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The AIH Transcript for July 25, 2022

HELEN MANN: Hello. I'm Helen Mann.

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

[Theme]

Prologue

CH: Tonight:

HM: A long time coming. At last, here on home soil, Indigenous residential school survivors, their families, and their communities listened as the Pope expressed his sorrow for the pain his church caused.

CH: A complicated response. A day school survivor says she has mixed emotions after hearing the Pope's apology: she's willing to forgive, but she's still waiting to see concrete action.

HM: Clearing the ice. In the wake of sexual assault allegations against players, Hockey Canada says it has a plan to tackle the sport's toxic culture. But our guest says the first thing its leadership should do is step down.

CH: Hard questions. The CEO of Rogers is grilled by MPs over the massive outage that left customers across the country in a lurch -- including some who couldn't reach 9-1-1.

HM: Getting to the points. We'll visit our archives to find out how Hunter S. Thompson wound up with a set of elk antlers that didn't belong to him -- and how his widow came to return them.

CH: And... babble on! If you've ever heard a parent coo at their baby in the cutest possible voice ever, you're not alone. Researchers say that kind of baby talk is remarkably similar all around the globe.

CH: As It Happens, the Monday edition. Radio with a powerful gaga reflex.

Part 1: Papal Apology: Day School, Hockey Canada: New Brunswick Prof, Baby Talk Study

Papal Apology: Day School

Guest: Margaret Swan

[sc]

[Indigenous drum and song]

[/sc] CH: The sound of drums as First Nations chiefs entered the site of a former residential school. Where they went to hear a historic apology from the head of the church that ran that school. Today, Pope Francis began his "penitential pilgrimage" in Maskwacis, Alberta -- where he asked forgiveness for the deep hurt caused by residential schools. He was met by hundreds of survivors and their families. First Nations, Metis and Inuit peoples were all in attendance.

[sc]

POPE FRANCIS: [speaking Spanish]

TRANSLATOR: Today, I am here in this land that, along with its ancient memories, preserves the scars of still open wounds. I am here because the first steps of my penitential pilgrimage among you is that of, again, asking forgiveness, of telling you once more that I am deeply sorry. Sorry for the ways in which, regrettably, much of many Christians supported the colonizing mentality of the powers that oppressed the Indigenous peoples. I am sorry. I ask forgiveness in particular for the ways in which many members of the church and of religious communities cooperated, not least through their indifference and projects of cultural destruction and forced assimilation promoted by the governments of that time, which culminated in the system of residential schools.

[/sc]

CH: Margaret Swan is a member of the Lake Manitoba First Nation. In the late 1960s and early 1970s, she was forced to attend Dog Creek Day School, which was operated by the Roman Catholic Church. We reached her just outside Winnipeg.

HM: Margaret, I know this is a difficult and emotional day for many people. So let me just say off the start of this that I would like to thank you and tell you we appreciate you speaking with us.

MARGARET SWAN: Oh, I… I just feel like I need to do this to help ours as much as I can by speaking our truth. For me, when he apologized for residential schools, day schools, they were very similar in nature. They were similar in terms of what they were intended to do. I have really mixed feelings and mixed thoughts about the apology and what I just witnessed on TV at home. I said before that an apology is… I felt kind of the first step up and how important that is. There's also what happens after that, though. And I can't help but sit and shed tears because of the fact that we still today our children today live with the remnants of the residential schools, the day schools, the Sixties Scoop and all of those colonized systems that caused so much damage for our people. In some ways, I feel intentionally because when those systems were implemented, the rationale behind it was to kill the Indian and the child.

HM: Did you get the sense today that… that the Pope understands that in some of what he said? He begged for forgiveness. He referred to the evil committed by many Christians against Indigenous people. Did you hear, in his words, something that acknowledged that… that… you know, that there was a lack of… of appreciation and respect for existing cultures and traditions?

MS: I believe he used words like… what was the word? He… he said catastrophic, a disastrous error and colonization. So, those three words, for me, speaks to the fact that, yes, he does understand to a certain degree. But obviously, I also believe you will never… no one will understand what it's like unless you're one of us. Now, what are they going to do for the next steps? Well, they… the Pope acknowledged that there was psychological, emotional and spiritual abuse. There was sexual abuse. They normalized all these abuses within our people to a certain degree until we started to learn that what we were taught by so-called God's people was not kind and not of us.

HM: How have you seen this affect your own family and your own community?

MS: Oh, my goodness. You know, I share my life experiences in different places. I've had to learn from books how to parent my children. I’m now helping with my grandchildren, and continue to learn positive parenting skills. The residential school system took all that away from us. And then, when you talk about the addictions, the suicides within ourself, I've lived it personally. I've lost two sons to addiction, accidental drug overdoses, they’re called. And we… some of us, like I said, if probably many of us try and break the cycle of family violence with very little to no resources. Some of us try to break the cycle of addictions with almost no recourse or resources.

HM: You said earlier that, you know, the apology is one thing, but what do they do now? How do they help move forward? And you've just mentioned resources for helping deal with things like addiction and parenting and psychological counselling. Would you like the church, the Catholic Church, to take responsibility or at least provide some resources for those kinds of services going forward?

MS: I think they have a big role to play in that. To take it even further, they need to look at overhauling the justice system, the child welfare system, the health system, the education system. All those systems are based on a… on superiority mentality. So, they need to change so much in this country to ensure that things don't keep repeating themselves.

HM: You saw so many powerful scenes today in Alberta. I'm just wondering, as you were watching it on television, what stood out for you?

MS: What stood out for me? [beginning to cry] I guess one of the things I thought about was the forgiveness part, and how our people initially were a forgiving people, and how we need to learn to be going back to be a kind people and not follow the steps of our colonizers, but rather take the high road. And then, watching Phil Fontaine on TV, and recognizing that he had… had he not said what he said as the national chief, what, 30… almost 30 years ago? Talking about his abuse, and how long it's taken to get to this point. And how many have died within our families before something tangible is going to be done to achieve better results for our people.

HM: I have to ask you, given the emotion I hear from you, and knowing what a heavy day this has been for so many people, do you have family or friends, other supporters around you today to give you the kind of love and support you need?

MS: I do. I have learned in the last five years to be very creative on how I deal with my emotional well-being. Because I've had to. I just… actually, I was watching the… the Pope on TV and everything that was going on. I sat, and I smudged, I prayed, I cleaned some… some sage my husband picked yesterday and carried on doing the same thing, just smudging and praying. And… and I just felt I... I need to be alone today to process this for myself and just pray and… and comfort myself with… with prayers.

HM: I'm sure it's going to be a challenging week going forward as well. I just want to wish you strength and tell you once again how much I really appreciate that you were willing to share so much of your experience with us today.

MS: You're very welcome. Miigwetch. Bye-bye.

HM: Goodbye.

CH: Margaret Swan is a member of the Lake Manitoba First Nation. We reached her just outside Winnipeg. We'll have more on the Pope's apology later in the program. A national Indian Residential School Crisis Line has been set up to provide support to residential school survivors and those affected. The number is 1-866-925-4419.

[fuzzy electric guitar]

Hockey Canada: New Brunswick Prof

Guest: Kristi Allain

CH: Hockey Canada says it has a plan to end the culture of silence and toxic behaviour in and around the sport. But given this year's bombshell revelations, hockey's national governing body will have a lot of work to do to convince people it can fix its own problems. Today, Hockey Canada released an action plan, which includes a tracking and reporting system for abuse complaints. And this week, officials with Hockey Canada will face Parliament over the organization's handling of sexual assault allegations against members of the 2018 world junior team. And Halifax police are also investigating an alleged assault in 2003 involving world junior team members. New Brunswick professor Kristi Allain has been studying men's hockey culture for decades. We reached her in Fredericton.

HM: Professor Allain, hockey culture has been criticized for many years and it's pretty apparent that nothing much has changed. Do you think, given this latest series of revelations, there's reason to believe anything will be different now?

KRISTI ALLAIN: I want to be hopeful that things will be different now. And I think there are… there's some reasons to be hopeful. There's been enormous public pressure to… to see change, right? We've seen the federal government step in and demand change. We've seen sponsors drop their sponsorship money. And we've seen Hockey Canada repeatedly say they're going to make change. But I'm less hopeful there. [chuckle] I want to believe they're going to make change and that they're committed to the transparency that they purport to be committed to. And yet, we haven't really seen any of that transparency. All we've seen is Hockey Canada say they're going to be transparent.

HM: What kind of conversations have you had with hockey families as you have been watching these scandals at Hockey Canada play out?

KA: I've mostly been having conversations with the press. But, I mean, I've had many conversations over the years. I've been doing this work now for over 20 years, and I've spoken to lots of players, I've spoken to lots of families. And these aren't new problems. You know, I think that… that people enmeshed in hockey, men's elite level hockey, know that this is a problem. They've known that this is a problem for several generations. And yet, I think the conversations we're hearing are that, you know, people aren't surprised. The surprising thing is that it's taken till now to see a real public push for meaningful change.

HM: Earlier this year, we learned of a lawsuit by an unnamed woman who alleged that she had been sexually assaulted by players, including world junior team members, in 2018 in London, Ontario. Can you remind us of what we've been able to learn since then?

KA: I think we've learned very little. That… that the London police determined that there was no grounds to lay charges. They are now reopening that investigation. That's not surprising. Often when these claims come forward, the police force is reluctant to charge or the victims revoke their capacity to participate in this process because it's a hard process, because it's an arduous one, and because there's intense public pressure from fans and from others to keep this out of the public eye. We… we know that this woman was… that some sort of settlement was made to this person from Hockey Canada. We don't really know much more than that, except that Hockey Canada claims that they're now committed to… to looking at this again. That this was a private process. That this was a secretive process. And we know that the only reason we know about this is through some excellent reporting by people like Rick Westhead, who's really devoted quite a lot of time and care and attention to shedding light on this. So as much as Hockey Canada and other elite-level hockey programs say that they're interested in changing the culture of hockey and being transparent, this change is not being driven by hockey programs, but it's actually being driven by the press.

HM: And now, through those reports, we have learned about another extremely disturbing incident that is alleged to have taken place back in 2003 in, which Halifax police are now investigating. We've heard from Hockey Canada that… that the organization is committed to fixing the problems of its culture in the sport. And this whole question of transparency, they've actually issued what they call an action plan today to shatter the code of silence and eliminate toxic behaviour in and around Canada's game. Looking at the kind of things they are suggesting going forward, do you have any reason to believe that they will succeed?

KA: I'm not sure how we can believe that the very people who've been committed to this culture of silence, to this secrecy, can be the people to transform hockey? These are the people who offered payments to people who were victims of abuse, who subscribed to non-disclosure agreements. I have no confidence in their ability to transform the system. These are folks who have been embedded and embroiled in a hockey system that's deeply broken. They probably… many of them came through the systems themselves and now are back working in the system. These cannot be the people to transform hockey. We need new voices. We need new people. We can't have the same thing, can't do the same thing with the same people and expect different results.

HM: What should happen to Hockey Canada now?

KA: I think the Hockey Canada board should have stepped down. And it should be… it should be released immediately. And then we decide what comes from… from there. And it's not just Hockey Canada. I mean, to be clear, this is a problem that pervades men's elite-level culture of hockey broadly. So it's not just Hockey Canada. These players played in other leagues. They played in the Canadian Hockey League. Many of them will go on… that play, you know, in the world juniors go on and play in the NHL, the… the AHL, etc. This is a hockey problem. We have to fix hockey. And it can't be hockey people to fix hockey, unfortunately.

HMN: In their press release today, where they talk about these measures that they want to employ going forward, they include increasing and enhancing training for players, coaches, employees and volunteers to, quote, include additional focus on masculinity, consent and toxic behaviours. And to drive a culture in hockey that encourages all participants to speak up. It would suggest that they have been aware for some time that there is this toxic silence, toxic masculinity that has pervaded the sport.

KA: Yes. And, of course, they have. There have been anti-violence training programs in many of the leagues, including the Ontario Hockey League, for quite some time. The problem is, is that the… the… not the people implementing them, but the people setting up these programs, so the coaches, etc., often subtly and not so subtly undermine these programs. So people come in. They give these programs, and they're well-meaning, but… but they're not taken seriously because the people at the top don't take these seriously. These are a hoop to jump through to carry on one's hockey career. They're not a deep and earnest attempt to understand what meaningful consent looks like when… when negotiating sexual relations with a partner.

HM: Professor Allain, thank you so much. I really appreciate your input today.

KA: Thank you so much. I appreciate you having me.

HM: All right. Goodbye.

KA: Bye.

CH: Kristi Allain is an associate professor of sociology at St. Thomas University and the Canada Research Chair in Physical Culture and Social Life. We reached her in Fredericton.

[indie rock]

Baby Talk Study

Guest: Samuel Mehr

CH: You're about to hear a woman speaking in Mandarin. See if you can tell whether she's speaking to an adult or a child. Mandarin speakers: this will be even easier for you.

[sc]

[a woman speaking Mandarin clearly in a singsong way… so probably to a child… or a loved one]

[/sc]

CH: Even if you don't speak the language, you probably guessed that that was a mother soothing her child -- and you're not alone. A new study published in the journal Nature Human Behaviour determined that human beings are pretty good at determining when someone is addressing an infant -- even when they have no idea what that someone is saying. The study also seems to provide the best answer yet to an enduring question about human behaviour: Do people around the world talk to babies in the same way? And what about the songs we sing to infants -- how much do they have in common? Samuel Mehr is the lead researcher on the study and the director of The Music Lab at Haskins Laboratories at Yale University. We reached him in Montreal.

HM: Samuel, you collected and analyzed audio samples of people speaking to infants from around the world. So, how exactly do people talk to infants? What do we all have in common?

SAMUEL MEHR: There's a few different acoustic principles that are at work. And what's interesting about these results is that we find that each really differs from song in terms of how it's special for infants. So when we speak to infants, we do things like we raise our voices higher in pitch. We use a lot of different vowels. We move around a lot in our kind of vocal range, whereas when we sing to infants, it's kind of the opposite. We sort of do a bit less. It's like smoother and calmer and kind of less active in a sense.

HM: So, you collected clips from 21 different cultures or from around the world, not just different languages, but also people in a variety of social settings, including some places that were pretty isolated. And yet, you found this commonality. Why do you think that is?

SM: Well, there's a number of different reasons to think that might be the case. You might ask why we would have special vocalizations for infants in the first place? And I think, you know, some of the most compelling reasons have to do with first that young infants have to learn language. So, there are a lot of the basic linguistic principles that they need to get a hold of. But also, I think there's a pretty kind of intuitive role that parents and other adults play with infants, which is communicating important information to them to help them survive. And I think the vocalizations that we provide for infants can signal a lot of that information. Like, I'm here, I'm looking after you, I'm paying attention to what you need and so on.

HM: Why was it so important to have such a wide range of examples to analyze?

SM: So, in this study, we wanted to be sure that we were capturing the vocalizations of people from lots and lots of different cultures and lots of different languages. So, some of the most interesting groups that we've studied are people for whom the anthropologists that was working with them in order to get to the society, they would have to hop on a boat. And these are fairly isolated groups that aren't exposed to the Internet. They don't have a lot of radio or television. And that means that the vocalizations that we're hearing in those societies are really unique to those societies. They're not influenced very much by other people.

HM: So, you mentioned that we are conveying information to infants in how we speak to them. Are we also doing so in a way that helps them learn to talk for themselves?

SM: Well, there's a whole field of developmental psycholinguistics that looks at these questions. And one of the sort of exciting things about this kind of descriptive work that we're doing, where we're just trying to get the basic facts of what the vocalizations are, is that we're providing a lot of data for that field to start figuring out what is it about higher pitch? Or what is it about this vowel space that, you know, our parents in the study are really messing around with to produce speech for infants? We don't really know the answers yet to that... to those sorts of questions. But the kind of descriptive work that we're doing here, I think, lays the groundwork for more research to figure that out.

HM: There is also another component to your research. You determined that people can usually tell just from an audio clip whether a speaker is addressing an infant or another adult. Why is that significant?

SM: Well, there's two parts to the research. As you say, the first part is just asking, what are the acoustic regularities? What is it that makes these infant-directed sounds sound infant-directed? But the other part is whether people are sensitive to those sounds. You know, and it turns out that in the citizen science experiment that we run, that we ran online, we had about 15,000 participants on the music lab lab.org who played this game. And in the game, you hear a sound, and you're just asked, you know, who's listening to this? Who… what's this… what's this sound about? And people are quite good at being able to tell when an example of speech or song is directed at an infant. And I think that suggests that… that human auditory perception is sort of wired up a little bit to pay attention to the context of the sounds that we hear from our… from our, you know, fellow human voices.

HM: What do you hope, then, that… that people… well, not just regular folks, but scientists as well, might take away from this?

SM: Well, there's a number of different implications. I mean, one of the ones that I'm most excited about has to do with the fact that infant-directed song appears to be pretty different than infant-directed speech in terms of its acoustic features. It's not the case that when we make music for babies, we're sort of doing, like, an offshoot of speech in some way. It seems to be really a different kind of vocalization. And that raises this interesting possibility that part of human psychology is sort of specially designed for music perception and music production. My lab focuses a lot on music, so that's sort of exciting for us. And it's one of the… one of the few different implications of the research that that we're… we're sort of stoked about.

HM: Some people get annoyed when they hear people talk baby talk to young children. They say they should talk to them like adults. What do you say to that?

SM: I would say that [laughing] if parents… if parents in 21 societies from every continent around the world in many different languages are doing this, there's got to be something right about it. I don't think there's any evidence from the field of psychology to suggest that there's anything negative about producing infant-directed vocalizations that are tuned up to what the infant is interested in. You know, it may not be the same as, say, reading aloud Dostoyevsky to your kids. But we also don't know what the negative effects are doing that? So… so, yeah, I would… I would suggest that it's… there's probably little risk of this being negative for kids.

HM: I don't know if you have kids of your own, but presumably, you're surrounded by… by some in your life. Do you… are you aware of how you talk with them? Or have you been aware of it before you started this research?

SM: Yeah, absolutely. We have… we have a couple of little kids. They're both under five. One of the fun things about being a developmental psychologist with kids is that you get to try out studies that you're, you know, working on in the lab at home with your kids. I was able to test out, you know, the effects of unfamiliar lullabies on our baby when, you know, she was 18, 19 hours old in the hospital, could try singing songs to her that I knew she had never heard before. And they seemed to calm her down.

HM: [both chuckle] Well, that's… that's comforting anyway, for parents, if not for the kids themselves, it gives them a little bit of quiet.

SM: [laughing] Yeah, that's right.

HM: Thank you so much. It's… it's interesting research. And it will be interesting to see where it goes, too.

SM: Happy to speak with you. Thanks for having me.

HM: Okay. Bye-bye.

SM: Bye-bye.

CH: Samuel Mehr is the director of The Music Lab at Haskins Laboratories at Yale University. We reached him in Montreal.

[dinner rock]

Part 2: Papal Apology: Métis, Archive: Hemingway Antlers

Papal Apology: Métis

Guest: Audrey Poitras

CH: He called it a "penitential pilgrimage". And today, Pope Francis began that pilgrimage in Maskwacis, Alberta, with what he referred to as a "first step": an apology for the forced assimilation of Indigenous children at residential schools. Audrey Poitras was watching the Pope's first public speech on this tour as support for local elders. She's the President of the Metis Nation of Alberta. We reached her at the Nation's headquarters in Edmonton.

HM: Audrey Poitras, how did it feel for you today to see the Pope stand up in this country and make this apology?

AUDREY POITRAS: Actually, I think it was to me, it was I think what… what people have been waiting for. Our people have been waiting for him to come to our land and make the apology. And I think it was a very genuine apology. And… and certainly, he… he expanded on it more than what he did in… in the Vatican. So, I think our citizens will be… will be pleased. We know that there's some people that are not ready for an apology yet, but there's others who are clearly waiting for an apology. So, I believe it will be well-received.

HM: So, tell me about the elders that you were watching this with. What… what struck them? What did they speak of while they were watching this?

AP: One of our survivors, an elder, clearly said, I feel free. I feel like I have…. I've finally got some recognition of wrongdoing. And we can move forward. We can move forward now. And she spoke about it was time to… we will never forget, I believe is what she said. We will never forget what happened. But it's time to move forward and support our… our… our children and grandchildren without always looking back over our shoulder.

HM: Was this Angie Crerar?

AP: It was.

HM: And you went with her, I gather, to Rome to meet the Pope earlier this year. So, you've had that experience of seeing him there and here. Does this feel like a culmination of that journey?

AP: It feels like it's another step in that journey, for sure. I was very honoured that I was asked to go as a support to her, as well as to a couple of other survivors that were there as well. And it was a… it was an amazing experience for me to be able to actually be there to support them without any other official duties to do. And listen to them. Listen to them talk prior to going to the Vatican. And then, to hear them say, we believe that we did hear an apology. And were very pleased that he also committed there to come to Canada. So, of course, this is the next step in that journey. And now, he has come here. And I think from what I understand from them is, he's also said it's not over yet. There's more work that needs to be done. And which is the very same thing that we've heard from our survivors here because we've had a few sessions with groups of survivors, who have clearly talked about different things that they wanted to see.

HM: And when you talk about that, you mentioned earlier the… the investigation that the Pope called for. And yet, we've already had the extensive investigation conducted before the Truth and Reconciliation Commission. So, do you think that… that people want to go through that process again with the Catholic Church?

AP: I don't think they specifically want to go through that same process. But I think from what we heard from some of our citizens. They want records revealed so that families can know where their children ended up? What happened to their children? Are there children, some of them in those graves? Or are those children some of the others that were… were taken somewhere else that they didn't even know of? So, there's a lot of different things. There's other people who are clearly saying it's… it's… it's not only about records, and it's not only… and the Truth and Reconciliation did an amazing job, but there's people who are now saying, we need to talk about the healing part. We need to… we need to have healing centres. We need to be able to have people… because it's intergenerational. It's not just the survivors themselves. A lot of it was carried on within families. And we also want to have some… some talk about having memorials set up where these families, where these children were, at least, if not the children's names, the families names, in recognition of what happened. And so, never to happen again is what they say. There's also a lot of different pieces.

HM: Um-hm. These records that you speak of, these have been contentious for some time. And, you know, the church has not revealed everything that they hold. This is really important to so many people. Do you think that's something that… are you hoping that the Pope will… will make that promise before he goes back to Rome?

AP: I hope he will make that promise. I hope he will make it happen because I'm… I think when I have… as I've talked with people all during this journey, because long before we ever got to… went to Rome, our leaders, our ancestors, talked about this for a long, long time. There was a lot of work that went on prior to getting even the trip to Rome. So, I think that it's… I think we are on a path where I want to believe that everyone is going to do everything they possibly can towards truth, justice, reconciliation and being able to have our next generation of Indigenous people move forward without carrying that.

HM: There is criticism of the apology from some who say that it did not go far enough. They… they want an apology from the pontiff on behalf of the church as a whole, as opposed to the actions of certain people at certain times. What do you say to that?

AP: Well, I'll say to that I've heard that from some of our people as well. And I… well, all I will say is I will continue to help in any way I can to have as many people as possible feeling like that… that they have heard what they want. And that's one of the things that I have heard as well. And we'll continue to do whatever we can to make that happen as well.

HM: So, you were in that room today with elders, survivors of the schools. What was it like for you to… to share this time with them on such an important day? Just give me a sense of the… the emotion and the profundity of that moment?

AP: Well, who I was with was very, very pleased with the apology. And clearly, similar to what you're saying you heard from Angie already, was that they were… they were pleased that there was firstly an apology in Rome and a commitment to come to Canada. And they were pleased with today's. And the other thing that I did hear from them was how pleased they were with… you know, we know that Dr. Wilton Littlechild, has done an amazing lot of work around this issue, whether from a local community perspective, from a national perspective, or from the United Nations perspective. And everyone was very pleased that he was able to hear this, that we had at least got that far to hear this apology today. And I think that's really important because we have… we do have people who have practically spent their life wanting to get things right. And that I did here today as well.

HM: What about that moment when when Littlechild placed the headdress on the Pope?

AP: Yeah, that was… I know who I was with was very emotional at that point to say that was… they were very pleased to see that.

HM: Ms. Poitras, thank you very much for joining us today.

AP: Oh, thank you.

Audrey Poitras is President of the Metis Nation of Alberta. We reached her in Edmonton.

[horns!!!]

Rogers CEO

CH: As soon as Canadians could call again, he was called on the carpet. Today in Ottawa, MPs grilled Rogers CEO Tony Staffieri about the company's recent nationwide service outage. They asked him to explain what went wrong on July 8th, and whether a lack of competition in the telecom sector played a role. Some also pushed for guaranteed rights for customers who lose access to service -- especially emergency calling through 9-1-1. Mr. Staffieri acknowledged that Rogers had failed its millions of customers during the July outage -- its second in two years -- and vowed to do better. Here is Conservative MP Tracy Gray questioning the Rogers CEO.

[sc]

TRACY GRAY: We learned that your core system going down also included 9-1-1 going down, but as well, there were four emergency alerts that did not work. One dangerous person alert by the RCMP and three Environment Canada tornado warnings. Is that correct?

TONY STAFFIERI: I'm not aware of all the specific messages that didn't go out. But as I've said, it's unacceptable that even a single emergency message did not go out. And that's what we're focused on correcting.

TG: Okay. Did you have protocols and processes in place should an outage like what occurred, so that critical services like 9-1-1 and emergency alerts were still operating?

TS: We had procedures in place to ensure that 9-1-1 and emergency essential services would switch over to an alternate carrier's network. For very specific technical reasons, that automatic transfer did not happen.

TG: So, you've had two system-wide failures within your organization… within your organization created by your organization, putting public safety at risk. So, who are losing their jobs? Or should it be you? Do you have confidence of your board?

TS: I'm accountable to ensure this doesn't happen again. And as I've said, we have already undertaken processes and actions to make changes, so that we quickly move forward with the plans that are articulated to ensure this does not happen again.

[/sc]

CH: Rogers CEO Tony Staffieri answering questions from Conservative MP Tracy Gray at the House of Commons Industry committee this afternoon.

[hip-hop beat]

Archive: Hemingway Antlers

CH: In the decades since Ernest Hemingway died, he has inspired people. Sometimes writers, who employ his flat prose style and his preference for short words and his habit of stringing phrases and sentences together for effect using the word "and". But also sometimes just men -- regular men who grow white beards and don their best khaki- or cream-coloured clothing and compete in the annual Hemingway lookalike contest in Key West, Florida. On the weekend, Jon Auvil won this year's contest. Which looks right and feels right: Mr. Auvil doesn't just look like Mr. Hemingway. He also dabbles in two of the author's passions -- fishing and writing. Back in the sixties, Ernest Hemingway inspired another writer -- Hunter S. Thompson. And not just in the literary sense. On a visit to Hemingway's home in Idaho, Mr. Thompson felt compelled to steal a set of elk antlers, somehow. He meant to return them one day. But, after his death, the task fell to his wife. In 2016, Anita Thompson spoke to As It Happens guest host Laura Lynch. Here's an encore presentation of that interview.

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LAURA LYNCH: Anita Thompson, how did it feel to finally return those antlers?

ANITA THOMPSON: Well, it felt very good, and I felt privileged and pleased to be able to go to the Hemingway House in Ketchum to meet with the Hemingway Legacy Initiative folks directing his legacy there.

LL: Can you take us back? It was 1964 when Hunter made the trip to Ketchum, Idaho, and that was three years after Mr. Hemingway's death.

AT: Yes.

LL: What was he doing there?

AT: He was writing a story to try to put himself in Hemingway's shoes because he related so deeply to Hemingway's work. And Hunter wanted to find out more. He wanted to have a feel for the area that Hemingway lived and died in in Ketchum. And so, he wrote a piece for The National Observer.

LL: What did he tell you about why he decided to take the antlers?

AT: Well, when he would talk about it, he… he was embarrassed by it because that is… Hunter is not a thief in general. He just was so caught up in the moment. And the house was moving. Mary Hemingway was not there at the time. And he made such a long journey to go and visit that he just couldn't help himself. And he was much younger then and not as wise. And he had planned to return them all these years.

LL: And did you encourage him to do that?

AT: Oh, yes. Yes. We planned to take a road trip several times and just quietly return them, but we never did.

LL: Where were they in your home?

AT: They were hanging in the garage next to the red shark. They’re massive, massive elk horns, elk antlers. And they're hanging above the 1972 red Chevy Caprice. So, they’re a beautiful complement to the car, except they weren't Hunters, so it was time to return them.

LL: Did he ever tell the Hemingways that he had them?

AT: No, he didn't. And he didn't have a personal relationship with the Hemingways, per se. I got a hold of Sean Hemingway through Simon and Schuster. And Sean had just finished editing his sixth volume of his grandfather's work, “Green Hills of Africa”. So he was pleased to get the email. And we've been in touch for about a year to get these back to him.

LL: So, what prompted you to reach out to Sean and finally do this thing that Hunter had been talking about?

AT: The reason is because I just recently purchased Owl Farm from my own trust that Hunter set up for me, so that I can turn it into a private… Hunter's home, into a private museum.

LL: Just for our listeners, Owl Farm is?

AT: Owl Farm is Hunter's home that he started moving to Aspen in the early 1960s, very slowly. And then, in 1968, purchased Owl Farm from George Stranahan, and has been… was living here ever since. And I moved in in 2000. So, I've been living here for 16 years with the antlers. And I knew that I couldn't in good… in good conscience open a private museum until those antlers were returned.

LL: So you reach out to Sean and… and what did he say? Was he upset about… about the theft?

AT: No, not at all. He was so gracious and pleased to have them back. I don't think he was even aware that Hunter had taken them.

LL: And so, as you said, there was a rather prolonged discussion about actually getting them back. [both chuckling]

AT: Because they’re huge. Like I said, it involves a shipping company. And just returning them home in my Prius was relatively easy. It was the shipping that was taking a long time.

LL: Wait a second. Am I understanding you correctly? You put these huge antlers in your little Prius.

AT: Yes, in a Prius with the seats in the back down. They do fit in the back. And it was kind of odd.

LL: You must have had a few double-takes on your journey?

AT: Double-takes, yes. They're almost the size of the car themselves.

LL: But that raises a question, how on earth did Hunter manage to steal them?

AT: We ask that all the time. When I was putting them into the car, they're almost as… the same weight as I am, about 120 pounds, I think. And I don't know how he did it. Hunter was very tall. He was six-two. He was a big, strong guy, so.

LL: Presumably, they were mounted on a wall too, which would have taken --

AT: Yes!

LL: Either brute strength or tools. [both laughing]

AT: Well, he did need some tools, I believe. We found… we believe we found the holes where Hunter unbolted them from the entrance area on the outside.

LL: This talk of theft of things from… from notable people, Ernest Hemingway's house wasn't the only place that's been a target for theft.

AT: Yes.

LL: Owl Farm, where you are, that's been broken into a few times by adoring fans. What kind of things have been stolen over the years?

AT: Well, I don't know what has been stolen over the years. We keep this place under lock and key. I have a security system, I have staff and we have gates just because fans do love it. There are a lot of people who love Hunter's work, who also get caught up in the moment. So I just try to protect the house.

LL: But now…. now you are going to open it up?

AT: Yes, I will open it up to… by appointment only guests. I kept Hunter's things just as he left them in 2005. For the first few years, I left everything in place because it brought me comfort. And then, it started… it dawned on me just how important the Hunter's home is for people who love Hunter's work. So, I decided to keep it as a museum style, keep it everything in the way he left it. It's not like my second home or vacation home. It's… it's my only home. So I'm slowly transitioning into a cabin on the property so that I can turn the house into a private museum.

LL: I wonder what you think Hunter would say about your trip to Idaho to return the antlers?

AT: He would be glad because we had planned it so many times, and I'm glad that I was able to put them in the car and finally return them for him, and for Mary Hemingway. He did take them from Mary Hemingway, Ernest's widow. So, I did it for her, really -- just to finish that little chapter.

LL: Yeah. Gosh, I guess you think about what… what Ernest Hemingway would have said about all of this. [laughing]

AT: It's about time people return those antlers. [both chuckle]

LL: Well, good on you.

AT: Well, thank you so much for calling.

LL: Yeah, good on you for doing it, Anita Thompson. Thank you.

AT: It was fun. It was a really fun project. Hemingways are wonderful.

LL: Thank you very much.

AT: Thank you. Have a great day.

LL: Bye-bye.

AT: Kay. Bye-bye.

[/sc]

CH: From our archives, that was Anita Thompson, widow of Hunter S. Thompson, speaking to As It Happens guest host Laura Lynch in 2016.

[bright piano]

Robot Chess

CH: It's only a cursory search. But if you Google "greatest quotes about chess", one from grandmaster Bobby Fischer that sticks out: "Chess is a war over the board. The object is to crush the opponent's mind." That is pretty intimidating. Even violent. But only, you know, metaphorically violent. It's about crushing minds -- not hands. Unlike a video of a recent match in Russia that's making the rounds online. The Moscow Open tournament, which took place earlier this month, featured some of the best chess players in Russia -- and some of the best chess-playing robots. One of which faces off against a seven-year-old prodigy in the clip that's gone viral. The boy is just about to make a move when suddenly the robot grabs his hand. Onlookers jump in and save the child -- but not before that robot has broken his finger. In a surprise move, the vice president of the Russian Chess Federation pointed the finger at the child -- saying he violated the safety rules, which state that competitors must wait for the robot to complete its move. Thankfully, the president of the Moscow Chess Federation was more sympathetic, saying, quote: "The robot broke the child's finger. This is, of course, bad." Unquote. The Seven-year-old is recovering, and played again the next day. But obviously, the chess-playing robot needs some retraining. Because every human knows you don't get what you want by snapping your own fingers -- let alone someone else's.

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July 25,2022 Episode Transcript

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