Former CTV news anchor Lisa LaFlamme.Facebook
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Women in journalism
Re Grey Matters: LaFlamme’s Hair Colour Was An Issue With CTV Boss (Aug. 18): After working a few jobs answering viewer calls on national, female-helmed news and current affairs shows in the 1990s, men taking issue with a woman’s right to determine her appearance comes as no surprise to me.
The calls after Barbara Frum’s historic face-to-face interview with Nelson Mandela in 1990 nearly made me lose faith in humanity. (Check it out online for the journalism, not the shoulder pads.)
CTV and CTV News head Michael Melling surely aren’t alone in their seeming ignorance and malice. Ask Jennifer Valentyne, or legions of other women in the industry.
Susie Taylor Hanna Toronto
One year later
Re A Terrible Year (Opinion, Aug. 13): Thanks to The Globe and Mail for noting the first anniversary of the Taliban takeover of Afghanistan.
I was recuperating from COVID-19 when I saw Goran Tomasevic’s photograph of a sick girl lying in a street, one arm splayed slightly beside her frail body. Something about her posture felt just as I had, flattened in my sick bed.
Me, surrounded by glasses of clean water and juice, Tylenol at the ready, hand sanitizer, alcohol wipes and N-95 masks. Her, lying alone without access to medical care, open sewage running between houses.
Knowing what we knew about the Taliban, I shake my head in disbelief at how we could have possibly let it come to this.
Catherine Lang Victoria
State of play
Re Canadian Democracy Needs Something Better Than The House Of Commons (Opinion, Aug. 13): I don’t understand why contributor Preston Manning’s proposed structure is a good idea.
Although I share his dismay about the state of our governments, I think it boils down to politicians’ overarching desire to get and hold office, with scant regard to governing well. I would think that between climate change, the Russian invasion of Ukraine and the medical crisis precipitated by the pandemic, there were enough existential threats to make all parties decide that doing their jobs is more important than re-election.
Given the lies, distortions and misrepresentations on social media, I don’t see how any group selected using that vehicle could have credibility. I don’t know whether anyone would pay attention.
Nonetheless, I applaud Mr. Manning for his idea and idealism. I haven’t the foggiest how to fix this mess.
Jim Bertram Toronto
Can Canada?
Re Europeans Have Had Their Moment. It’s Now Time For A Canadian To Lead NATO (Opinion, Aug. 13): While Canada has been a contributing NATO member for six decades, our level of effort has ebbed and flowed. In recent decades, we have not had a level of defence spending that would rank us as a first-tier NATO member.
If NATO entertains a Canadian candidacy, who would it be? Secretaries-generals have typically been heads of state from smaller nations or foreign or defence ministers from larger countries. The late Bill Graham would have been an ideal candidate. But now? Can we name one Canadian with the stature required? We are just not in the game.
I cannot imagine that our European allies would seriously turn to Canada to fill this job. And would the current government seek such a role anyway?
In my view, we will need to do a lot more in support of NATO before anyone will turn to us to provide a secretary-general.
David Collins Victoria
Indexes, a response to
Re Catalogue Models (Arts and Pursuits, Aug. 13): Indexer Lisa Fedorak has the right approach to her work, especially the concepts of understanding the material and having an idea of the audience. A non-fiction book, especially, is only as useful as its index.
I have a technical writing certificate, so I understand the value of the index. Accordingly, I paid an indexer to do my book. The result was unhelpful, so I spent 12 hours a day for seven days, before computer programs, creating a new index that better reflected the information I had gathered and the audience I had written it for.
As far as I know, my book is still proving valuable nearly 30 years after publication, and the index makes it so by opening the door to the right page. A good indexer makes an author’s ideas available and is worthy of recognition on the masthead, just like a good translator.
Virginia Baldwin Author, Pathology of Multiple Pregnancy West Vancouver
Land marked
Re Canada: From Toronto To Kelowna, The Impossible Country Never Fails To Impress (Aug. 13): I also crossed Canada and was awed by the vastness of our country and its landscapes. But I also saw how a history of erasure and violence was etched into them.
The railways were often built by taking even more land from Indigenous peoples already pushed onto small reserves (such as Whitefish Island in Sault Ste. Marie). In Thunder Bay’s Fort William Historical Park, one should question the relative size of the Indigenous village (tiny) versus the size of the reconstructed fort (very large) in the context of a fur-trade relationship that had two equal parties.
There is also a perplexing lack of official road signs for Indigenous communities and murals ignoring their modernity (such as in Little Current on Manitoulin Island). And at the turn of a road, there could be a ghostly red dress hanging in a tree, a reminder of a missing or murdered Indigenous woman.
Catherine Deluz Victoria
Nature of things
Re How To Add Nature To Your List Of Hobbies (Report on Business, Aug. 13): As a young girl working and living alone in Toronto, I looked for activities in the evening. One was a course at the University of Toronto called Nature Study. That lead to outings in parks and ravines.
On one such walk in High Park on Nov. 14, 1954, I was approached by a guy who offered his binoculars, seeing that I had none. He also offered me a ride home! I declined because I wasn’t going home.
Fortunately for me, he didn’t give up. Turns out, unbeknownst to me at the time, he was my dream guy.
He got my phone number from the club secretary. We got together. He proposed marriage in about three weeks. I gave an affirmative answer three months later, and we married in a year and a half – and lived happily ever after.
It’s not only the birds that mate, but the birders, too.
Helen Hansen Guelph, Ont.
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