is that it's moving it back to the civilian system. So it was in the civilian system until the late 90s when the Somalia affair caused a giant omnibus bill to be passed, which snuck back in that it would be the jurisdiction of the Canadian Armed Forces. So it's important for us to know that we're going back to a former model because it means we do have a bit of an understanding of how this works in the civilian system and that it is that slightly better than the military system in terms of conviction rates, but also survivor's trust in the system, which I mean makes complete sense because you're taking it away from the chain of command. Certainly, survivors would feel like they would have more access to justice in a slightly more impartial system.

MG: And is that what you're hearing from survivors about this move?

JULIE LALONDE: Absolutely. So the overwhelming tone that I'm getting from military survivors and military members is that this is a step in the right direction, and I agree.

MG: What were the biggest concerns with the military justice system of handling sexual assault investigations?

JULIE LALONDE: I mean, we've seen it with the RCMP, we've seen it with police forces across the country. When you investigate your own, there's inherent bias. But even if you were to actually go through with the process, you know, to the letter. By definition, survivors are going to be reticent because they're reporting to people who might be good friends, colleagues with their abuser, with the perpetrators. And so the feeling that am I going to get good, unbiased support? I don't really think so. And so that's sort of the major issue is is the trust factor and the belief that, yeah, I mean, I'm reporting someone who's friends to you or I'm reporting someone who reports to you. Am I going to actually get the level of justice that I'm old?

MG: And again, that has been raised by, you think, of what the former Supreme Court Justice, Maurice Fish said in a report to Parliament last spring, raising concerns about the independence of a military justice system. If that's such a big concern, why has that been able to remain in place until the new Minister of National Defence made that move?

JULIE LALONDE: The Canadian Armed Forces is incredibly insular. They're incredibly- yeah, it's very much like we are our own world. We have our own set of rules, our own culture. And so they are incredibly resistant to outside anything. And so until this moment, until basically their hand was forced, they really were going to reject any and all kind of opening up of their books or expanding the services that folks can access in the civilian world because by definition, they really want to be insular. And so having outside eyes come in and they might find things that the military doesn't want folks to know.

MG: In that report, Justice Fish also recommended that these prosecutions be moved to the civilian system, at least until the Declaration of Victims Rights is implemented. What is that?

JULIE LALONDE: Well, it's supposed to be a blueprint for folks to know what their rights are and what they can access and what justice looks like. And this is the piece that concerns me the most. There's a lot of excitement around the announcement that this is going back to the civilian system, but it is interim, as you mentioned at the top. And so how long is it going to be there? Is it going to remain there? And that's my concern, particularly because we've seen that this issue is incredibly partisan and that, for example, the Desha report that came out in 2015 was very robust made incredible recommendations. But the Trudeau government didn't really want to follow up on those because it was done under the Harper government. So every government that comes through is going to argue that they have a different lens, a different perspective. And that's my concern, as we seem to always be starting from scratch every time we have a new government or a new scandal of some kind. And I want some permanency. I want confirmation that this is going to be in the civilian system indefinitely so that survivors can build up. That trust can start to trust in that system in order to come forward. But the idea that we're going to make that switch right away and everyone's going to trust him, it's going to be wonderful is pretty naive.

MG: In the letter to the defence minister, the former Supreme Court Justice Louise Arbour, acknowledged that there are some concerns about moving prosecutions to the civilian system. What concerns do you have? I mean, this is something that you hinted at at the very beginning of our conversation.

JULIE LALONDE: I've been working in the civilian system, working with survivors for close to 20 years, and the conviction rates for sexual assault in Canada are abysmal. I mean, the Globe and Mail report, thanks to Robyn Doolittle a few years ago, found one in four sexual assaults are deemed unfounded in the civilian system. That number hasn't gotten much better in the last few years. So my concern is that people are seeing this as a panacea that this is going to solve all the problems. And those of us who are in the civilian system are like, Oh, it's awful over here. The grass is not greener. So yes, I think it will be slightly better for military members because of that impartiality. But the idea that it's going to solve everything is naive. And then secondly, now we're going to need civilian forces, police forces to be trained in military life to understand the nuances, the complexity in order to be able to to offer true support to survivors and again, based on my experience. Police are not culturally sensitive in all facets. So again, there's going to be a tremendous amount of work to get them up to speed on understanding military realities.

MG: And that's what Louise Arbour was mentioning specifically. I mean that the civilian system doesn't necessarily have an appropriate level of knowledge of the military. How could that hold an investigation back?

JULIE LALONDE: Well, I mean, we're seeing that we have a country of judges that don't even understand sexual assault and are proceeding over sexual assault cases, so we know that these things fall apart when you don't have the specificity, the nuance. And so a military member coming forward and explaining why they held on to that story for so long or why they reported it and then waited to hear back before they decided to accept the civilian system if it happened overseas, for example, if it happened by their spouse. But their spouse is a military member. Like all of those complexities, I understand and folks who work in the military understand how that can impact a survivors capacity to come forward. But again, that's nuance that the average police officer is not going to have.

MG: Anita Anand is new in this file. She is the new minister of national defence, and this is one of the first things that she's done in this office. What hope does that give you that change is now on the way?

JULIE LALONDE: I'm hopeful. I mean, I'm by definition an optimist. I think you have to be in order to do this work, you got to believe the world can get better. So I believe this is a step forward one because there is a new minister so that that signals a breath of fresh air. Just a new perspective. She's a woman, which we can't deny is also a factor. She works in the civilian system. She's in the civilian world, right? Unlike the the former minister, for example. And she I mean, the letter that she put forward to say, we're going to accept the recommendations literally wasn't even addressed to her. It was addressed to the former minister. Like, that's how quickly she took action. And that, to me, is a really positive sign.

MG: Could I just go back to something you just said, which is that she is a civilian and works in the civilian world? You talked earlier about outside eyes and the concern in the military, around outside eyes being allowed in and what they might see. How big of a deal is that that she, unlike Harjit Sajjan, is not a former member of the military?

JULIE LALONDE: I think it's- I mean, it's the norm, and I think that's important, I think that's why the former minister was so unique because he was a past member of the forces, so it's going back to the norm. I think what is important is that she's a woman, she's a woman of colour and she is a woman who has come forward very quickly in saying, We're not going to shy away from this, we're going to name it. So I think it's important that she's a civilian. There's definitely been some support of that as well. What I'm hearing from survivors, which is, again, just somebody who's looking at it objectively as much as one person can to say this doesn't make sense, this doesn't add up. You can try to make excuses and say, it's your culture that says this is how it has to be, but it doesn't make sense to anyone outside of your bubble, so try something different. And her gusto, I think, is also important. She's keen to see change, and it's not. It doesn't appear to be anyway sort of tiptoeing around some of the the issues that I think previous ministers have for not wanting to offend or not wanting the military to shut their doors. And that's, I think, the biggest recommendation that has yet to be fulfilled, which is folks are asking for strong accountability from outside forces. And so there needs to be oversight. There needs to be parliamentary oversight of this because otherwise what we've seen is that once the media stops focussing on this issue, the military goes back to what they were doing and they're only moving forward because the pressure is on. And I hope that the new minister will keep that pressure.

MG: That kind of hints at what I was just going to say, which is what will show you that there is real change coming. This is a first step from her. But following that, what are you looking forward to seeing to show you that that, as I say, real change is happening?

JULIE LALONDE: I want to see them continuing to give us updates, even when we're not putting their feet on the fire. I want to see a permanent, you know, an actual CDS, like a chief of the defence staff that's put in the position that, OK, this is your role, it's not interim or acting. And I want to see broader conversation around how the military is going to, you know, they're talking about how they're down almost 8000 members like they're having difficulty recruiting. They're having they're struggling with their image. So I want to see some stability. I want to see them have a concrete plan and I want to see them updating Canadians quarterly yearly without a scandal in the news. Just them coming, being forthright and saying this is where we're excelling. This is where we're lacking. This is how we're going to continue to move forward.

MG: Julie, good to speak with you again. Thank you.

JULIE LALONDE: Thank you.

MG: Julie Lalond, women's rights activist and advocate who does training for the Canadian Forces and to the Department of National Defence.

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MG: You're listening to the current on CBC Radio one, my name is Matt Galloway. There are 43 quintillion different ways to arrange the squares on a Rubik's Cube, but of course, only one of those ways is correct. Since it was invented in 1974, people around the world have spent endless hours trying to figure out how to find that one magic combination. Some do it better than others. Some, like 12 year old Sankavi Rathan from Mississauga, Ontario, who said a new Rubik's Cube related world record last fall.

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I only started learning the Rubik's Cube early this year. Once I was good at it, my parents suggested we should apply for a Guinness World Record. So we emailed Guinness World Records and they told us there was a record called [unintelligible]. Rubik's Cube solved one handed while hula hooping and the record was twenty five cubes. I was just like, Wow, maybe I could break that. I always like a challenge. Instead of just keeping it simple, it's more fun to just take it up to the next level.

MG: For some of us, just solving the cube itself was enough of a challenge. The man behind the cube that has inspired so many records, like Sankavi's, is Hungarian architect Erno Rubik. He says all these years after his invention, we can learn something about solving other big and thorny problems by thinking about how we tackle that multicoloured cube. Erno Rubik, good morning.

ERNO RUBIK: Hi.

MG: Thank you for being here.

ERNO RUBIK: Thank you.

MG: What do you think the Rubik's Cube can teach us about solving problems, solving problems?

ERNO RUBIK: It's one of the main task in our life. We are facing all the time problems. We have problems in social life. We have problems in our neighbourhood. We have problems to fight with nature, for example. It's a very important element factor of our life. And the good thing is we can do it by playing. Play. It's again, it's a very important part of our life. It's important not to forget. Kids are learning by playing. And if it's good, if we keep our as an adults, those elements of life and and play life is not deadly serious, it's probably at the end but but in the meantime, not. So we can find all the time enjoyment, pleasure to play and we can win. We can win, especially with the cube, not on somebody else, but we can win. Win the problem, to solve the problem, to beat the problem. And we can discover our capabilities, what we are able to do and what how enjoyable to do this.

MG: Tell me more about this because you wrote something last year about the parallels between the COVID pandemic and solving the Rubik's Cube. What did you mean by that?

ERNO RUBIK: Actually, in this pandemic, it's a big problem for human beings in general. We are fighting with it, and I can't say we ought to be winning the game, but it's not finished yet but that is a progress. It's not something that you can not type of game, but you can finish at once in a short break. It's a long play. So I think finally, we need some kind of years or decades to finalise this game.

MG: Is that what you meant when when you wrote it takes resolve in an unusual level of tolerance for multiple failures in the dim hope of a distant reward? I mean, people can apply that to the Rubik's Cube, but is that what you would apply to? How we have struggled with this pandemic and struggled to find an end to this pandemic?

ERNO RUBIK: Yeah, yeah. So that means we need to learn about the failures, know any problem solving it without faiiresl and probably the failures are what we can learn most. Partly, we succeed. Partly something went wrong and make corrections and try something else so that at the end help us to find a final solution.

MG: What about the other big problem that we're facing right now, climate change? We're in the midst of of these big negotiations happening in Glasgow. What do you think those negotiators could learn from the Rubik's Cube?

ERNO RUBIK: OK, I see the cube is symbolise complexity. Very much what is partly is a contradiction because of the cube is a very small object with the few elements and so on. And but it symbolises how complex can be the variations and the roots with little or no soul, no element. So we can imagine how complex can be, then billions of people would like to move together. So to get Solution B, we need to be more capable, more understanding to learn in general if you would like to find a solution. It's not efficient to be impatient. You need to patience. We need time to do it. And it's not something that it's possible to force. We need to work on and not to give up.

MG: When you created this thing in 1974, what were you thinking about that?

ERNO RUBIK: I was not thinking about anything else, just what I'm doing. And I think I can suggest to everybody, if you are busy with something, concentrate what you are doing and don't mind the surroundings. So concentrate focussing. And that's how to to finalise and achieve your target.

MG: What did it look like initially? I mean, did it look like the cube that we all struggle with now? Or did it look different?

ERNO RUBIK: The key elements of the of my cue is that the structure, the structure, the engineering structure, the child make it capable to move in three dimensions. The visual information is the most important information that we can get. But after that, you need to to understand what you see and to do, find the structure in a pattern to top the cube. You need that capability, for example, what we call pattern recognition. Pattern, in a deeper sense, it's a connetion between elements of reality. So that's mostly this collection is hidden, so it's under the surface. And what we need to find out is hidden connections and structure.

MG: Once you created it and you scrambled it up, how long did it take you to solve the Rubik's Cube the first time?

ERNO RUBIK: It took me about one month to be able to solve. That means it's not to solve something to solve that problem. That's one thing. But after that, you are using fewer by using your knowledge, you are executing a solution. Executing a solution, it's a very different thing than to find a solution. So according to that, a very few percentage of people on Earth find the solution by themselves. More than 90 percent of people who can do the cube learnt it not to discover it, but learnt it. In that time, and I started with the whole thing I was alone. So I was with no background, what to do and how to do it. What I tried to do was stand the capabilities, the potentials and but to do and that is really the problem or I lost.

MG: Would you have ever imagined that something like this would have such staying power that people would still be using it now all those years later?

ERNO RUBIK: And I'd say there are several potential to use it. One thing is the more typical thing for the kids. The cube is most popular in teenagers and teenagers are very competitive, they're like to be the new challenge, and they like to prove their capability to win. That's the background of the new sports that developed what we call it now speed cubing to make it beating the clock, but is a complex task because you need to recognise the task and the pattern. And it's the same time you need to be able to execute it very fast. So you need a good finger's good eye, sharp eyes and good memories.

MG: What do you make of the speed cubing? I mean, there are people with these, these people hula hooping while they're doing it. A man in India set a record for solving six cubes underwater in two minutes. What do you make of that?

ERNO RUBIK: You know, that's over hundreds of Guinness Records was born in connection with the cube, but that's the nature of human beings there. The people have fantasies and find out a strange task for themselves. So to solve the cube by freefall, for example, or to do it under the [unintelligible] and so on and so forth. And each of them is it's good for measure your capabilities. This type of activity is very important when they are growng up, to find out who we are and what we are capable for. So they are doing it by biking. They may have done it running the Marathon and many other strange or unusual situations as well.

MG: We also, though, live in a time where people don't have a lot of patience, that things move very quickly, that we have short attention spans and people move from thing to thing to thing. Do you think we have the perseverance that's required still to solve the cube?

ERNO RUBIK: Yes. I think it's a very interesting side effect of the cube that they heard. They had started to use it in elderly homes because mentally, it's very important to play with that cube and to be successful. And then and by ageing, the memory is weakening. So to play with the cube, it's have to keep it in better condition. And in the same time, you need hands or you need coordination between hands and our mind and so on and so forth.

MG: How often do you pick up the cube?

ERNO RUBIK: It's happen. It's happen. I'm not counting.

MG: And you can still solve it.

ERNO RUBIK: No, not frequently, but it's happened. Mostly what I'm thinking on it's about new possibilities, what else we can do with it and what kind of progress we can do with the construction or with special modifications and that kind of things.

MG: What do you mean modifications? Could there be like- are you looking at changing the cube?

ERNO RUBIK: It's there are so many potential changes. And so the cube, the main content of the cube, is the idea. And by using this idea, you can use it in a very different looking and different play content object. So it's a very, very exciting excursion or route.

MG: Just finally, what advice would you give to somebody who sees this more as a torture device than a game, and they find it difficult to solve the puzzle? What advice would you give them?

ERNO RUBIK: You know, they can see of live as a torturing process, but we can see of life as a way of happiness. So I say look after that first initial

MG: and is there a do you have any tips, even if somebody was looking for a tip on how to solve it, do you have any I mean, any?

ERNO RUBIK: Very easy in today's race. It's not the same as I had been in 74, and today there internet. It's full of information. You can find hundreds, if not thousands, of videos and these action sheets and many other information which are out. You can try this. Each one is it.

MG: Seems kind of like cheating, though.

ERNO RUBIK: You know that there are several solutions for the cube than the physical one, taking apart and put it together. I think if you have a task, you know, cheating is not the way to win in my life. And in my view.

MG: it's a real pleasure to meet you. It must be quite something having this thing that's named after you that you created go all around the world. I mean, that must be a remarkable experience.

ERNO RUBIK: A very interesting one. So and then I wrote my book, I try to explain about my impression and and interesting route to discover the effect of the Cuban people, and it was very interesting seeing how the Cube became an icon of creativity, way of thinking logic and discovery.

MG: It's great to meet you. Thank you very much.

ERNO RUBIK: Thank you.

MG: Erno Rubik is the man behind the Rubik's Cube, and that is The Current for this Monday. Coming up next on CBC Radio One, it's Q. The Scotiabank Giller Prize will be handed out tonight and the hosts of the Giller Prize, RuPay Core and Paul Sun Young Lee will be speaking with Tom Power about what to expect from the first live awards ceremony in Canada since the pandemic began. That's coming up in just a few moments on CBC Radio One. Earlier, I was speaking with the artist Ai Wei Wei, and we'll leave you this morning with some of his music. This is from a 2013 album, The Divine Comedy, a collection of political protest songs. It's Ai Wei Wei in Hotel U.S.A. I Matt Galloway thanks for listening to The Current. We'll see you tomorrow.

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[Song]

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