Dear AB,
I trust this letter finds you recovering from what must have been an extremely emotional time in your life. I know I write on behalf of many thousands of people around the world who watched the semi-final against New Zealand, and who share a small part of your pain.
Let me assure you that sitting watching the game from a distance, and having been in that cauldron situation myself, I fully comprehend the deep down, inner-burning hurt feeling you are experiencing. I understand the anguish having not reached your final goal, but sometimes in life it isn’t all about the final win. Someone once said, “When the great scorer comes to judge, he judges not on how many runs you made but how you played the game.”
We all know that winning a World Cup event is something extremely...
Lifestyle
Hey Indiana,
Gurl. We’re writing because you’re about to do something really terrible in the name of freedom. Letting businesses deny service to anybody because of who they are is just plain wrong. We know you’re thinking, “Nobody asked for your opinion, San Francisco,” but it’s not like our city and your state don’t have a history. You gave us LGBT activist Cleve Jones, after all. (And Jim Jones, whom we can charitably overlook for now).
I know you've already taken shit from Salesforce CEO Marc Benioff and Mayor Ed Lee, both of whom said a big "hells no" to letting anyone even associated with them set foot in the Hoosier State, but please hear us out. There’s a lot wrong with enshrining discrimination against LGBT people, and not just because the world is mostly moving in the opposite...
2,924
Dear Mr van Beurden
In February, you gave a speech calling on your peers, as you put it in your title, to be “less aloof, more assertive” on climate change .
Given your prominence as CEO of Shell and the resurgence of interest in climate, your speech has rightly provoked debate. Perhaps I could set out some reflections that passed through my mind as I studied it. Most of what I am about to say applies well beyond Shell.
The title of your speech is intriguing. I have been involved in this debate for 20 years, six of them as the UK’s diplomatic envoy on climate change. During that time many adjectives have been applied to your industry - not always fairly. But nobody has ever accused you of being aloof.
Yes, there have been more strident voices. You have spoken in measured terms...
4,110
Dear Mr van Beurden
In February, you gave a speech calling on your peers, as you put it in your title, to be “less aloof, more assertive” on climate change .
Given your prominence as CEO of Shell and the resurgence of interest in climate, your speech has rightly provoked debate. Perhaps I could set out some reflections that passed through my mind as I studied it. Most of what I am about to say applies well beyond Shell.
The title of your speech is intriguing. I have been involved in this debate for 20 years, six of them as the UK’s diplomatic envoy on climate change. During that time many adjectives have been applied to your industry - not always fairly. But nobody has ever accused you of being aloof.
Yes, there have been more strident voices. You have spoken in measured terms...
1,209
My Dear Ex-Friend,
This is likely a letter that you have never in a million years expected to see. We haven't been friends in so many years that you probably thought I had never thought about you anymore. Clearly, based on the fact that I'm even writing this letter, that's not true -- with you or any of my ex-friends, ex-boyfriends or even past "enemies". In our relationships, we all leave marks on one another. Whether they are good or bad, we still remember those marks to some degree either consciously or unconsciously.
As for the two of us, it seems that we left plenty of bad marks on each other during the few years that we were friends back during our school days. Competitive. Critical. Putting each other down. Calling each other names. Whenever we were together there always...
3,920
Dear Mr. Fellegi:
Please find attached a position paper adopted by the Board of Directors of the Canadian Council on Social Development, that defines the Council’s perspective on various poverty measures in Canada and that includes recommendations regarding these measures directed to Statistics Canada and federal, provincial and territorial governments.
Given the fact that Canada does not have an official, government-mandated poverty line, there is a great deal of controversy that surrounds poverty measures in Canada and the manner in which they are reported by governments and non-governmental organizations alike. The development and launch of the Market Basket Measure promises to fuel this debate.
The CCSD felt the time was right for a thoughtful piece that would address the...
2,487
Dear Mr. Harper,
Canada is in the historically unique position to begin reversing the academic brain-drain and establish our nation as a world leader in the knowledge market through our innovation of science and technology.
I am a Canadian citizen, researcher at Harvard University and Brigham and Women’s Hospital in Boston. Like many other top-tier Canadian scientists and their spouses, my wife (a physician) and I made the difficult decision to leave our country for the United States, where higher institutional funding rates meant I was more likely to be successful. While this decision has benefited me in my career, it has meant that my ensuing industry partnerships, scientific discoveries and resultant patent have directly benefited the American economy, despite the significant...
2,766
Dear Eve Ensler,
I want to start off by saying thank you. I appreciate the time you took to reach out to me, because I know you’re incredibly busy. I know there are much more important people in this world than myself, so I appreciate you engaging in dialogue with me and my colleague Kelleigh Driscoll.
This all started because on Twitter, I addressed some issues that I had with V-Day, your organization, and the way it treated Indigenous women in Canada. I said that you are racist and dismissive of Indigenous people. You wrote to me that you were upset that I would suggest this, and not even 24 hours later you were on the Joy Behar Show referring to your chemotherapy treatment as a “Shamanistic exercise”.
Your organization took a photo of Ashley Callingbull, and used it to promote...
3,148
Dear Minister Alexander,
I would like to commend your statement, made 12 August 2013, that refugee claimants from Russia’s lesbian, gay, bisexual and trans (LGBT) community will be taken “very seriously” by Canada’s Immigration and Refugee Board. The political and social climate in Russia is increasingly hostile toward LGBT people, and Canada, as a global leader in advancing the human rights of the LGBT community, must be responsive.
I am gravely concerned about a new law that has recently been proposed at the federal level in Russia. The Associated Press has reported that, if passed, this law would make the “fact of non-traditional sexual orientation” a basis for denying LGBT people custody of their own children. This chilling bill is the latest in an escalating series of...
2,550
Dear Minister Alexander,
I would like to commend your statement, made 12 August 2013, that refugee claimants from Russia’s lesbian, gay, bisexual and trans (LGBT) community will be taken “very seriously” by Canada’s Immigration and Refugee Board. The political and social climate in Russia is increasingly hostile toward LGBT people, and Canada, as a global leader in advancing the human rights of the LGBT community, must be responsive.
I am gravely concerned about a new law that has recently been proposed at the federal level in Russia. The Associated Press has reported that, if passed, this law would make the “fact of non-traditional sexual orientation” a basis for denying LGBT people custody of their own children. This chilling bill is the latest in an escalating series of...
2,363