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The AIH Transcript for March 29 2021

Hosts: Peter Armstrong and Chris Howden

Prologue

PETER ARMSTRONG: Hello, I'm Peter Armstrong, sitting in for Carol Off.

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

[Music: Theme]

CH: Tonight:

PA: Proceedings with caution. As the trial begins for the former Minneapolis police officer accused of killing George Floyd. An activist who knew Mr. Floyd tells us he worries the court won't deliver the justice people are hoping for.

CH: The bitter end. Newfoundland and Labrador's NDP leader tells us how it feels now that the province's drawn out controversial election is finally over and she's lost her own seat.

PA: Open book. Beverly Cleary believed kids should be able to read about characters who acted like them and dealt with the same issues they did. And a fellow author tells us the results were only ever good.

CH: Whatever floats their boat. Crews finally freed the humongous container ship that's been blocking the Suez Canal for days. But it's not clear sailing yet.

PA: Sound check. Thousands of people in Barcelona attend a concert without physical distancing to help researchers gather their thoughts on how we can safely get back to huge gatherings.

CH: And kicking it old ghoul. A Satan's sneaker some are calling wicked in a bad way, sells out in under a minute because along with a pentagram and inverted cross, the shoes come with human blood, but just a little. As It Happens, the Monday edition, radio that sees a vain attempt at controversy.

[Music: Theme]

Part 1: Chauvin Trial

Chauvin Trial

Guest: Trey Pollard

CH: Before the lawyers in the trial of former Minneapolis police officer Derrick Chauvin had their say today, George Floyd's family had theirs. Outside the courthouse this morning they spoke out and then kneeled in silence for eight minutes and 46 seconds, the amount of time Mr. Chauvin kneeled on Mr. Floyd when he died. Derrick Chauvin is facing charges of second degree murder, third degree murder and second degree manslaughter. He has pleaded not guilty. George Floyd's brother Terrence had this to say before the trial's opening arguments began.

TERRENCE FLOYD: Yeah, they murdered him. Well, we are still Floyd strong and we are still here. So we go hold it down for him, say, and they say trust the system, they want us to trust the system. Well, this is your chance to show us that we can trust you.

CH: Terrence Floyd, one of George Floyds brothers, speaking earlier today outside the courthouse in Minneapolis. Trey Pollard was also outside the court. He's a community activist who knew George Floyd and we reached him in Minneapolis.

PA: Trey, what was it like for you today? Watching and listening to George Floyd's family?

TREY POLLARD: I've been in communication with them throughout the duration of all of this. I knew George Floyd personally. So I had many conversations with those guys. Today was an emotional day as the day, you know, that opening arguments for the trial. And, you know, and especially those guys are speaking how they feel, they're speaking how they feel.

PA: What do you make of what we just heard Terrance Floyd say about trust in the justice system? Do you trust the system?

TP: I don't think it's a matter of trust, to be honest with you. I mean, the justice system is the justice system. And what I mean by that is just like anybody else deserves a fair trial. He does, too. So for me, it's not a matter of trust, just a matter of having a fair trial. And I think that's specifically what it is that, you know, the cop is guilty.

PA: Do you feel, though, that this will be a test for the fairness and the ability of the community to trust in the justice system?

TP: No, I don't, actually, because when you go to trial, it's the same thing that we asked for if it's a young African-American male or female. This you know, you have to find this person guilty beyond a reasonable doubt. If there is one piece of doubt there. And unfortunately, this trial can go left and it can go left pretty quick. All right. So I personally feel like the way you start building trust in the community is one, start having more officers that's from the community in which they work in, hired on the force, because essentially what happens is you have men and women that work for the Minneapolis police, but they live in southern suburbs. They live in the furthest west suburbs. So they don't know any of the individuals that they working with in the community. And so what happens is they, you know, catch a kid doing something that normally, if you know him, you would be able to talk to him. Whereas these, guys, essentially, they just lock them up. So I think that the way you start building trust is you start being more active in the community. You start having events with the community and you start showing the community because you can say whatever you want. But if your actions doesn't reciprocate, what's coming out of your mouth, then that's what we used to in a community.

PA: In the courtroom today the prosecution played that video that everybody's seen of the officer kneeling on Mr. Floyd. The jury got to see that today. The 911 operator said in court that Mr. Floyd was pinned down for so long that she actually thought the surveillance feed had frozen. Do you think this video and what it has come to represent, do you think the video will be enough to convince the jury?

TP: That's where I think he will be convicted at, because as a licenced professional, not to mention you've asked several other licenced professionals saying to you, even an officer that was on duty for the second day on the job and, you know, with the training officer, which was him, shouldn't we turn them over. The paramedic, young lady that worked for the Minneapolis fire department said you've got to check his pulse, you've got to check his pulse. You know, that's why I think he will get convicted, because as a licenced professional, at what point did you not feel like it was OK not to get your knee off his neck like the whole world saying that, like that's something that's not deniable. And despite the defence trying to bring other things to the table, that would have possibly been the cause of his death. The reality of it is you had already subdued him. He wasn't fighting back and there was no reason for you to continuously keep your knee on his neck except the fact that you had intentions behind it. It's the only thing that it shows.

PA: You know, we knew this was coming, but we got the confirmation today that the defence got up in front of the jury and made their argument that there are other factors. They say at play that Mr. Floyd had health problems, he had drugs in his system. What do you make of those arguments?

TP: True. They are true. And when you're having a trial, you have a defence attorney, you have a prosecutor. Defence attorney is to try to create doubt in a case that's being brought against their client. He has all rights to do that. Question is, you know, his experts and things like things of that magnitude going to follow up on it. And say, like those drugs in his system or things of that magnitude, a contributing factor to him ultimately losing his life. That's where, you know, people need to pay attention because those determining factors is what's going to determine the outcome of this trial. And that's what I'm in fear of. I'm in fear of the expert solidifying what the defence attorney is saying, because if that's the case, how can you find him guilty?

PA: How worried are you about what happens if this police officer is found not guilty and the streets react to that?

TP: Well, you know, the unrest that occurred last year is going to probably be 10 times that, unfortunately. And to be honest with you, Peter, my friend, I think that Minnesota is in a no win situation because even if they find them guilty and they find him guilty of a lesser charge in the eyes of the public, they don't want to see nothing less than a second degree murder charge. And if they don't get that and he by chance, gets charged with some less, he potentially won't even go to jail. So if you find him guilty and if it's not of the most extreme where you can give him 20 plus years, society is going to be pissed. And then if you find him guilty of a lesser charge, and he don't get the full amount of the time that is required. Society is going to be pissed. I personally feel like Minnesota is in a no win situation under any circumstances. To be honest with you. It's you know the perception of the public and it's reality, reality of it is, you know, he has a right to a fair trial and, you know, all evidence will be looked at and evaluated. And, in the eyes of the public is like, don't go to trial, just give him 25 years to life right now. Unfortunately, reality is not... that's not reality.

PA: Well, Trey, we appreciate you. And as ever, we appreciate your insight.

TP: Absolutely. Man, I will be down there every day.

PA: Thank you so much.

TP: Thank you.

CH: Trey Pollard is a community activist with the non-profit group We Push for Peace. He's in Minneapolis, Minnesota.

[Music: drums and guitar instrumental]

Suez Freed Ship

Guest: Sal Mercogliano

[Sound Clip: Crowd chanting]

CH: That's not the sound of a crowd chanting the name of a soccer star. It's the crew of a tugboat celebrating this morning as they helped free the massive M.V. Ever Given container ship from the Suez Canal. The days long ordeal cost billions, disrupted global shipping and inspired countless Internet memes. Sal Mercogliano is a former merchant mariner and a maritime historian at Campbell University. We reached him in Raleigh, North Carolina.

PA: Professor Mercogliano. Was it a huge sigh of relief when you saw the M.V. Ever Given finally get unstuck this morning?

SAL MERCOGLIANO: Oh, it was a fantastic sigh of relief. The fact that global transportation will not be thrown into a larger disorder than it already is a huge relief. And it's an amazing feat. I have to tell you why the salvage company and the crews of the tugs, the Egyptians, are just amazing, unbelievable. I talked to a master salver just a few days ago who predicted this could go on for weeks based on the size and scope of that vessel.

PA: Right. And I mean, I think as much as a third of the ship had actually run aground, it looked a lot more complicated than it did kind of from the outside, didn't it?

SM: It was extremely complicated. When I talk about salvaging a vessel, you almost have to think about it like a person in a car accident. You have to first stabilise the vehicle, then you have to stabilise the patient, and then you have to remove the vehicle to get the patient out. In this case, the patient was the ship. And then you had all these obstructions, the dirt it kicked up, the hazards all around it. And what they basically wound up doing was just yanking the ship right out of the mud.

PA: I know a bunch of extra tugs arrived yesterday, yesterday afternoon in Egypt. What happened? I mean, was it Mother Nature and a little bit of extra tugs? What finally freed this thing up?

SM: One of the things you're dealing with is a vessel of such huge proportion. Two hundred thousand tons. You need specialised equipment, specialised material. And what they brought in was a specialised tug that is actually designed for it, a salvage tug. It's able to anchor itself into the Suez, put a line to the stern of the vessel, and then using both winches on the bow and stern and its own physical horsepower to literally yank it. Before what you had were just tugboats.

PA: Right.

SM: Kind of what you would have in a harbour kind of pushing you around. This thing is the kind of the NFL lineman coming in versus kind of peewee football pushing against it.

PA: So I had to do some reporting on this on Friday. And one of the things they were talking about then was trying to find a way mid canal to get in and start unloading the cargo or fuel or something to lighten the load. Why didn't they end up having to do that?

SM: Well, that was a chore of epic proportions. Just to give you the idea of the containers you see on board that vessel, they're stacked twenty one high, from the bottom of the vessel to the top. And to get a crane that can reach that high, let alone reach across the 60 metres of the vessel, is almost impossible. These vessels can only go into certain ports around the world because those cranes are available, not to mention the fact that those containers are fully loaded, really heavy, and they require specialised cranes to lift.

PA: What is it about this story that you think... I mean, I saw you tweeted today, THAT'S IT in all caps. And, you know, the memes are everywhere on this story. What is it about this blockage that has so captivated so many people around the world?

SM: Well, I have to say, number one, it's the digger. I think that image is so captivating. I chuckle about it all the time. I've received more memes even with my name in it. And you can possibly imagine. But I think, you know, one of the things that bother us the most is when something happens that disrupts our lives that we have no control over. And that's an example of that right here. We are so dependent on the global maritime chain and infrastructure, yet we know almost nothing about it. We don't see it on a common daily occurrence. Most of the ports are out of the reach of most people. Yet when it happens, all of a sudden we find out goods may be shorted, prices may go up. And I think it has a lot to do with the fact that we experienced that just last year with covid, when all of a sudden there were shortage of paper towels and toilet paper. And again, it's not that well, we were short of paper towels or toilet paper. We just didn't have them with us. And when you need those, you need them, you know, right then.

PA: So the memes may be done. The ship is moving, but this story is far from over. The traffic jam that built up behind the Ever Given is still enormous. How long is it going to take them to work their way through that?

SM: Well, I would tell you that the Suez Canal Authority is being very optimistic in how fast they can move through there. On a daily basis they move about fifty vessels through the canal. There's four hundred there now and you have fifty arriving every day. Even if you manage to double that, you're talking four days to clear the backlog and then you have two hundred vessels have just arrived. The difficulty you get into is they have a set number of pilots. They can't really rotate them faster than they go through. Plus, if they use speed to get through the canal, that's kind of what got'em in trouble in the first place.

PA: What do you think we've learnt about how this happened, how long it lasted, how we got out of it that we can use to make sure that something like this doesn't happen again?

SM: Well, in the maritime industry, there's a saying that maritime rules and regulations are written in blood. You know, you don't realise you need more lifeboats on the Titanic until fifteen hundred people, and Jack, die before you make changes. And changes are going to have to be made for these monstrous vessels in some ways. Unfortunately, while we build these huge, massive, tremendous ships, sometimes the technology doesn't stay apace with them. You know, you go back 20 years, you had half the size vessels with twice the size crews.

PA: And just before I let you go, will the Ever Given captain and crew ever live this down or is this a sea story that's going to stick to them for the rest of their lives?

SM: Well, the crew will be able to live it down, the captain, you never know. Captain, is ultimately responsible for the vessel. You know, commanding a vessel like this is a pride. It's you know, you don't put these vessels in the hands of just anybody. And so there's going to be a lot of finger pointing. And unfortunately, the Masters tend to get the blame for everything when it comes to this, especially when they start trying to figure out who's going to pay for this. Got to remember, this is a Taiwanese company with a Panamanian flag vessel, Indian crew, German operating company, Japanese owner, American Classification Society in an Egyptian canal. So the insurance claims against the vessel and any potential delays are going to be mired in that international mess.

PA: Well, we're going to miss the mems. I really appreciate you sharing this today.

SM: Yeah it was great talking to you.

CH: Sal Mercogliano is a former merchant mariner and a maritime historian at Campbell University. We reached him in Raleigh, North Carolina.

[Music: percussion instrumental]

Barcelona Concert Research

Guest: Josep Llibre

CH: If you looked at video or pictures taken from behind the crowd, you'd think it was a normal concert, you'd see thousands of people standing shoulder to shoulder with their hands in the air, dancing to the band, playing on stage. But if you take a look at the scene from the front, you'd clue in that this is a concert during covid because of all the white masks on people's faces. The concert took place at a venue in Barcelona this weekend. The event was given special permission by authorities and saw thousands of attendees tested for covid earlier in the day. Josep Llibre is an infectious diseases physician who was part of that testing and who worked alongside music promoters to make the event happen. We reached him in Barcelona.

PA: Dr. Llibre, how would you describe the mood at this concert on Saturday night?

JOSEP LLIBRE: I would say it was magic, 5000 people dancing and singing with no physical distance. It was amazing. The group was perfect. The behaviour of the people was very, very good. And the screaming in the morning was perfect, very smooth.

PA: Walk me through the process. What did people have to do on the day of in order to be able to actually enter the venue for the concert?

JL: You had to do a rapid antigen test in the morning. The same day we had three venues in Barcelona. You had to download an application in your smartphone and you had to select a time, hour and a place. Then you went there, you did your antigen test and if negative, you downloaded it to your application. That was automatic. And with that, you could go inside the concert. In the concert, you had to wear a face mask, all the event, and there was an improved ventilation and some small measures everywhere. So to avoid queues in the closet, to avoid queues in the bar, in the entrance and the exit, and we split the public in three zones to prevent interchanges between the public.

PA: Were there groups of people who were told you can't buy a ticket for this event because maybe you have a heart condition or you have pre-existing conditions or you've been in contact with somebody previously, that makes you too much of a risk for this concert?

JL: No, just the age group was between 18 and 65. You had to say that you don't have a severe disease that could jeopardise your safety if you get infected by covid. And six out of five thousand people were rejected because they were positive or could be that they were asymptomatic all of them, but they had a high viral load and the potential to spread the infection would have been very high.

PA: But I mean, six out of 5000, that's not bad.

JL: It's very, very low. And that was the expected rate. So we were not looking... All these structures was not to find 1000 or 2000 was to find between six and eight positive cases, positive cases with the potential to spread, which is somewhat different.

PA: So you did 5000 of those rapid antigen tests. Everybody was given a special face mask. Was that included in the cost of the ticket? I mean, how did that get paid for?

JL: Well, it paid to the ticket, but that this concert did not generate profit because it was only 5000, so a small concert. Thirteen [inaudible] seats were empty because we decided to do only five thousand people in the floor, the main floor of the stadium. So the promoters, the town hall in Barcelona, the government, all them paid the excess of money and some advertisements paid the excess of money from the antigen tests and 80 nurses that we had to employ to do all the tests.

PA: How did you guys come up with the plan for inside? Because as you say, you had improved ventilation. There were three zones that people were allowed in. It was inside. But people, as you say, tested, had to wear their masks. How did you come up with a protocol that would work for a venue of this size?

JL: Well, all this started six months ago when they contacted us in the Infectious Diseases Department to ask if we could design a strategy to make a safe concert. So we understood that with the availability of new antigen tests that have a high sensitivity and specificity for Sav-covid-2, if everybody was screened, we could create a safe environment. Then the problem was how to screen such a high amount of people. So we did that in December in a controlled study in the Salah Apollo in Barcelona with Primavera Sound. It's a company that organises concerts and 1000 participants were allowed to go inside the concert all randomised to a control group with no concert entrance. And we could prove that with all these measures, no one was infected in the concert. So then now it's the first time ever in the world that we applied the same strategy in a big venue, 5000 people. Now we are waiting two weeks because we are collaborating with the public health department in the government, in Catalonia, in Barcelona and in weeks. We are going to know how many assistants have been diagnosed covid and we will compare that rate with a background population with the same age, the same week in the same city to prove if there was no increase rates of covid.

PA: And your model showed that you expected to have between six and eight people screened out by the rapid antigen test. What does your model show you in terms of how many people of those 5000 at the event might now test positive for covid?

JL: I expect it will be very low because the antigen test to everyone who has a [inaudible] so a potential to spread. So there's a very, very low possibility that they missed someone infected that has enough virus in the body to spread the infection.

PA: What other kinds of research do you expect will be done on the data that you're able to gather? How important will this be to you and also to other groups who will want to look at it?

JL: Yeah, if we can prove in two weeks that this has not been a super spreading event so that the rate of infection amongst those who attended the concert is similar to the background population, probably you're going to see many, many concerts applying the same technology or even going a step further. There was a French crew of investigators in the concert from Paris because they wanted to see everything. They are going to do the same in Paris with a bit more than 7000 participants. The same is being done in the Netherlands and in Denmark. So probably you're going to see many, many strategies. But this is going to change a lot in very few time because people is going to be vaccinated. So we need documentation of your status regarding vaccination and probably the tests are going to be done at home or in a pharmacy somewhere. So probably we are not going to need to test all the participants, but they are going to come with the test done. So probably everything will be easier in the future.

PA: Well, on behalf of music lovers everywhere, thank you for this research and thanks for speaking with us today.

JL: You're very kind. Thank you very much.

PA: Take care.

CH: Josep Llibre is an infectious diseases physician at German's Trius Hospital in Barcelona. That's where we reached him. And if you'd like to see pictures from this weekend's event in Barcelona, visit our website, CBC.ca/aih.

[Music: upbeat music]

Satan shoes

CH: Now, as far as I know, the devil wears nada, on his feet anyway. Well, he is notoriously sneaky. He's never really gotten into sneaker culture, what with the cloven hooves and all. But now, finally, someone has stepped up to create the perfect pairing of archfiend and arch support. A.K.A. Satan shoes, which are essentially black and red Nike Air Max set 97's with a few little tweaks, a bronze pentagram here, an inverted cross there, some human blood, that kind of thing. I know what you're thinking, vile, but it's not actually a whole vile. The shoes are made with a mere drop of human blood, which was, by all accounts, donated willingly. The rest of the red liquid that now occupies the shoe's air bubble soul is ink. The Satan shoes are the work of notorious provocateurs, MSCHF, who teamed up with the rapper Lil Nas X for a limited edition run of 666. Which right on cue generated outrage over the weekend from several high profile politicians and religious leaders in the U.S.. One evangelical preacher called the shoes "evil and heresy". Nike has taken pains to make it clear it has nothing to do with the shoe and does not endorse it. In fact, TMZ is reporting that Nike has filed a lawsuit. Now before things get too out of control, a gentle reminder, MSCHF and Lil Nas X don't have blood on their hands. They have it on their feet and really, this whole thing was supposed to be just for kicks.

[Music: guitar instrumental]

Part 2: NL Election Over

NL Election Over

Guest: Alison Coffin

CH: It took 10 weeks to figure out which party will lead Newfoundland and Labrador, and it's the same party that was in control before the epic election campaign. In the chaos caused by rising covid numbers, in-person voting was cancelled and some voters claimed they never received mail in ballots. On Saturday, Premier Andrew Furey led the liberals to a slim majority government. Here's part of what he had to say after the results were announced.

ANDREW FUREY: We have come to a point in our history where the road ahead is a little foggy. But if we are bold now, we have a once in a lifetime chance to change the trajectory of Newfoundland and Labrador. Today is a moment's pause, a pause in a journey that for me began a year ago with a head full of ideas on the difference I wanted to make for the people of our province. But I think back and how many miles I've travelled since then, the communities I visited, the many faces young and old I've met with, listened to and most importantly, learn from. It feels like every one of them is in this room today and they're not here to celebrate. They're here to remind me, to hold me to the simple truth that when you ask people to push, you better push with them. That when you say you will speak for them, you do so loudly, honestly, and only with the best intentions in mind. The time for boldness is now Newfoundland and Labrador. From here it is forward only, forward always. Thank you.

CH: That was Newfoundland and Labrador liberal leader Andrew Furey. In a rare blow, the leaders of both the progressive Conservatives and the NDP lost their seats. Alison Coffin is the leader of the NDP and we reached her in St. John's.

PA: Ms. Coffin, after months of campaigning how does it feel not only to lose the election, but also your own seat?

ALISON COFFIN: Well, certainly it's disappointing for sure. But the silver lining in this is I know our party did a very good job. I know our message resonated. The two seats we won were resounding victories. And there is, I have to admit, a fair bit of relief. In knowing that now I know what I'm dealing with, like I can make a plan for how I want to go forward.

PA: I bet. I mean, the uncertainty alone. But, man, you lost by, what, 53 votes?

AC: So far, 53. That's where the votes are today.

PA: That's got to be salt in the wound of a long campaign like that?

AC: A little for sure. But that also tells me that there's hope there. There's hope there. That is very close. And remember, this is not a normal election. Moments ago, I already was speaking with someone who said I wanted to vote and I wasn't able to vote. So this is... This really is a little bit of an indication of exactly how badly our election went.

PA: Do you think your riding would have come out different if in-person voting had not been cancelled?

AC: Well, all manner of things could happen. But if you look at my riding, I mean, downtown St. John, there's a lot of individuals who move in and out of St John. And there's a lot of individuals who are in a marginalised situation. So getting ballots out to individuals maybe with no fixed address is an issue. I know last time when we talked about... When we looked at the vote, we had an enormous number of people who are sworn in at the voting station on Election Day. Now, I don't know if they voted for me or not, but that tells me there was an awful lot of people that you can't reach out and touch very quickly in our district.

PA: The problems in this campaign were legion. I mean, the timing, the you know, the communications around this, the logistics of actually... Which one do you think? Is there one that stands out as the biggest problem with how the election was held?

AC: That's a really hard question. I think hitting a moving target was perhaps the most difficult. Remember, it was just three days before the election was supposed to have an original E-day that things started skating, you know, part of the Avalon went to mail in ballots. So they had a different date and then all of the province shut down. And then we had a different date for [inaudible], another date for [inaudible] and another date for when the counting was going to happen. So I think that was really frustrating. It's really hard to develop an appropriate response when you don't know what circumstances you are in and what target you're trying to hit.

PA: In your mind, was this a legitimate election?

AC: There is an awful lot of outstanding questions in this election. I think it's still a little too early to determine whether or not legitimate. We still have to wait for the election results to come in. But given the sheer volume of concerns, the number of ways that questions have been raised, the number of people who have questioned.... Who question the validity themselves, I think I think we need to sit down and have a sombre discussion about what it meant, what the results mean, how it was executed, and then do an analysis of well, was legitimate or not.

PA: And when you do, are there... Do you have recourse? I mean, is there a way to fight the results?

AC: There are a variety of ways to do that. Now again, I have not had those in depth conversation, certainly at first glance. There are some levers that can be used within the confines of the Elections Act. And I think there's some constitutional issues there as well. But I need to sit down with my lawyer and some other advisers and talk about what our options are.

PA: At least for the time being, does an election with this kind of an asterix around it mean that the next government should or even must govern differently, that it needs to take in the weirdness of this campaign in the way that it actually goes ahead and governs the province?

AC: That certainly would be the prudent thing, it would make sense to realise that we do need to recognise that this is cooperation here and that everyone's views need to be better represented along the way. However, I have some fear that that's not going to happen. Remember when Andrew Furey said that he was running... he wanted to run on a majority government so he could do the things he needed to do. That tells me that no matter what other people have to say, he has something in mind that he wants to make happen. And he did not think that he could do that in collaborating in a minority government situation. And in the time that I was in office with him, he never once reached out to try and move any issues forward. So well, it would be prudent to tread carefully. I really do not expect that that's the case.

PA: So on top of everything else, and you still got a lot of work ahead figuring this out. You've got to be exhausted. What do you plan to do to decompress from this marathon campaign?

AC: I have a number of outlets and remember, I'm kind of exhausted, but I've also been trapped in my home for five weeks because we've had a covid shutdown. So, you know I have a lot of natural energy. So I kind of need an outlet at this point. So, you know, I've got a lot of time and a number of very important issues ahead of me. So that could be dangerous.

PA: Yes. Yes, indeed. All right. We're going to leave it there, but do stay in touch. Let us know how these next few days go.

AC: Absolutely will do. It's been a pleasure.

CH: Alison Coffin is the leader of the Newfoundland and Labrador NDP. We reached her in St. John's.

[Music: piano instrumental]

AstraZeneca vaccine

CH: AstraZeneca has hit yet another bump on the road today. Canada's top vaccine committee told the provinces they should hit pause on giving the AstraZeneca shot to patients under the age of 55. It comes after very rare instances in Europe of blood clots in some patients, mostly young women. Here in Canada, more than 300,000 AstraZeneca shots have already been administered, with no reports of blood clots. But the recommendation was made anyway as a precautionary measure until more data are available. Dr. Matthew Oughton is an infectious diseases doctor in Montreal. Here's how he reacted to the news today.

MATTHEW OUGHTON: This vaccine has really had a bit of a roller coaster ride, and this seems to be the latest bump in this roller coaster. Now, after the last few weeks of reports of these rare events of severe blood clots, mostly coming from Europe. And we're talking about when I say where we're talking about something in the order of one per 100,000 doses to one per one million doses on the basis of that, where these blood clots were largely seen in women below the age of 55, I think that's what's guiding the announcement.

SUDHA KRISHNAN: But in terms of this race of getting people vaccinated as much as possible, how worrisome is this right now?

MO: This is a major issue, I think, because we have the started or already an established third wave, increasing numbers of cases in the younger population. In fact, people ages 20 to 39 that had the highest per capita incidence of new cases, not only cases, but severe cases in Canada. When we were using AstraZeneca as a large part of the vaccination strategy to all of a sudden halt that is going to make a major dent in the plans of getting large amounts of people vaccinated in a way to sort of try to outrace the third wave. So I think this really is setting us up for difficulty in using vaccines to control this third wave.

CH: That was Dr Matthew Oughton speaking to CBC Montreal host Sudha Krishnan today.

[Music: meditative music]

Beverly Cleary Obit

Guest: Kate DiCamillo

CH: Despite the title of the 1968 book, Ramona, The Pest, Ramona Quimby wasn't really a pest, not as far as her creator, Beverly Cleary was concerned. But the point was she had every right to be. Children in general, and girls in particular had every right to be chaotic and unruly, and quote "A little bit noisier and a little bit more stubborn than adults". Ms. Cleary subscribed to that philosophy from when she started writing in the 1950s right up until her death last week. And in a 2006 interview, she spoke a bit about where Ramona and that credo came from.

BEVERLY CLEARY: The actual Ramona that I think might have inspired me was a little girl who lived near us. Who was....She was considered rather impossible. And I have a vivid memory of her coming home from the grocery store. In those days, children could be sent to the store and she had a pound of butter, which she had opened, and she was just eating the pound of butter. And somehow that little girl became Ramona, although Ramona never ate a pound of butter.

BARBARA LALICKI: Why do you think the children like Ramona so much?

BEVERLY CLEARY: Because she does not learn to be a better girl. I was so annoyed with the books in my childhood because children always learn to be better children. And in my experience, they didn't. They just grew. And so I started Ramona and she has never reformed. And she's really not a naughty child. In spite of the title of Ramona, the Pest, her intentions are good, but she has a lot of imagination and things sometimes don't turn out the way she had expected.

CH: Beverly Cleary speaking with her former editor, Barbara Lalicki in 2006, Ms. Cleary died last week. She was 104 years old. Kate DiCamillo is the author of The Tale of Despereaux and many other kids' books. She wrote the foreword to a recent reissue of Ms. Cleary's 1965 novel, The Mouse and the Motorcycle. We reached Ms. DiCamillo in Minneapolis.

PA: Kate, what goes through your mind when you hear that clip of Beverly Cleary?

KATE DICAMILLO: Well, I laughed the whole way through that clip that Beverly Cleary. I wasn't even really thinking until the very end when she made that beautiful point about how Ramona doesn't basically reform and how kids... That's what we respond to so much in those books is not just her exuberance and her joy, but it's her unwillingness to not go under. I mean, she's you know, it's just.... There was another interview that I heard with Beverly Cleary where she talked about how she never wanted to condescend. And that makes so much sense to me too. That come through so much because you were so talked down to all the time when you're a kid and these books never do that. They're just brilliant.

PA: They're so special for that. What was it like for you to discover Ms. Clarey and these amazing characters?

KD: Well, I had a two part discovery because as a child, I remember so clearly it's almost a flashbulb memory of my mother reading us Ribsy. She had checked it out from the library. I can still see the cover of the dust jacket. And she read it to my brother and me. And we just it was the first time I'd ever seen an adult laugh until they cried. But then what happened was when I was in my mid 30s and started to write, I got all of the Ramona books, which I didn't read as a child because I think I just miss them time wise.

PA: Right.

KD: And I was working at a hot dog stand and it wasn't a very busy, hot dog stand. And so I had all this time to read and I made my way through all those Ramona books. And I just couldn't believe how wonderful they were, how funny they were, how relevant they were. And again, that absolute refusal to condescend to a kid. And so they really shaped me, I think, as a writer because of that time in the hot dog stand with Ramona.

PA: But that perspective of age is so key and so important here that you sort of know what they're getting at as a kid. But then to read them as an adult, they stand up in a totally different way. And I wonder, looking back now, characters like Henry Huggins or Beezus and Ramona Quimby, what they mean to young readers today compared to, you know, when they were first introduced in, say, the 50s or the 60s.

KD: Well, I know they're still read with just as.... I mean, it's funny because the week before Beverly Cleary died, I was watching a school bus... Kids get off a school bus. I was walking my dog, Ramona, and the last kid off the bus got down and she was moving slowly because she was reading, as she walked off the bus and she was reading Ribsy. And it was all I could do not to say, isn't that a great book? But there it is. All these years later, that's what moved me when I was a kid. And there's a kid now, 50 years later reading the same book.

PA: And you actually reacted to the news of Ms. Cleary's Death by writing her a letter from your younger self. What did you want to tell her?

KD: I wanted to tell her one, I grew up in a time when it just never occurred to me to write Beverly Cleary and thank her for Ribsy. But that's what I did in the letters, just like I felt this profound gratitude as an eight year old to this person who had told this story. And I couldn't have articulated it that well at the time. But that's what I wanted to say was thank you. Not only did you entertain me, but you made me feel less alone. You made me feel safe. And you got the dog back home safely.

PA: I grew up in a house that was basically wallpapered in books. And now my 11 year old daughter has, you know, the old dog eared copies of these books that my wife held on to for all of these years. You wrote the foreword for Ms. Cleary's 1965 novel, The Release of the Mouse and the Motorcycle. What did you want readers today, like my 11 year old is carrying around in her school book. What did you want them to know about that book?

KD: I wanted them to know that every good book and The Mouse And The Motorcycle is a very good book, is a way to look differently at the world, to see all the things that you don't know are happening, that are happening. Like mice riding motorcycles. Anything is possible, and the older you get, the more you let that notion go. But if you read a kid's book, you can get that feeling back.

PA: Is there a book or a passage in a book that stands out? That really sort of captures what Beverly Cleary and what Ramona Quimby were all about for you?

KD: I think so much about Ramona. She dresses up as a witch for Halloween. She has this fantastic witch mask and she loves it. It scares her when she first sees it. She puts it on. And then she has this wonderful moment where she realises that no one knows that it's her behind that mask. And it's so psychologically, again, acute and so funny and it gets into our hearts, not just a kid's heart, all of our hearts, that we're afraid that we're not going to be seen. And that's what Beverly Cleary did so beautifully, was she saw all of us as human beings. So that's why the books will last.

PA: Well, they sure have. And it's really just great to be able to remember all of this with you and to hear your take on it today. So thank you so much.

KD: Oh, thank you for talking with me. I'm so grateful to get to talk about one of my heroes.

CH: Kate DiCamillo is a Newbery Award winning children's book author and a lifelong fan of the late Beverly Cleary. We reached her in Minneapolis. Ms. Cleary Died last week. She was 104 years old.

[Music: electronic music]

Baby Beluga

VOICE: [Sound Clip: Baby beluga] Baby beluga in the deep blue sea. Swims so wild and you swim so free. Heaven above and the sea below and the little white whale on the go. Baby beluga...

CH: That's Baby Beluga by Rafie. And when Colleen Omand was teaching her grade one, students at Isaac Brock School in Winnipeg about the whales, that classic children's song came to mind but a different version. Ms. Omand teaches in the school's Cree language bilingual programme, and she taught her students a translated Cree version of the song. The class submitted a performance of their version of Baby Beluga to the Indigenous Languages Symposium contest, and they just won First Prize. Ms. Omand Spoke with the CBC last week.

[Sound Clip: Ms. Omand talking to her students]

COLLEEN OMAND: Throughout the years we've been learning Cree songs, Cree nursery rhymes and we have one support that's been supporting our Cree language program for a while. And we adopted her as our classroom chopan. Her name is Ellen Cook. Chopan, that means a great grandmother, an elder. She translated this song when she was a teacher. She's a retired teacher now, so she translated the song. And it was... It took quite a long time to get used to the words because, as you know, our key words are really long. So we practised daily. We repeated the word slowly. We started the words slowly at the beginning because for social distancing, we couldn't sing. So they learnt the song. A friend of mine sent me a message telling me about the singing contest that was happening. She sent me the link and I looked into it. And I'm like, Oh, that would be interesting to do this project. I didn't have the piano or the song. So Ms. [inaudible] our wonderful Vice Principal stepped in and said, I'll help you with the piano. And we went upstairs to the music room where the piano was and she started playing. By this time, the students have learnt the words through chanting and reading, and she played the piano. The students began singing and they did a phenomenal job. I'm excited to see how this is going to carry on. Our students are learning the language and my hope for them is that they will carry the language that they learnt and they will continue to grow and learn the Cree language. That's reconciliation and action.

CH: Colleen Omand speaking with CBC Manitoba's information radio about her Grade one class and their Cree translation of Raffi's baby beluga. And now here's part of her students award winning performance.

[Sound Clip: students singing baby beluga in Cree]

[Music: guitar instrumental]

Alberta spring cleaning

CH: With every spring comes a chance for new growth, but not without a bit of groundwork. And this year there will be more ground work than usual. As was revealed in Alberta this weekend as the snow melted away and revealed hundreds of masks littering the streets. Candice Anderson saw this moment as a chance for the province to come together. So she organised community mask cleanups in various cities, including her own. Here's Ms. Anderson sharing the story this morning on the Calgary Eye-Opener.

CANDICE ANDERSON: It was just good to get out and make sure that everything looked a little bit better now that we had a bit of a winter thaw, though, today it seems to be covering back up again. But we got the opportunity to go out and in Vermillion collected three hundred and twenty facemasks in our town of five thousand people. But Calgary specifically, I did have somebody who did reach out to me in the Hillhurst area who went out for only an hour and found just seventy five masks in his community alone. So, yeah, that's a little bit alarming of a number to know that's just one individual who went out. So I can only imagine if everybody had done the same, what kind of numbers we would be looking at for Calgary. We do try to attribute some of it at least to the wind in southern Alberta because the masks are so lightweight, they get scooped out of the garbage or out of people... fall out of people's pockets or out of their vehicles, things to that effect. But unfortunately, I think that probably a large portion of it is due to just negligence.

DAVID GRAY: There's another worrying trend with all these masks that just get thrown out of car windows or however else they magically appear in somebody's lawn, is that wildlife are picking them up. Have you seen some of the photos of wildlife, it harkens back to the time that all those plastic six pack rings would show up around the necks of ducks?

CA: Well, that's exactly the problem. I mean, this is becoming the tumbleweed of our time. Right? And bringing attention to those kind of problems, again, is that the animals are getting tangled up in them. Birds that are being affected by the loops on the masks are an issue. I mean, of course, even the fact that these masks all do contain a portion of plastic in them that take approximately four hundred fifty years to break down. So we are going to see a substantial amount of pollution that's going to be happening with the mask.

CH: That was Candice Anderson speaking with host David Gray today on the Calgary Eyeopener. She was in Vermillion, which was two hours east of Edmonton.

[Music: string instrumental]

Part 3: Miniature Gallery

Miniature Gallery

Guest: Simon Martin

CH: Over the past year, our lives have all shrunk considerably and now one UK gallery is running with that premise in a big way or I should say, in a very small but spectacular way. The Pallant House gallery in England has enlisted 30 of the UK's leading artists, including Damien Hirst and Turner Prize winner Lubaina Himid, to create tiny works of art, nothing larger than a UK pound coin, which is a hair over two centimetres in diameter. And starting in June, the works will be shown in a specially created miniature gallery about the size of a refrigerator. Pallant House gallery director Simon Martin is the man behind the 2021 Model Art Gallery. We reached him in Brighton, England.

PA: Mr. Martin, you were secretly putting this together for months before the news broke over the weekend. How does it feel to now have this idea out there in the world?

SIMON MARTIN: It's brilliant because actually we've been keeping this secret, you know, all this time, and it's so nice to now be able to share it with the world that this is happening and to have a real positive outcome from such a difficult period. I mean, everybody has found the last year so hard. And I think actually everybody's looking for good news stories. And so it's really nice to be able to share this extraordinary project is really happening.

PA: I'd like to dig in on that if I could. What is it about this last year and the whole living through a pandemic that has inspired this project?

SIMON MARTIN: Well, I think one of the things that struck me, I mean, this is back in April last year and museums had been closed and artists exhibitions were being cancelled. And, you know, people were suddenly not able to work in their studios. Everyone had to be at home and lots of artists were trying to home educate their children. And I was kind of thinking, well, actually, what is a manageable project in this situation? How can people still be creative on a manageable scale? And we have two miniature model galleries at Pallant House Gallery in our collection. And I was thinking well, actually, this could be a really interesting thing to revisit 20 on to find, you know, to ask the artists of today. And so, what I started doing was writing a kind of wish list of artists, really, you know, who were the most famous, significant artists that I was able to access. And fortunately, most of them have said yes, which has been really wonderful, actually. And it's you know, it's a diverse mix of artists as well, which I think is very important given the issues which have been coming up in the art world over the last year.

PA: But as you say, it's some of the biggest names in the game right now. What is it that you think drew them to this project and the idea of working with something so small?

SIMON MARTIN: Well, I think I think people are always interested in the idea of miniaturisation. And I think artists are very intrigued by things like this. They love this idea of playing with scale and actually trying to condense, often quite complex ideas into a new fun way of creating work. And I think for a lot of people, it provided something a bit lighter in this relentlessly awful period. And I think for me and my colleagues, this one has really brought us a lot of pleasure. And every time a parcel arrived at Pallant House gallery, you know, our curatorial team unpacked it, it was like Christmas, these exquisite things. I mean, there's some of them... Edmund Deval has made a tiny porcelain vase with a gold rim which sits on a little marble plinth. And it's the most beautiful, exquisite little piece of work. I think one of the other things is also that it's not about any one artist. It's about a collective endeavour. And I think in the midst of a pandemic, being able to create work which will collectively create an exhibition which will have a long term future, I think is also a really lovely thing to do.

PA: You described those moments of like Christmas morning of the packages arriving and opening them up and seeing them yourself for the first time. I wonder, as you get closer to actually opening the doors and letting people in, what are the pieces that you're most excited to watch other people see for the first time?

SIMON MARTIN: Well, I think people will know some of the artist's work very well. And I think one of them, Damien Hirst, for example, has made a miniature spin painting. And normally these, you know, his spin paintings are maybe three metres across, a huge, great thing. And yet they've managed to make this on a miniature scale and so that's really wonderful. I think another artist Lubaina Himid, she was the first black woman to win the Turner Prize in Britain. And she's created this wonderful wood panel collage painting, which is just kind of figurative and it's just such an optimistic and bright painting. It makes you smile, you know, but at the same time, there's a playfulness. But actually some of the works are still quite serious in intent. And I think that's also, you know, one of the things we want to do is for it to introduce children and young people to contemporary art. And in this one structure that. All of these different... This cross-section of British artists, but it also works adults and the adults who have seen the idea are just, you know, they're enchanted by it as well. And I think that there's something for all ages in this. And one of the things we'd like to do is to be able to send it to other galleries in London and around the rest of the country and maybe even abroad. And, you know, as like a kind of mini, mini exhibition of British art.

PA: One of the interesting things is that the artists have donated these works to be part of the permanent collection. And if I've got it right, part of the deal is that these works will never be sold. You might not be able to answer, but I wonder, do you have any sense of what these might be worth?

SIMON MARTIN: It's so hard to say, I mean, you know, these are unique things, and I think actually it's more than the sum of its parts. I think that is the thing that together it creates this extraordinarily unique thing. And so it's going to be a... When it comes to us having to work out there you know, the collective insurance value will get kind of professional valuers to work with us on that.

PA: Well, it sounds amazing. Good luck between now and June. And maybe we'll speak to you again once people actually get a chance to look at this.

SIMON MARTIN: Thank you so much for having me.

PA: Thank you.

CH: Simon Martin is the director of the Pallant House Gallery and the man behind the 2021 Model Art Gallery. He's in Brighton, England.

[Music: Piano instrumental]

Theodore Tugboat

CH: He's been an ambassador for the city of Halifax for two decades, but now he's moving on and moving West. Theodore Too the Life-Size replica of TV kids show character Theodore Tugboat is leaving Nova Scotia for a new home in Hamilton, Ontario. The popular attraction was put up for sale last July as tourism along the waterfront was capsizing as a result of the pandemic. But his new owner, Blair McKeil, has big plans for Theodore. He's the founder of McKeil Marine.

BLAIR MCKEIL: Theodore is incredible. You know, I love him. My sons love him. And you have to think of how many people go down to the waterfront to see Theodore and ride on... He's just an iconic, iconic, iconic individual. So when I see it on national news, go across there selling it, I called immediately and we're fortunate enough to work something out. And hopefully Theodore will not, hopefully, he will be a big part of our life for a while. So we're excited about that. What our biggest challenge is actually the marine industry as a whole, not just myself having We're having a heck of a hard time getting people to be interested in working in this industry. So we're going to use Theodore to really promote the maritime industry at large as well as the maritime. And the other thing, my wife's really involved in a ton of preservation, protection of water, freshwater, things like that. So he's going to have multiple roles, as well as from a philanthropic perspective taking kids for rides, things like that. So we'll, him around the lakes and promote the marine industry. Talk about the maritimes, because we're proud of the maritimes and try our best to make people aware of the marine industry because the jobs that are available there, they're all high quality jobs. And we're really going to use him to try and help promote some of that. We hope to get him out of Halifax and start working his way up to the lakes in June, and he'll take his time and visit several ports on the way up. Nova Scotia's always going to be his home and certainly we'll see how things work along. It would be nice to think that we could run them back down and visit the Maritimes as well.

CH: Blair McKeil speaking with the CBC's Haley Ryan. Mr. McKeil is a Marine industrialist whose company bought Nova Scotia's Theodore Too, and is bringing the replica of the TV tugboat to Hamilton, Ontario, this summer.

[Music: polka music]

Imissmybar.com

CH: By now, we all know that pandemic life doesn't feel right, and when you're out and about, it doesn't look right either. But as radio people we're especially missing the beautiful chaos of pre pandemic sound. Crowd sounds, concert sounds, the suddenly poignant sound of someone yelling into their cell phone on public transit or a party where someone keeps playing baby got back at window rattling volume. Oscar Romo misses familiar sounds too. He's a bar owner in Monterrey, Mexico. So when his pleas for an early end to the pandemic fell on deaf ears, he and some colleagues decided to make some noise, literally. The result is "I miss my bar.com", a website Mr. Romo says has struck a chord with bar keeps and bar goers around the world. And according to NPR, a growing number of mixologists have been using the site's library of bar sounds to create a new kind of cocktail. [Sound Clip: bar sounds] Oh, man, from the sound library of I miss my bar.com, that was a cocktail of serving drinks, bartender working, street ambience and people talking with a garnish of full room. I call it the Tear-jerker.

[Music: upbeat techno Music]

Wakefield UK FB

Guest: Sue Perry

CH: Sue Perry from Wakefield, England, has learnt that you can be in the wrong place at the right time. Earlier this year she joined an online buy and sell group for people in her city, hoping to give away some items to her fellow residents. But on closer examination, she realised her fellow Buy and sellers were very neighbourly, but not actually neighbours. We reached Sue Perry in Wakefield, England.

PA: Sue, what made you realise that the group you thought you had joined seemed a little odd?

SUE PERRY: The skis and the ski boots and the warm clothes, that sort of give it away? And also the place names I didn't recognise Edelweiss, I think were one of them.

PA: So, I mean, we've all clicked on things that we realise all that's not the right group and you just unsubscribe and move on. You decided to post something. Have I got that right?

SP: I did, yes. I just thought, one little post, if I just said, well, oops, I'm sorry if I seem to have joined the wrong Wakefield buy and sell, I'm in Wakefield, UK. Everybody stay safe across the pond.

PA: And you probably thought that would be the end of it.

SP: I certainly did. Yes. And I was certainly wrong.

PA: So tell me, what were the responses?

SP: Well, there were lots of people dropping in and chatting and asking how things were. And it was a lovely distraction at the time. And my daughter is a nurse. My son in law was a nurse, and my own son is an outreach worker. And they had all caught covid through the job. So things were a little dark at that time, let's say. So. It was a lovely, lovely distraction.

PA: Just to be clear. Are they OK now?

SP: Yes. They are.

PA: Well, thank goodness, yeah, you need this distraction. You get this distraction. What did you end up talking to all these people about?

SP: Just everyday things, really, as we say, here gabbing.

PA: And it starts slow. And I guess it just builds right up.

SP: Yes, exactly.I likened it to, it started with a snowflake and ended up an avalanche. It just snowballed.

PA: One of the people that you ended up that was on this group, a guy named Scott Milton Grace. What happened with him and what did he end up organising?

SP: It started off with a post saying, I think we should send Sue a care package, which I thought was a little joke. First person said, I've got maple syrup from last year and then somebody else said, I've got some honey. And so it went on and on and on. A couple of days later, Scott said, Well, I'll go buy a Canada box and put it in my office. And if you want to come along and put things in to send and it quickly filled up, it was just non-stop. And then when the box was full people donated money to buy the postage, which is just absolutely fabulous. So, so, humbling. Then Scott messaged me to say that their Mayor he'd been in touch and he wanted to do something as well. So he sent this little package to our mayor in Wakefield that I have to pass along now.

PA: what's in the box. What did you end up getting?

SP: Oh gosh, it's a local to Wakefield and the area, which is lovely. There's about 7 CD's of singer songwriters, six or seven T-shirts, maple syrup, lots of honey, lots of books written by local people, and the little ceramic cup that someone has made, a dollar,a Canadian dollar, some leatherwork and the local nude calendar.

PA: The nude calendar?

SP: The Wakefield nude calendar. [Laughter] I remember someone said we should send the nude calendar and I thought that were a joke, but no, it [inaudible].

PA: Your neighbours must think we're crazy over here.

SP: Well, it's been in our local Wakefield Express newspaper everybody thinks this wonderful. Absolutely wonderful.

PA: Do you think you'll ever get over to visit Wakefield, Quebec?

SP: I never say never. We have relatives in Vancouver and it would be lovely, it really would be lovely to come to Wakefield.

PA: So will you send the Wakefield, Quebec group a Wakefield, England basket or box of your own?

SP: Yeah, well, our mayor the mayor of Wakefield, Yorkshire, I believe he wants to put a box together. So, yes, I will be putting stuff in the box and the Wakefield Express newspaper along with it.

PA: And after all this, are you still a part of the group, the Wakefield, Quebec Facebook group?

SP: Yes, I am still. I talk to Scott and his lady, Maria, it's quite nice. And I've had lots, lots of offers for holidays. Lots.

PA: When you joined this group, you said that it was something of a distraction and a bit of a boost from the pandemic and your kids situation. Do you think maybe us latching on to this story of goodwill and just nice human connection is in a lot of ways our own way of being distracted from the covid situation and all of us being locked up inside for so long?

SP: I think so. I think we're all in the same boat aren't we, we are on different ponds, but we're all in the same boat. Yeah, definitely. Oh, another little thing. When the box arrived, there was a little message written inside of it that Scott hadn't written on when they posted it. So it's been done either at the post office or in transit. And it says the spirit of love and kindness is alive and well in the heart of humankind. And then the peace sign and a heart which we thought was lovely. What a lovely thing.

PA: It really is. It's just a wonderful thing. It's been really nice that you were able to come on and speak about it with us today. Thank you. And do take good care, OK?

SP: Oh, thank you.

CH: Sue Perry is a resident of Wakefield, England, who accidentally joined an online group for residents of Wakefield, Quebec. And incidentally, you'd have to line up 850, 3000, 883 nude calendars in a slightly southeasterly direction to reach Redding from Wakefield, England. I mean.

[Music: Elevator music]

Eurovision Belarus

CH: Pop music isn't always about escapism, sometimes it's about protest like this 1989 Public Enemy classic [Sound Clip: Fight the Power by Public Enemy] or Nena's oblique anti-war statement, 99 Luftballons [Sound Clip: 99 Luftballons by Nena] or Billy Joel's heartfelt denial of responsibility for everything, "we didn't start the fire" [Sound Clip: we didn't start the fire by Billy Joel] So protest is a big part of pop, which is why at first it seems kind of square that the Eurovision Song Contest won't allow it. On Friday, Eurovision told the band Galasy ZMesta that it's song Ya nauchu tebya would not be allowed to be the entry from Belarus. Too political, it said. Let's hear a bit of Ya nauchu tebya. [Sound Clip: Ya nauchu tebya "I'll teach you"]. Sounds like the theme to a children's show with puppets from the mid 80s, which is hardly disqualifying, that describes about half of all Eurovision entries ever. So the problem is the lyrics. I know what you're thinking. Why are the organisers so afraid of a group fighting the power? Well, apparently Galasy ZMesta is fighting for the power. Their song actually mocks the people who've been out protesting against President Alexander Lukashenko in Belarus, the people who've endured a brutal crackdown from security forces. Ya nauchu tebya means I'll teach you and one lyric goes, "I'll teach you to toe the line". Well, fair enough then, eurovision, no protest songs, especially not protest songs that protest against protests. Everyone knows you're supposed to stick it to the man, not stick up for the man.

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March 29, 2021 Episode Transcript

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