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The Economist, adjunct of government

Arrgh. Today’s Economist got my goat, in one minor blurb. Overall, I’m a fan of this magazine: comprehensive international coverage, top-notch hi-tech analysis, rational and relatively progressive in its outlook. So here’s the blurb, from their brief summaries page, “The world this week:”

A team of American and Iraqi epidemiologists estimated that 650,000 more people have died in Iraq since the March 2003 invasion than would have died if there had been no invasion. The Bush administration said the study was flawed.

Why does this bother me? Well, the Bush administration’s point-of-view got 20% of the words in the blurb, and is presented as if it is a meaningful counterpoint to the study. What is their beef with the methodology of the Lancet study? So far, all Bush has said is “I don’t consider it a credible report” and he declined to give a figure of his own, while admitting that innocent people have died. (Others went further: a spokesman of the British Foreign Office found fault with the methodology, saying that “It is a fairly small sample they have taken and they have extrapolated it across the country.”)

So, on that basis, they give the administration 20% of the words in a summary of the story? To me, this is particularly obnoxious coming from The Economist: these guys live and breath statistics, they understand the methodology of the Lancet study, and the in-depth article in the same issue comes out entirely in favour of the study. And yet, they feel that they have to pander to their Republican audience and dilute the science (or augment the controversy?) when they discuss it in their summary.

Chomsky described similar situations where government statements are vastly overrepresented in media articles, and went on to accuse the media of acting as an adjunct of government. The Economist? It’s definitely not there yet, but it sure made me angry.

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Angus films

Just a followup on a recent post: Yvonne tells me that Angus Adventures are showing their film in Vancouver this weekend and next (at the Hollywood and Denman Place theatres). I see they’re also coming to Ottawa, Waterloo, Calgary and Edmonton in November (but no Toronto yet). Check out the details of their tour.

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Random Toronto weirdness

You do see some strange things around Toronto. I’ve got three to report:

1) While I was moving in furniture and driving along John St. to Queen West, the car was swarmed by about 40 skateboarders, many in punk-esque white shirts and skinny ties. They stopped in the intersection, shook their boards in the air (like Critical Mass), lay on the ground and did fake midair ollies, and then took off. Strangely synchronized…

2) The morning after Nuit Blanche, Zhan, Ed, Michelle and I were having brunch at Cora’s… and saw Steven Tyler (Aerosmith) two booths down from us. Surprising that he goes for $10 brunch…

3) Paul and I were walking past Trinity-Bellwoods and saw a sack sitting next to the sidewalk. When people walked by, the sack would start yelling at them, and poke out a few puppets. Mostly, it was just surprising to find out that someone was inside the sack…

And, of course, Nuit Blanche itself – two weeks ago, from 7pm to 7am there were dozens of art exhibits, performances and galleries open for entertainment. A lot of the events seem to be taking place in public pools, which was… uh… an unusual place to see art performances. Entertaining, although the quality wasn’t as high as I’d hoped. It was great to see hordes of people streaming around the streets at 3am on a cold, rainy night!

The photo on the right was one of the performances: “How to respond in the event of an emergency.” It was a long sequence, involving some faked fracas on the sidewalk, and then the arrival of two “police” officers who proceeded to tango. I like the randomness of the idea, and the way it messes with your expectations in a public space.

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West Queen West

At the start of September, I moved into a new home in the West Queen West neighbourhood in Toronto, and I’m just starting to feel settled in that place. The first thing to know about my apartment is that it is genuinely tiny: 250 ft2, including the bathroom. Knowing that, I left all my furniture in Vancouver and bought new, space-conserving items when I arrived. But trying to combine furniture shopping with a heavy class schedule proved challenging, and I didn’t finish the process until last weekend.

The building is big, and undergoing major renovations. My suite had just been renovated before I moved in, so I got nice new appliances, kitchen and bathroom, and a fresh coat of paint. But the half-renovated/half-unrenovated situation leads to an unusual demographic mix in the building: some hipster bachelors in units like mine, and some lower-income families in the larger unrenovated apartments. It can lead to strange encounters, like when Zhan came over and we passed an elderly Chinese man in his tighty-whities in the hall, taking his garbage over to the chute. But that’s the charm of urban living, I suppose.

For all that I espouse the values of density and urbanity, I’ve only actually lived downtown once in my life, while I was in Montreal in the summer of 2001. So far, I’m quite happy with swapping semi-suburban Vancouver living for urban Toronto. I haven’t really taken advantage of the colossal range of activities around me yet, but I do appreciate the quick commute, the wide variety of groceries, and being close to many friends. Before, it was always a trip out of my way if I wanted to pick up concert tickets at Zulu, find an obscure magazine on Commercial Drive, go to a movie, or attend a meeting at city hall. Now, those stops are always on my way to other activities, and ridiculously close to boot. And yes, I’ve sacrificed a lot of space. I managed to carve my micro-apartment into two pseudo-rooms, and I have to make my bed double as a couch, and my dining table double as a desk, but it’s liveable. My building has a green inner courtyard, and I’m right next to the spacious Trinity-Bellwoods park, so I’m not really giving up much in the way of green space. And yet, I’ll really miss jogging among the giant trees of Pacific Spirit park.

West Queen West is a pretty great district. In undergrad, my universe never really extended west of Bathurst, with a few exceptions like Little Italy. Now, the renovations at the Drake and the Gladstone have put West Queen West firmly on the map, and this artist’s community is bracing itself to be overrun by gentrification… I guess that’s my role. There are dozens of galleries out here, and plenty of workshops and weird restaurants mingling in the backstreets. I’m still trying to find a good cafe, but everything else I could want is right at hand.