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The Current Transcript for December 18, 2020

Host: Matt Galloway

STORIES FROM THIS EPISODE

Prologue

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This so important to follow the rules, because we've been the epicentre of the first wave, 1500 people died in Montreal because of the coronavirus. So we definitely have to continue to be resilient.

MATT GALLOWAY: Montreal is a city hit hard by covid from high case counts to a downtown empty of tourists. And that has put intense pressure on the mayor of that town, Valerie Plante in 30 minutes. She's here to talk about the current crisis, the future of cities post pandemic and her own story as told in a new graphic novel. Also this morning, long term care homes have become difficult places in the midst of this crisis. In 45 minutes, a story of success on Manitoulin Island in Ontario, where staff have given residents hope and joy. And later.

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What does it mean to want an age old call for change, not to change and yet also to feel bullied by the call to change?

MG: The latest book by the poet Claudia Rankine is on many best of the year lists. She joins us to talk about race, whiteness and her belief in the power of uncomfortable conversations and conflicted times. But the vaccine is here, and we start with a man at the centre of the plan to get it into the arms of Canadians. Good morning. I'm Matt Galloway. And this is The Current.

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Over 2,000 Ontarians got COVID-19 vaccine shots this week, but there's a long way to go: Rick Hillier; Andre Picard and half-hearted lockdowns

Guests: Rick Hillier, Andre Picard

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VOICE 1: Thank you.

VOICE 2: You're welcome.

[Applause]

MG: Well. That's the sound of the first Ontarian receiving her covid-19 vaccine on Monday. Her name is Anita Quidangen and she's a personal support worker at a long term care facility in Toronto. And that shot was one of the very first in what's being touted as the largest immunisation campaign in Canadian history. Heading up that effort in Ontario is retired General Rick Hillier. He served four decades in the Canadian forces, ending his career as chief of the defence staff. General, good morning.

RICK HILLIER: Good morning.

MG: Tell me what that moment meant to you when you saw the very first health care worker get her covid shot.

RICK HILLIER: Oh, my goodness. You know, like, I'm not an emotional guy, but I was a little emotional. You know, it was a culmination of an incredible effort globally to produce a vaccine. Somebody likened it to the effort to put a man on the moon back in the 60s. That's how much it took in that condensed period of time. And all of a sudden, after all of the tragedy and all of the deaths and all of the sickness and all of the cost outside of that, there is a bit of a light at the end of the tunnel. And, you know, I'm not overhyping it because we're not there yet. I kind of said to the team around us, you know, it's kind of like what Winston Churchill said; it's not the end is not the beginning of the end, but it might be the end of the beginning. And we're ready to come out of the abyss. And this is the light to follow coming out. So I was emotional.

MG: You've been at this all week, so that was on Monday. We're now at Friday. How has the campaign gone thus far?

RICK HILLIER: You know, the first weekend we cross our fingers, knock on wood, and we plan for all the setbacks that we will encounter and the bumps in the road, but we've had a good week. You know, we had 6000 vaccine show up in Ontario, 3000 came to Toronto, 3000 came to Ottawa. We had two sites operating with the first five getting the dose at the University Health Network here in Toronto on Monday afternoon. But then starting the vaccination clinic seriously on Tuesday morning. The same thing occurred in Ottawa Hospital. And as of last night, you know, as we went through the last three days, learning lessons, getting people through, getting the staff in place to be able to do the whole process, getting the people in place and in accordance with the priorities with which we are working. As of last night, I saw the number. We were well over 2000 people who had received their vaccination in Ontario out of the 3000 that we were aiming for in this first set. And we have the second vaccine for each of them set aside in the freezers for 21 days from now. So we've had a good week. We've learnt a lot of lessons. We've learnt a lot about how we're going to have to reach out to people. Our we are going to have to organise the online registration for vaccination appointments and how we're going to have to record people. You know, I went to I was at the University Health Network and saw the incredible team there. I went to Ottawa and saw that incredible team and I was inspired by them. I truly was. Those medical professionals who have been working so hard to keep people alive. They were fired up being part of the programme to bring this positive change to people around their region. And the people who were coming to get the vaccine, they were fired up to be to have a chance to get some level of protection as they do their jobs inside of those long term care homes and looking after the residents that they know and love and don't want to harm by bringing the covid-19 virus. And so we learnt a lot of lessons, a few bumps in the road. We learnt some really good things and we're going to be better for the next set to arrive. And that's what we're concentrating on today now is kind of taking those lessons and make sure they go out to the other sites that will open up as we get more vaccines.

MG: Many months into this, it is easy to slip into war metaphors when talking about covid-19. We talk about people on the front lines. We talk about the efforts to care for the sick compared to a battle you have actually led soldiers into combat. Do you think that war metaphors are the right way to think about the challenges we face with this disease?

RICK HILLIER: Well, depends on who you are and what you're trying to articulate for me. War means that the war effort is an entire focus of every resource and asset that we have at our disposal to achieve an end. And the end this time is to be able to efficiently and effectively offer a vaccine programme to the people of Ontario so they can voluntarily decide based on intelligence and good education and common sense that they want to receive that vaccine. And so that's why I use the metaphors. At times, of course, I slip back into my profession. I was a soldier all of my life. But it is a war. It's a war for survival. My goodness. You know, this tragedy has been visited upon us far too long and we have had little hope of getting out of that tragedy and those tragic circumstances up until now. And so I think the metaphors are apt and I think they are appropriate. But for me, it's just for me, talking about those metaphors means that we're focussing every effort we can, all of our energy on this and is putting it forward so that when at a press conference I attended within last week, you know, we're on covid time, and this means that we're focussing every effort that we can to make sure obviously we look after the people and those who are caught in the tragedy of covid-19 itself. And we know there's lots of that right now. And at the same time, we progress this vaccine and get it as fast as we can, get shipments, get it to the people who can vaccinate the people of Ontario as fast as we possibly can. I think it's appropriate.

MG: The processes are incredibly important here because this vaccine has to be kept, you know, as we know, an ultra cold temperatures or it can spoil quickly. There were some fears that some of this cargo could be lost through mishandling. Have you had any trouble with that so far?

RICK HILLIER: Not so far. But admittedly, now we have very small shipments. I don't want to overplay the ultra low temperature storage for Pfizer. Yeah, that's an issue of means. We've got a relatively limited number of sites that we have those freezers in. More freezers are coming kind of almost every day. The little surprise on the Pfizer one for us was the restriction on not moving it from where we received it in our initial intentions were to receive it, you know, to thaw it and mix it and then to forward ship it into those long term care homes. And there in that that special vaccination site that we would establish in each long term care home, going from one to the other to the other, we would vaccinate the residents and the entire staff that work in the home or go into the home and therefore provide us complete protection as possible. So we had to modify our plan and that's what we do. You know, again, to use a war metaphor, a plan is only good until contact with the enemy. Well, our first vaccine had some characteristics that surprise us. So we said, OK, well established, a vaccination site where the vaccine is delivered and stored at minus 75, minus 80. And we will bring in first priority to the workers, the health care workers, the personal support workers and the essential visitors to those long term care homes. We will bring them to the vaccination site. And the doctors tell us that by doing that, we increase the protection of the residents in the home, incredibly, because the vector by which the virus goes into the homes, as I think we all know, is true, the people who work there. So we had to modify our plan. It wasn't the freezer storage. It was more the mobility issue that challenged us.

MG: And so will you then, I mean, Health Canada is expected to approve the Moderna vaccine in the coming days. That vaccine doesn't need that ultra cold storage, but presumably also doesn't have those restrictions that you were just talking about. Is that going to allow you to get that vaccine deployed into different communities?

RICK HILLIER: Oh, my goodness. Yes. And, you know, the first communities are as we will get into those long term care homes and retirement residents that have had the tragedy visited upon them and are in those hot zones and the lockdown zones and the whole zones with high numbers of covid-19 cases. We'll use The Moderna to get into their establish that special vaccination site for each one of them and get the residents vaccinated. Also, what it will also allow us to get further afield into areas where covid-19 is rampaging. But most particularly, it will also allow us and we're planning for this now to go to many of those isolated communities in the north who have survived by being isolated and are going to have more difficulty doing that as we get freeze up and ice roads come in. And so we want to get into those isolated communities where you have to fly in as soon as we possibly can. Moderna will allow us to do that ceases.

MG: CSIS security experts around the world have been warning about threats to the supply chain and the role this is. I mean, we talked to the head of Pfizer, Canada. He said in some ways it's the most valuable substance on the planet right now. And so you have foreign actors like Russia as well as organised crime. Have you seen any evidence of that to date?

RICK HILLIER: I have not. That doesn't mean there's not evidence or anything out there. I have not. We have had many conversations about how comfortable we are with the protection we have against the cyber threats and all the things, whether it's an individual hacker to, you know, state sponsored cyber attacks. I have not seen it myself. But we've got organisations in Canada who are focussed on people who are focussed on that. That's their profession and their business. So we really do rely upon them to give us the warning whilst ensuring that our I.T. systems are adequately protected with redundant layers to give us that protection. But, you know, you've got to say no system is completely proofed from that kind of attack. We hope we don't get a lot of work being done to give us defences against it. And, of course, we would hope that we would get some pre warning or intelligence before or during early in an attack. But I've not seen any evidence of it myself. I have not heard of any attacks occurring.

MG: There are a lot of people who are just asking themselves when will the vaccine come to my doorstep? And so you can imagine there are people who do essential work who are clamouring for this vaccine: teachers, grocery workers, agricultural workers. As more doses are delivered, who's going to get priority? And how is that decision going to be made in terms of who's at the top of that list?

RICK HILLIER: Well, first of all, the government of Ontario is going to make the decision for Ontario. And we as a task force are now started our work for what we call the next set of prioritisation. But let me just walk through that really quickly here. You know, the first quarter of 2021 in priority one and two established by the government of Ontario, that is priority one is those in most vulnerable circumstances. So you're talking about people in those long term care homes, people into retirement residences and health care workers as priority two. In that group we have one point four, two million people in Ontario. We expect to get in the first quarter through to the end of March 2021, 1.2 million vaccines. In short, there is more demand than supply just for those first two priorities alone. We are uncertain of the timelines that will deliver us more and greater numbers of the doses of the vaccines in April, May and June. But we believe those deliveries will be substantial. And so what we'll do then is continue to finish off those first two priorities because there will always be some work to do in it. And then we will start at what is next down there. And that's what we've now got to offer to the government of Ontario over the next several weeks recommendations on how we proceed after that and what they would, you know, be best recommended to them to do. We haven't done that work completely yet, and the government needs that. We know that. But we wanted to get the first part right and get rolling on it and learn the lessons. And that's what we're doing right now. And now it's time to turn our hand to exactly that. So, look, I would end that by saying, you know, you've just got to take a deep breath and realise it's going to be some months yet because we don't have the vaccines coming. You know, I heard a news report last night that Pfizer apparently in the United States had some millions of vaccine shipping there, sitting there, that were not shipped out or weren't designated. We'd be happy to take them if they showed. But our schedule shows us not getting a lot of vaccines till April, May and June. So we're all going to have to be patient. We all want it now, which is a great turn of events from several weeks ago when a lot of people are saying, well, maybe, but not yet or not first. Now everybody wants it. And that's an awesome thing.

MG: Have you had the shot yet?

RICK HILLIER: I have not. I'll get it as soon as my turn in line comes. And I don't expect that for a while. But yes, I will take it.

MG: Rick Hillier, good to speak with you. And we will talk again. I appreciate your time this morning. Thank you.

RICK HILLIER: Thank you. My pleasure.

MG: Retired General Rick Hillier, Chair of Ontario's Vaccine Distribution Task Force. As that vaccine rolls out, Ontario and the country overall are starting to see the light at the end of the tunnel. But we have a long distance to go. As the general was saying before, the vaccine is widely available. Case numbers are still skyrocketing across this country. André Picard is the Global Mail's health columnist. André. Good morning to you.

ANDRE PICARD: Good morning.

MG: How do you think the country overall has done in its distribution of this vaccine thus far? You just heard from Rick Hillier talk about what's happening in Ontario.

ANDRE PICARD: I think it's been remarkably smooth and much better than we expect it, to be honest. So I think that's good news. But this is really the easy part. As he mentioned, these are very low numbers. I was just looking. We've only administered 6140 vaccines to date. So those are very tiny numbers compared to what remains to be done.

MG: I'd heard a health care official talk about the danger of vaccine euphoria, speaking about, yes, the vaccine is here, but we are in the midst of something really difficult. And it's going to be, as you and I have spoken about, pretty difficult winter. Ontario has seen days with more than 2000 cases of covid this week, even while regions are in lockdown. Why don't you think the lockdown's that have been in place for 28 in some regions have not been effective in reducing these case numbers.

ANDRE PICARD: I think the simple answer is they're not really lockdown's. They're kind of semi lockdown's, you know, with Canada is one of the only places in the world where we see we have a lockdown and people are know going shopping five times a day. Life hasn't really been disrupted. We haven't really been locked down. So I think that's been a problem all along, trying to have it both ways. And I think we're learning we should have learnt a long time ago that just doesn't work. You have to really crack down entirely if you expect good results.

MG: The Ontario Hospital Association put out a statement yesterday calling on the government to bring in stricter measures, saying hospitals will be overwhelmed if they don't. What's your understanding as to how hospitals are faring right now?

ANDRE PICARD: Well, hospitals are struggling. And in hospitals, when I talk about hospitals, I mean people working in hospitals. So they're really overwhelmed. The beds are full. You know, people say, oh, well, let's just have more beds. That's easy. It's easy to put a bed there, but it's not easy to get people to staff it. So that's where the real crunch is. We're really running out of workers to do this specialised work. So, you know, the [unintelligible] talked about having problems once we got to 150 ICU beds fully in Ontario, it's up to 250 now. It's really crunch time.

MG: So if the lockdowns aren't lockdowns and what is in place and that's not just in Ontario, in other jurisdictions as well, isn't working, what should happen, do you think?

ANDRE PICARD: Well, I think we have to decide at a certain point, are we going to have a serious, you know, Australia like lockdown where people just stay home? One person in the household today is allowed out once to get groceries, and that's it. That's what you have to do if you really want to get control. Now, Quebec, I think, is getting the closest to that. It's announced it in December 25th to January 11th. Everything's closed. Only the essential services. And what's going to be different from other jurisdictions is even the big box stores to Walmart's of the world. They're only going to be allowed to sell food. The rest, the stores are going to be shut down. And that's the first jurisdiction to do that. And that's how you have to get serious is to say, listen, aside from food and medication, stay home.

MG: Is it possible to do that if people aren't being paid to stay home? There's a whole debate around paid sick leave, but also just people who work in precarious situations and are afraid even to get tested because they worry about, you know, their employment if they were to test positive for covid.

ANDRE PICARD: No, it's absolutely not possible to do it without support. And again, that's the success of the Australian model, is they gave people help. They ensured that they could put food on the table, cetera. So that you have to do that. It has to be the full package.

MG: You and I have spoken about schools a number of times. The Ontario Education Ministry sent a note to school boards about preparing for remote learning after the holidays. There have been discussions across the country about perhaps extending the holiday break. What do you think is in store for schools in the next few weeks?

ANDRE PICARD: I think if it's going to be part and parcel of this, are we going to get serious about lockdowns? And if so, we're probably going to close schools. You can't have kids out wandering about with their parents if you have a lockdown. So I think it really depends on how serious we get about a lockdown. But again, what you're seeing in Ontario, we're seeing now, we're kind of sort of thinking of doing something and parents are just confused. The rules are not clear at all. You can have two schools in Ontario almost side by side and one is closed and the other one isn't. And they have the same number of cases. It's just really not clear why things are being done. And I think that's the biggest frustration of parents.

MG: There has been an argument and it's been made in Quebec. It's been made elsewhere as well, that perhaps students are safer, kids are safer in schools, in the controlled environment, in schools. Is that something that you think holds water?

ANDRE PICARD: Well, we've talked about this for four months now, absolutely. I think schools have to be made a priority because, you know, that's important to kids. It's important for people to work. But you have to be clear, if something is a priority, then everything else has to be shut down. And you're right, and I think it's really important we don't discuss enough that people say, oh, well, just shut down schools and they think kids will be magically safe. But we have to figure out what will they be doing? Will they be in the basement of their friend's house, much more at risk than this controlled environment. So it's not a simple shut down the schools and kids are safe. It's complicated like all of this.

MG: The great debate, though, is whether it goes back to the Australian model, whether Canadians would accept the idea of a lockdown like they saw in Melbourne, where, as you said, I mean, one person's allowed in the household to leave per day. You can't go more than a couple of kilometres outside of your house. Do you think Canadians would accept that?

ANDRE PICARD: Well, I think that's the great unknown. I think it's fair to say that it would have been easier to accept a few months ago than it is now. So it gets more difficult. The more you drag your feet in, the more you delay. So would it be possible? I think we still are in the realm of possibilities if we do it right after Christmas when a lot of things are quiet. I think this is our moment of opportunity to do something like that. If we're going to do I guess.

MG: Just finally, what are you most worried about? The holidays are here and we're heading into a couple of weeks over the holidays where kids will be out of school. What are you most concerned about?

ANDRE PICARD: My big worry is what you mentioned, the vaccine euphoria, that people are seeing the news and seeing how the vaccine is coming. I don't have to worry anymore. I'm going to go home and I'm going to have that Christmas party. So I think, again, we're in this time of are we willing to make this sacrifice for in the short term, for some longer term gain if we can all hold out until we do a serious vaccine campaign, which is going to be April, June. That's this is the key time now to suffer a little bit more under.

MG: A pleasure, as always. Thank you very much.

ANDRE PICARD: Thank you.

MG: Andre Picard, The Globe and Mail's health columnist. Your thoughts. Welcome. That idea of the Melbourne thing, is that something that people should consider here in this country? You can email us thecurrent2cbc.ca, tweet us @TheCurrentCBC or go to cbc.ca/thecurrent and click on the contact link. Your CBC News is next. And then the city of Montreal has been hit hard by covid-19 massive case counts struggling businesses. The city is in bad shape. In a moment, the mayor of Montreal, Valerie Plante, joins me to talk about what she's doing to help her city. And she'll tell her own story, a story that's told through a new graphic novel. I'm Matt Galloway. You're listening to The Current. We're back in six minutes. Stay with us.

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Montreal Mayor Valérie Plante’s graphic novel charts uphill battle for women in politics; keeping spirits up at Wikwemikong Nursing Home on Manitoulin Island

Guests: Valerie Plante, Cheryl Osawabine-Pelletier, Jet Francis

MG: Good morning, I'm Matt Galloway. You're listening to The Current.

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MG: Still to come, poet, essayist and playwright and author Claudia Rankine reflects on how conversations around race evolved in 2020. But first to Montreal, where the pandemic has pummelled a great city.

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During the course of this campaign, I had one goal in mind, I wanted to put Montrealers first. I'm not going to change that.

MG: A lot of Montrealers were ecstatic when on the 5th of November 2017, Valerie Plante, a relative newcomer to city hall, won the mayoral race in that city. Three years into her term, that sense of euphoria seems gone. Her city has been one of the hardest hit during the pandemic, grappling with both the health and economic devastation it's brought. And if Canadians want to get an idea of who Valerie Plante is, well, she's written a new graphic novel, co-written it. And the book is called OK, Universe Chronicles of a Woman in Politics. Mayor Valerie Plante joins me now from Montreal. Mayor Plante, good morning.

VALERIE PLANTE: Good morning.

MG: I want to talk about your book in just a moment, but I have to start with what's going on in your city right now. You are, as I mentioned, in the midst of this dual health and economic crisis. What did you see your role was as the magnitude of this disaster became clear.

VALERIE PLANTE: For me, it was clear that this pandemic was new for everyone, even for the mayor. And so what I decided to do was to make sure that no one would be left behind. That means that any type of measures, whatever it's regarding health or housing, that we would be would be there to complement the government's efforts. So during the first wave, we did learn a lot. But as an example, I did put a lot of energy in making sure that people living in homelessness wouldn't be left alone because, of course, it did hit them and the most vulnerable to worst.

MG: We have seen a rise in cases across this country. You mentioned the first wave. Quebec is not doing much better than Ontario when it comes to this second wave. Why is it that you think leaders in your province haven't been able to get the numbers under control?

VALERIE PLANTE: Well, this is a big question. You know, the first way there was some explanation that came of, you know, why it was difficult combat in Quebec to contain the virus. And my child got hit very hard during the first wave. And this time around, it seems like even though all the effort has been put together, there's it's I wouldn't say out of control, but the numbers are getting higher and higher. Montreal was on the plateau for a very long time and it was very happy with that. Of course, it now and we're seeing it, like you said, in Ontario and other provinces, it's almost like it's hard to contain. So the reasons are multiple. But at this point, and especially with the holiday coming, I'm definitely inviting my children. But of course, all Canadians to really respect the they have the public health rules because this is a team effort. We need to, you know, put aside our personal interest, if I could say so. We can do go to go through this together.

MG: Well, you mentioned those rules. I mean, in just a few days, your city, as well as the rest of the province, are going to be under some pretty strict lockdown conditions, some of the strictest in Canada. This runs from Christmas through the 11th of January, maybe even longer. How do you expect your public to deal with that?

VALERIE PLANTE: Well, the fact that Montreal got hit so hard during the first way, we were the epicentre of the pandemic and that it's not a title that I'm proud of, but this is what happened. And actually 8500 people died just in Montreal. But this is huge because of the covid. So people know and we know how much people have lost the family members, how hard it is for the people, employees in the health system. So, we've shown a lot of resilience and courage, and I do expect that people will do the same. And for the city, we're trying to make the outside the outdoor accessible to everyone. We're trying to make it easier for people to go for walks and maybe enjoy a bit of skiing and skating here and there. We've made all the material free for under 18 just to encourage people to take a breathe, even though it's winter because it's going to be a tough winter.

MG: I was in Montreal in September and I mean, it's one of the great cities in this country and usually just choked with tourists. I was shocked at how empty the city was. And this is something that's being replicated across Canada where tourists aren't travelling, people are working from home. You mentioned the homelessness crisis that has been exacerbated. People aren't riding public transit. What do you think the future of a city like yours is post pandemic?

VALERIE PLANTE: Well, it's going to have an impact and there's already reflection we've started about what do we do with downtown areas and this reflection, I'm doing it also with the mayors of the big cities and in Canada, which is very helpful because we're all going through similar experience. But for Montreal, you know, of course, we're hoping that the vaccine will help. But definitely I think it's going to change how also we interact with each other in a way that, you know, we go we will continue to travel and come to Montreal for festivals and vibrant cultural scene. But I think also we might go for smaller events in different neighbour neighbourhoods. It might be I'm really I'm thinking about how to make our city, of course, as welcoming as before. But of course, we will have to adapt it. And maybe it's just spread the joy through the entire city instead of just focussing on one area, which is the downtown core.

MG: Something like this, a challenge like this, I mean, I'm sure you could not have possibly imagined when you ran, not even for mayor, but for for council. This is the story that's told in this graphic novel. Why did you want to tell the story now?

VALERIE PLANTE: Well, to be honest, I started to write and draw. I don't draw so well. That's why I have a fantastic illustrator that I worked with. But I started to write anecdotes when I entered politics in 2013, and I never stopped kind of a way for me to get things out of my head. And so I finished writing this book last December. So it's been a year. And I decided to launch it now because more than ever people are looking for I think we need a bit of hope. We need to look at inspiring stories. And reading is a great activity, that's for sure, with the pandemic. So I'm proud of this. But I mean, Simon is a bit of my alter ego and the main character, but it's not exactly me as well.

MG: Simone faces a lot of sexism in her run for council. And this is something that you have talked about as well. Tell me about what you faced and how you reacted to it, because your reaction is part of the story in the book as well.

VALERIE PLANTE: You know, I think the book is is a way to talk about double standard or kind of what I call ordinary sexism. I think we're not in a time where today somebody's a man or woman would turn to a woman saying, oh, you're not you're a woman, you're not qualified enough or go back to your kitchen. We're not there anymore. Right? But it's more like how, as far as men and women in a society sometimes continues to carry on some stereotypes or some little things, maybe some words looks, comments where we apprehend a certain situation or whatever, depending on your gender. So I wanted to bring it in again in a soft way. It's not a place in this book where I'm like, how can I say? I mean, the message are there. But I wanted to bring them softly because again, everybody can carry those stereotypes of their biases without even knowing them.

MG: How did you react when when you were facing that abuse? Because in the story, Simone says, I shouldn't you know, this shouldn't get too much, but it does. And there are if you're a public figure. And so people are going to say things, but there's something about these attacks that that that really stick with you.

VALERIE PLANTE: Yeah. To be honest. I mean, now that I'm mayor, I mean, it is hard. I cannot deny would be a lie to say that, you know, it never bothers me. Of course not. Because sometimes when you feel there's a double standard, it's not something that I can say very outloud, because as a woman, there's always this possibility that some people will say, oh, she's playing the victim now or it's not true, or people feel attacked when you share some of the things that your you're experiencing. So it is not an easy one. At the same time, I feel like I'm in a very good place as mayor, as the first woman mayor of Montreal to call out some some of the things even in my surroundings because and to just address to a book like that or are to [unintelliglbe] that I will be doing. I do have that the space and the opportunity to change things. But I want to do it in a, like I said, in a- when I say gentle, it's very- I want to raise awareness. Let's put it this way. And this is why a graphic novel for me is perfect because it is accessible. It can be fun. It can be silenced in the graphic novel. It can be just that can be poetry. So so this is this is why I like the the visual for this story.

MG: So much of the story is about gaining the trust of the city and earning the trust. What happens when you lose that trust? There was a poll. That found out that six out of 10 Montrealer said they wouldn't vote for you in the next election. So what happens when you lose that trust?

VALERIE PLANTE: So to be honest, like this specific poll, do I always, of course, I take in consideration polls, but this one was done by Internet with 400 people. So I, I don't want to minimise, but it's important not to take it as an overall of my love of me as being mayor. But of course it hurts. And you question yourself. I question myself a lot. I question myself all the time because I took that position with a lot of humility. And you want it not so much. You want people to to like you, but you definitely want people to be proud of their mayor and and their city. And this is where there's a balance to find. And it's not always easy because I'm taking measures that may not be popular, but at the same time, I'm doing it for Montrealers now, but in the future. So everything related to climate change, those are things that, you know, kind of can can be difficult in our day to day life as citizens. But at the same time if we look ahead, we need to make some of those changes. So it is not an easy one. But I always keep my I have very strong values, integrity, and I stick to that.

MG: What have you learnt through that process? I think of I mean, one of your biggest supporters in 2017 was the Montreal chef, David McMillan. And this year he said that your government is authoritarian because of what he calls an activist agenda, putting in bike lanes and removing bases. I mean, what have you learnt through through a process like that?

VALERIE PLANTE: Well, one thing I've learnt is some people that I like you one day may hate you the day after Mr. McMellon, which I do not understand his position all through the years, it keeps it sense it's going from one way to another. So I'm but so, Mr. McMellon, I'll just leave it to that. But for the rest, of course, it's you need to adapt. And at the same time, again, I know that if I look at every individual, some people say, I love Madame Plante for this, but I don't like her for that. I like her for this. But I don't like for that. I make decisions, I make decision. And some of them may not be popular. But again, most of the time, and I think all the time, there is what I rely on when I make decision is very, like I said, strong values. And I don't come up with a project that out of nowhere. I got elected. I said I would work on environment, on economic development, on housing and on mobility. So I stick to the plan. And yes, some people don't like that, but I'm sticking to the plan.

MG: Just before I let you go, the title of the book, OK, Universe comes from you're sitting at the end of the dock and you're kind of asking the universe for a challenge. What is your next challenge?

VALERIE PLANTE: Well, I'm definitely running for the next mayoral campaign, which which is next year, so that's going to be a big challenge because I never take things for granted. Never, never. And I want like I said, I want my child to be proud. And to be honest, right now, the kind of short term challenge is to bring back the economy here in Montreal, here in Quebec and in Canada. And I think we're all facing the same thing. But it is my responsibility as mayor to make sure that the city is a good place, a good place to invest, and that there will be jobs being created. So it's working with the entire ecosystem. So a big job, but I'm up for the challenge.

MG: Mayor Plante, it's good to speak with you again. I appreciate your time this morning.

VALERIE PLANTE: Yes. Have a great holiday.

MG: And you. Thank you very much. Thank you. Valerie Ponce is the mayor of Montreal. Her new book is called OK, Universe: Chronicles of a Woman in Politics. This is The Current on CBC Radio One, my name is Matt Galloway. For the residents and staff of Canada's long term care homes, this year has been gruelling. These communities have been at the centre of so much loss, so much isolation and a lot of fear as well. But even in this darkness, some homes have managed to find moments of light.

SOUNDCLIP

[Sound: Joyful chatter]

MG: Just to be clear, those are shouts of joy and laughter, those are the residents of the nursing home on Manitoulin Island on a deerhound, not exactly a real deer hunt. Here to tell us more, Cheryl Osawabine-Pelletier, administrator of the Wikemenikong Nursing Home and resident of that home Jet Francis, good morning to you both.

JET FRANCIS: Good morning, sir.

CHERYL OSAWABINE-PELLETIER: Good morning.

MG: Cheryl, what exactly was for people who don't know the deer hunting activity?

CHERYL OSAWABINE-PELLETIER: So the residents were using Nerf guns while our three activities staff were trying to dodge the bullet hiding behind Christmas trees.

SOUNDCLIP

[Joyful noises]

CHERYL OSAWABINE-PELLETIER: It was quite the events we heard screaming and laughter throughout the building that morning was getting pretty intense and I would say it was very competitive with the the residents. And I believe some of them were very happy with their shop. But like you said, they didn't really get shot.

MG: Where did the idea for this come from?

CHERYL OSAWABINE-PELLETIER: It actually there was a couple of our residents are male residents that used to go hunting all of the time. And it was about the time where they were getting the the feeling that they want to go out hunting. So they they talked to our director of care and she talked with the activity staff and they came up with this idea of shooting the the deer. So like the activity staff stepped up. I'd say they were going over and above our residents.

MG: Jet, when this idea was raised, how did you react? What did you think of it?

JET FRANCIS: Well, I thought it was going to be we're going to have a blast or like Cheryl said, and everybody was, I guess, their childhood about hunting. And it was hunting season when we did that. It was moose season. And we thought we'd try it out.

MG: And did you feel guilty at all at shooting the staff?

JET FRANCIS: No we shot low.

MG: You shot low.

JET FRANCIS: So we wouldn't really want to shoot them in the head.

MG: This story turns into a big thing. Cheryl, what happened when the story got out?

CHERYL OSAWABINE-PELLETIER: The word I can think of is overwhelming. The amount of common shares, messages, emails, it was just overwhelming. And but I the biggest compliment that I can see that comes out of this is that there's other homes that are putting this in place, implementing it at their facility. We're getting tagged and saying like, oh, we've implemented this like we heard about a home in Ohio doing this. And I think that was the biggest takeaway that we could get from this, is that other residents are able to experience deer hunting and enjoy it, just like our residents did that day.

MG: Jet, did you feel famous? Your image was all over the place. I saw you on television and everything.

JET FRANCIS: Yeah, it was kind of overwhelming. I didn't think I thought what was going to be local, you know, like from Wikipedia said, bring it on. I thought that was going to be it. But I guess, like you said, my face was plastered all over, I guess. Well, it's OK by me to would be famous for 15 minutes.

MG: Well, no, but it's also a nice thing to happen. I mean, this pandemic has dragged on and on. I was just wondering, you know, what's it been like for you?

JET FRANCIS: It's been hard, you know, because we're all used to being out in the bush where don't delay people fishing, swimming, you know, and then when we're locked up, it's not good. But we did manage to do other things, like we did like have a little concert in the courtyard and we did some planting. Everybody was planting a garden, I guess for the first time for themselves in their lifetime, I guess.

MG: How different, Cheryl, is it? I mean, this is the holidays and normally I'm sure there would be families and friends coming through. How different is it this year than it would typically be around this time of the year?

CHERYL OSAWABINE-PELLETIER: You know, right now, like, it's going to this is going to be the hardest time, I think, for our residents. Like, I'm already feeling it. They want to go home. They want to see their families. We started doing a video and we were asking the residents three questions. And one of them is like telling us about their childhood growing up. And what was Christmas like? What do they want for Christmas and any message that they have for their family? And we're listening to their stories. One is, you know, you kind of go back and think like the simplicity of Christmas when they were growing up, we didn't have all this technology electronics, you know, and it was just about gathering with family. And that's what they want. They want to gather with their family. And I'm sitting there and we are trying to protect all of our residents here. But at the same time, your heart breaks because you can't honour their simple request of seeing the family. So I think this year just it's it's going to be such a huge challenge next week at Christmas time. Definitely.

MG: You talked about stuff going, you know, over and above when it came to the deer hunting game. I mean, anybody takes a look at the photos, the home is posted up on Facebook. There's a real effort to create an atmosphere, a good atmosphere in the home. Tell me more about that and what people are trying to do there.

CHERYL OSAWABINE-PELLETIER: They're trying to because they really wanted to go deer hunting, whatever they asked, or we try to deliver what they want, like Jet was saying, you know, like it even like go down to, like, the food. They're used to their traditional foods. So we incorporate that into our home. We tried to give them the things that they were accustomed to growing up before they came to live here, and that's what we were doing with that deer hunting, trying to make it as realistic as possible without sort of bringing the deer in and actually giving them guns. I think we did a pretty good job of I would say.

MG: You would see the the effect of that on the residents who are there. And Jet was talking a bit about that. But, Cheryl, you'd see the effect of that of that hard work to to lift the spirits of folks there.

CHERYL OSAWABINE-PELLETIER: You know, we have people that do come in and people that follow our page that don't necessarily have family here. And the thing that is the common theme is your residents are always happy. And that's what we believe. Like Jet has said previously before, like the one thing that he liked about this facility is you hear the laughter in the hallways because the staff are going above and beyond. And we they treat the residents as if they're family. And that's become even more important, especially during the pandemic, especially when they can't see their family. We've become their family even more so now.

MG: Does it make you think differently about the work that you do? You have some long ties to this nursing home?

CHERYL OSAWABINE-PELLETIER: Yeah, like my grandparents were both living here and I remember coming and visiting with them. And now it's like I started here seven years ago when I first started. I didn't know exactly how it would be. But as I got into the job and I was like, I think I found where I belong because I look at all the residents like my favourite person. I always tell people my favourite person in the world was my grandma growing up because she lived with us. And I come here and I look at them and I was like, you know, I look at them as if they're my grandparents and how would I want to? Because I would have fun with my grandma. So I was trying to have fun with all of the residents here. Mind you, as I get older, I'm going to have to start seeing my parent, I guess.

MG: Jet, what's the effect of all of that, that laughter that you hear in the hallway, particularly at a tough time like the one we're in right now?

JET FRANCIS: It's very uplifting because, you know, you hear everybody chat together and somebody tells a little joke or say something funny and you hear them all laugh. And there's nobody like moping around or anything like that. Everybody, everybody gets involved. I've been here like two years and I thought, you know, I wouldn't like it, but I was proven wrong and. Well, I guess you could say I love it here.

MG: It's fantastic. It's home.

JET FRANCIS: Yeah, it's home.

MG: I wish you both the best four for Christmas and for the holidays. It sounds, Cheryl, like you have created something really special there. And forget to say that, you know, it's perfect for him and it's perfect for you. That's something I think that a lot of people would just strive for. So well done.

CHERYL OSAWABINE-PELLETIER: Thank you.

MG: Thank you very much. And Jet, take care of yourself.

JET FRANCIS: OK.

MG: Good talking to you, Cheryl Osawabine-Pelletier is the administrator of the we come out with Wikemenikong nursing home Jet Francis as a resident in that home on Manitoulin Island in Ontario. You can go to the medical nursing home Facebook page to see the deer hunt video. And some of the other fun highlights from life in the home talked a lot about the joy that people like Cheryl are bringing to elders like Jet in the home. We did a whole show on Joy and we got a lot of response. I'd love to hear more of what has brought you joy and what has been a very difficult year. You can reach us through The Current. We've all had these little moments of joy, even in tough times. Reach us through email thecurrent@cbc.ca. You can tweet us @TheCurrentCBC or head to the website cbc.ca/thecurrent. Click on the contact link. Your regional update is next. And then I'll speak with the poet and essayist Claudia Rankin, one of America's pre-eminent voices on race. In 90 seconds, she's here to reflect on a monumental year and where we go from here. I'm Matt Galloway. This is The Current. We'll be right back.

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Why American poet Claudia Rankine decided to talk to white men on airplanes about privilege

Guests: Claudia Rankine

MG: Hi, I'm Matt Galloway, you're listening to The Current. Claudia Rankine is one of America's leading thinkers on race. Five years ago, her fantastic book length poem about racism called Citizen an American Lyric became a New York Times bestseller. Now she is inviting readers to dig even deeper by asking themselves and each other what role whiteness and white privilege play in their daily lives, even when the answers might be uncomfortable. Her new book is called Just US and American Conversation. And Claudia Rankine joins me now from New Haven, Connecticut, where she's a professor of poetry at Yale University. Claudia, good morning.

CLAUDIA RANKINE: Good morning.

MG: This has been a long year, a year in which we have seen deep racial divides come into focus. There has been a reckoning on race at the end of this year. How are you feeling about the future?

CLAUDIA RANKINE: Well, you know, it's fantastic to finally have leadership with the Biden Harris presidency. I have to say, I feel a sigh of relief. What worries me is the American public at large. Trump-ism has taken hold of the imagination of people who are committed to certain racist ideologies and they're not going away.

MG: You use the phrase Trump-ism. What did Trump ism reveal? Because the narrative is that those sentiments, those thoughts were there just kind of lurking beneath the surface. And maybe, you know, his actions gave people permission or gave people voice. What do you think Trump ism allowed?

CLAUDIA RANKINE: He amplified things in our society that were at play, but just unsaid but institutionalised. And we see how institutionalised in the fact that the Republican Party, with the exception of a few, have basically stood behind him as he tried to destroy our democracy by suppressing votes, denying that he lost the election.

MG: This book begins with a poem called What If? And it would be a crime to speak with a poet like you and not hear you read a little bit of this in your own voice. Would you mind reading some of this?

CLAUDIA RANKINE: Of course. Thank you for asking. What does it mean to want an age old call for change, not to change and yet also to feel bullied by the call to change? How is a call to change? Name, shame, name penance, name chastisement? How does one say what if without reproach? The root of chastise is to make pure the impossibility of that. Is that what repels and not the call for change? What if what I want from you is new. Newly made. A new sentence in response to all my questions, a swerve in our relation and the words that carry us, the care that carries. I am here without the shrug, attempting to understand what I want and what I want from you. Run parallel. Justice and the openings for justice.

MG: Tell me where that comes from.

CLAUDIA RANKINE: The desire, the what if, you know, the opening piece is actually a response to a conversation I had when I went to see Fairview with a friend in Fairview's a play by Jackie Sibley's jury, in which the play asked the audience to imagine a space where people of colour had the same kind of mobility and freedom that white people have. And in the inside the play, they asked the white people in the audience to go stand on the stage and to just give the space over to black people and people of colour. And the white friend that I was with, she refused to go on stage and she said she didn't- she felt chastised by the ask. So this poem came out of that, like, what do you mean when you say you want change? But even such a small thing as standing up in the moment of an imaginary ask becomes an affront to you.

MG: When you say you're standing there, you're there without the shrug. What does that?

CLAUDIA RANKINE: Well, without the position of disengagement. You know, the ask of this book is really can we arrive together and be attuned to each other and not be committed to being right so much as being in a kind of reciprocal reciprocity with each other to listen, to adjust, to swerve in ways that allow both of us to exist at the same time.

MG: Part of that is about speaking, as I said in the introduction, about whiteness and white privilege. And the book is full of examples. And that and that's one of them of what that might look like or that might feel like. Are there examples that you think might surprise people?

CLAUDIA RANKINE: Well, you know, one of the moments that surprised me, actually, I decided that I would have conversations with white men on aeroplanes. And one of the men that I had a conversation with in the course of the conversation, he said to me, you know, I don't see colour, I don't see race. And and I understand that's a desire to say we're all human, we're all one. But it denies the reality of how much a constructed thing like blackness and whiteness has gained power in our life. And so I said to him, you know, and I a black woman, when I got myself to say that, I knew it would reroute the conversation that had been going so well. But I was really pleased that I allowed myself to say, because his response surprised me, which was, you know, what other inane thing has I have I said I didn't really ever expect to hear from him again, but I got an email from him. And because of that, we started to be in contact. And when the piece was first published in The New York Times, I wrote to him and I said, you know, that conversation we had is going to be in the newspaper. I just want you to know. And I said, you know, will you write a response to the piece? And he did. And in his response, he said, you know, thinking about our conversation afterwards, I realize I said things to you that wasn't true. It was a desire to create a world that he aspired to, but not one that existed. And that was really, you know, a learning moment for me.

MG: Maybe he felt comfortable in part because you're sitting on this plane and you bond initially over a shared affection for this song. Have a listen.

SOUNDCLIP

[Music]

MG: That is nightshift by the Commodores. Why do you love that song and how did that create a bond on the plane?

CLAUDIA RANKINE: Well, I mean, I love I just love the song. I love the rhythms of the song. I love. But I also love the content of the song, the idea of talk to me so you can see what's going on. And so it was very, it was a surprise when he also loved the song, knew the words. And it's true, we we started singing it together on the plane and and that, you know, music is the great equalizer. You just sort of move forward from there. But I do think the fact that the message of the song is talk to me. It sort of cut into his desire to begin to address diversity, as he said in his own company, and to think about how racial politics were at play in his his world.

MG: Why were you doing that? Why were you speaking? I mean, you spent a lot of time on planes, but why did you find it important to go and talk to strangers, white men, and ask them about white privilege?

CLAUDIA RANKINE: Well, I was terrified when Donald Trump started to run for president. And so when he did become president and, you know, out of the gate, we had such horrendous things happening even with my own students around and around immigration issues. I thought thirty five. I think it's something like maybe 35 percent of the population, 34-33 percent of the population are white men, but they hold 75 percent are in the 70s and switches from year to year of elected office. So this portion of the population governs the population. So I just decided, you know, it's I really need to start talking to these people who have so much power. So I just gave myself this old project of speaking with these men that often I'm sitting next to them for, you know, seven, eight hours on flights. I thought, why not actually ask them the kinds of questions that I think about, you know, things like do you understand how much privilege you have? Do you how do you understand that privilege? How down you understand the power that wield within your lives that affects the lives of people like me?

MG: Were you hoping that that you would come away with a different understanding of that privilege or perhaps that they would have a different understanding of it after those conversations?

CLAUDIA RANKINE: Well, I was I really wanted to understand, so I was, in a sense thinking about myself, I was thinking how why am I not able to communicate the urgency of the situation, the impending presidency of Donald Trump, for example. So I really thought I need the right vocabulary. I need to to be able to to think about things from their perspective so that I'm able to write about it and speak about it in a way that puts us in the same reality. Because right now I feel like I'm speaking at cross purposes. I mean, even the word privilege, I think the more conversations I had with these men, the more I realized that if you say the word white privilege, the term white privilege, they immediately think you're talking about economic privilege. And when I say white privilege, I'm thinking about the ability to just live to, you know, leave your house without worrying that you're going to be shot by the police if you take your phone out of your pocket.

MG: There was a celebrated project by Whitney Dow, who's a documentary filmmaker, interviewed white Americans as part of this Columbia University project called Facing Whiteness. Take a listen to one of the men that he met, paper factory worker named Thomas Galef from Battle Creek, Michigan.

SOUNDCLIP

VOICE 1: Were there any specific things that you were hoping to communicate about whiteness and about how, you know, being a white American?

VOICE 2: The most specific thing that I think I'd like to see come out of it is that people of colour realize that just because I'm white and I'm conservative, I'm not a racist. I try and take people at face value. If you want to be low life to me, I'm not you're not going to get my respect. If you want to treat me like a human being, I'm going to give you respect. But I expect it in return.

VOICE 1: Do you feel that people of colour, whatever their race, misunderstand white people for the most part?

VOICE 2: No, not more than half. No, but you've got to I feel you've probably got a certain percentage that for whatever reason and I don't know if it's people they listen to, how they were brung up, I don't know. But they feel like they're victims. I don't get where they get that from. I don't understand it.

MG: Claudia Rankine, what can we take? Do you think, from that exchange?

CLAUDIA RANKINE: Well, you know, Whitney and I are good friends because in many ways we we have a similar project. And the thing I often ask Whitney is why don't you ask the hard questions of these people when they say things like, you know, they're just making themselves out to be victims? And Whitney always responds because I want to keep the conversation going. And if I go there, then they'll shut down. So I you know, I have to stay as neutral as possible so that the conversation can keep going. And I respect that. But, you know, as I'm listening to this, I that's what I'm thinking. Does this person not have a sense of what it means to be black in this country? Does he know the name George Floyd, Michael Brown and Beyonce Taylor? Does he understand the fact that black women in their own house have been killed by police, by the people put in charge to keep us safe for no other reason than the projection of criminality onto the black body?

MG: You ask in the book, if white people don't see their whiteness, how can they speak to it? What have you learnt about why it's it's so difficult for some people to talk about whiteness?

CLAUDIA RANKINE: Well, I think the acculturation of whiteness throughout has been the equation of whiteness equals people in general. And to say no, actually white people, whiteness was a created concept that gave you a lot of power and took things from me in order for you to be able to live the way that you live. People don't want to know that. They don't want that because they automatically then feel like you're asking them to be responsible to to their lives and to the choices they make and the choices our government makes. And you are asking them that. And it's much easier for them to move forward thinking that they're not in collaboration with white supremacy and the tenets of white supremacy like segregationist policies, for example, or voter suppression that are continued mode's in these United States. Even the way mass incarceration works is an extension of slavery and Jim Crow policies.

MG: This plays out at a dinner party that you go to in which Donald Trump's views on race come up and the tone and the atmosphere of the dinner party changes. What happens?

CLAUDIA RANKINE: At that dinner party, someone is writing a book on Donald Trump and his presidency, and they make the claim that economic concerns really drove the election. And I said, you know, well, why don't we give white people the benefit of the doubt in the sense that they voted for what he campaigned on and what he campaigned on was, you know, racism against Mexicans, against blacks. And he said there was no way to know that. And he didn't have a crystal ball. And so things were getting a little heightened. And a woman sitting across from me at the dinner table points to the brownies on the table and says, oh, aren't those beautiful? They look fantastic. And and I look at her and it's one of those moments when you could either let that go and allow the conversation to move in another direction, or you can call it for what it is, a moment of silencing. And I just decided I would do that. It's sort of not my way normally. But for some reason on that day, I turned to her and I said, am I being silenced? And and the palpable rage that came towards me at that moment was stunning to the point where my husband leaned over and said to me, should we leave now?

MG: And is that because you broke what you were talking about earlier, that kind of social contract between black folk and white folk in terms of how you talk about each other?

CLAUDIA RANKINE: Exactly. That we're not supposed to hold white people accountable for their actions. If they voted for Donald Trump, they did it for sort of reasons that are separate from his agenda. So he might be racist. But there, you know, so somehow we have racism without racists, so those people who voted for him just wanted, I don't know, lower taxes or something. And now we're seeing, you know, these people are willing to for years to come out on the street and say plainly what it is they support with Trump. And and the rhetoric is out and out white supremacy. It's group like the Proud Boys, etc., who are in the streets. And so, you know, civility has been used as a way to silence disagreement. I mean, especially with black women. If you disagree, you are moving closer and closer to the trope of angry black woman. And that phrase has been used as a silencer.

MG: You have a white friend who tells you I mean, you talk about this in the book, who tells you that she has to defend you to her other white friends because they think you're a radical.

CLAUDIA RANKINE: Yeah. And if that was a stunning moment, you know, when she said that to me.

MG: And do you feel like a radical?

CLAUDIA RANKINE: I don't feel like I'm you know, activists are always asking me, why aren't you more of an activist or, you know, I'm an artist. I write books. you know, I spend a lot of time in museums. And so I try to put on the page what I see. And my work is a very different kind of work. It's more, it's less about solutions and more about process and and writing down and exploring and asking questions of what is in front of me.

MG: What are those questions like in those conversations. Like without prying too much in your own household, you're married to a white man, you have a mixed race daughter. What are those conversations like?

CLAUDIA RANKINE: You know, race has been- the issues around race are constantly being questioned and discussed in our household.

MG: What do you mean?

CLAUDIA RANKINE: Because they come up? We are both both of us are artists who are involved in the making of things that question how race is constructed. And my daughter grew up inside that kind of world. When we are in the world, his privilege is writ large. Just recently I walked her dog and I forgot to turn the alarm off the house alarm before I went out, and so the alarm went off. When I came back, I found policemen all over the yard and they said the alarm went off and I said, Oh, that's me, my bad, you know, and to get into our house, we have to put in these codes. Then you have to put in more codes to turn the alarm off. And I do all that. And then I come back out and I'm chatting with the sort of lead policeman and my husband has gotten an alert on his phone. So wherever he was, he jumped in his car, he came home and he comes bounding out of the car towards us. And stunningly, this policeman turns to him and says she said she lives here. And I, and I really thought, how did we get here so fast? But you and I were just having this nice little chat. But you know this, the six feet white, blue eyed man walks up and suddenly he owns this house and that kind of thing has been very present in our lives in our 30 year marriage.

MG: And you write about going to a parent teacher, meeting at your daughter's high school, and there's only a couple of black teachers who were there, if you think about the world that she will inherit. What are you looking for for her and what are you worried about?

CLAUDIA RANKINE: Well, you know, when I wrote that essay, I think I wrote in there somewhere that her world cannot be my world, that it's a new day. It's a new time. So things must have changed. Since writing the essay, her school was targeted by a white supremacist who claimed that they were going to attack the students of colour on campus and the FBI was brought in. So it was an interesting moment for me to see. The same thing that happened to me in college is now happening to her. So the world, you know, hasn't changed radically that much. But I do hope for her that the present generation is so much more engaged, so much more literate around these issues, so much more outspoken that I cannot help but think things will shift, maybe not in in the ways that make it gone. That's not possible. But it will shift in terms of how things are addressed. It's harder to address these issues as things that are not present and active in our day to day lives.

MG: This book is called An American Conversation. And at the end of the book, you talk about the value of a conversation, our conversations, pathways to understanding, or are they are the accommodations? And after a summer where people are saying enough conversation, we're tired of talking and it's now time for something more direct?

CLAUDIA RANKINE: Well, I don't know how you get something more direct without conversation. You know? You know, maybe I'm a pragmatist and maybe that's why it's often hard for me to think of myself as an activist, because I think sometimes the protests are incredibly important because they're they're driven by a single issue and a single single mindedness that is very necessary. But I think for change to happen, people really, they have to sit down, they have to talk, they have to figure out what can happen and what cannot happen and how it can happen and to what degree it will happen. And all of those things have to happen through communication. So I don't understand this idea that we're ever beyond conversation.

MG: One of the most powerful things you can do is sit down and talk to somebody.

CLAUDIA RANKINE: Yeah, not that's what I say.

MG: Thanks again for your time. I really appreciate it.

CLAUDIA RANKINE: Thank you. And happy holidays.

MG: And to you. Thank you.

CLAUDIA RANKINE: Bye bye.

MG: Claudia Rankine is a poet, essayist and playwright and author of several books, including Just US and American Conversation. She's also a MacArthur Fellow and a professor of poetry at Yale University. And that's it for The Current for today and for this week. Q is up next on CBC Radio one topower speaking with Derrick Baker, who you may know as Virginia to Vegas, very popular pop artist who moved to Los Angeles from Toronto thought it would take his career to the next level. What happened is the subject of a conversation that you will hear coming up in just a few moments on CBC Radio One. I'm Matt Galloway. Thanks for listening to The Current. Have a great weekend and I'll talk to you Monday.

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Friday December 18, 2020 Full Transcript

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