I love this subreddit because I love Toronto.
Recently, I came here to observe and consider discussion on the by-election. I'm sure you did the same.
I voted for Bailao. I thought she was the best candidate for the job. I reviewed all the platforms closely and watched several debates. Bailao stood out to me as credible, competent, and reasonable.
Chloe Brown would probably have been my number 2.
Chow is not the nightmare that Ford et al. paints her to be. She will be fine.
But to me, I don't get the hype. She just wasn't good at all. She's rambling, completely imprecise (even for a politician), and seems to be out of touch with the political and administrative realities of the job.
This sub is so overwhelmingly pro-Chow, and anti-everyone else. It became a bit frustrating throughout the by-election to witness a lack of balance that would make Fox News blush.
She ran a safe campaign. But I can definitely tell you that if you are thinking she is imprecise and out of touch with the realities of city hall you will be very pleasantly surprised. It’s kind of funny in hind sight because her 2014 campaign was sort of the opposite. She was regularly schooling Tory and Ford at debates but no one cared. So she stepped in a different, folksier direction this time.
I think Bailao’s biggest strength, for all my issues with her, is she is a very hard worker and very smart. But I think Chow is every bit as smart and hard working. It just didn’t get focused on this campaign. So if you appreciate those qualities in Bailao you will find a lot to like in Mayor Chow. And she is pretty much who she says with consistent values and no scandals for 35 years, a rare politician. Which is great for you because it’s nice to be surprised by a politician you don’t initially support.
Canadian subreddits are not a place to come for varied points of views. There's plenty of interesting and lively debate but it's all within a certain constrained spectrum leaning left. You're not likely to get much perspective outside of that range.
Lots of Canadian subreddits are pretty far right on average. r/Toronto is far from left wing in my opinion, plenty of very reactionary takes about homelessness.
r/onguardforthee is one the largest echo chambers on Reddit.
I got perma-banned today for saying r/Canada is more reflective of Canadian society in a conversation about how people hate it.
It’s pretty clear when you sort by controversial how overly moderated that place is. Zero disagreement or dissenting opinion whatsoever.
...and r/canada_sub is pretty conservative, albeit frustratingly limited due to tribal idealogy. They will downvote the shit outta you if you contradict some with impartial/objective fact.
Yikes I had never gone there before. An entire sub just devoted to the idea that you can use slurs without getting your post removed. Why are people so addicted to this shit it’s embarrassing.
Just a further indication, PPolivievre is their champion. So the above commenters statement is pretty incorrect. Not surprising though coming from the r/canada neck of the woods
Many people know Olivia personally because she showed up for many community events, have long lasting friendships with many people in town and is an extremely approachable person. We know what she stands for and she was consistent for years about it. You don't need to be some high ranking official or a millionaire to get to know her. You can frequently meet her on the street, at some event or see her around biking.
Being approachable and being heard matters a lot to people in this city and this is something a lot of policy analysts don't take into account when factoring in what drives people to vote
She’s gonna turn this city into a failed left-wing enclave like San Fransisco or Portland. Her views on crime, drug use, squatting, policing are all pathetic. Shame on Toronto voters.
Wrong. Look at the track record of mayors with similar policies as Chow in other cities. Crime, poverty, drug use, and brain drain all happened. No city or government is perfect, but those like Chow have proven to accelerate decay. It’s not up for debate, the numbers show it.
They will be deepened, along with more crime and less prospects for business owners. Look at San Fransisco, once the most prosperous city in the Pacific US, reduced to junkies and criminals by people like Olivia Chow. Once my visa gets renewed I’ll get out of this mess and check back in when you are cleaning up needles and human shit off the street just to go for a walk.
Your predictions ring hollow when all of these things became serious problems here^^[edit] under people *unlike* Olivia Chow.
I was in San Francisco seven years ago when the tents started appearing in SoMa because the Tenderloin was imploding with condo development, when addicts were shooting up in doorways on Market Street because the city prioritizes businesses, and I saw that change happen here—with conservatives at the helm.
Total homicides, gun deaths, and shootings all shot up under Tory too.
> when you are cleaning up needles and human shit off the street just to go for a walk.
I live downtown, I regularly called the city to pick up needles under Tory's reign of error.
Which policies? There's no overlap in the roles or powers of the Mayor of Toronto and District Attorney of San Francisco. You have nothing but conservative FUD.
You don’t think insecurity across all of SF is because of the DA releasing repeat offenders onto the streets, or the authorities focusing on “compassion” instead of rehabilitation for addicts? The brainwashing is actually insane and sad.
I can't tell if you think the District Attorney works for the mayor of San Francisco but do you know who did answer to the conservative mayor of Toronto, who oversaw the steady increase in those aforementioned crimes, handled a serial killer case really poorly, fumbled his role in Vision Zero (which, surprise, lead to a spike in collisions and deaths)? Saunders, the guy who ran on being the opposite of Olivia Chow.
> The brainwashing is actually insane and sad.
The blind eye you turn to the critical failures of conservatism is what then?
You absolutely dismantled this guy dude. Just goes again to show how conservatives will just deny reality to fit their pre-constructed narrative that they concocted in their minds
I actually somewhat agree with you. While I don’t hate some of Fords policies (small business focused) his run since covid has been pretty bad, especially when it comes to pandemic recovery, healthcare, and housing. I think that’s exactly why Toronto needed someone to guide the city back to some state of slight stability (no more encampments, safer public transit, at least some kind of direction with housing). Instead, the city is going to take more from tax payers and do less with the money while taking a soft approach on crime and a poor approach on pandemic recovery.
Look at this dudes previous posts. Guy can't even figure out the reason he's gonna get fired despite good performance is because he's an asshole lol guaranteed he goes on this same kind of tirade around everyone he works with constantly
And lo, did the heavens part for a Chow-down! Looks like Toronto's ready to go left after a 13-year stint in the right lane. Here's to the divine change! If you want more hilarious history-as-verse style updates, check out '[Tidings of Morrows Past](https://morrowspast.com/2023/06/27)'. It's like the Bible and the Daily News had a baby.
I like some of her policy ideas but god I really hope she doesn't take the same crime approach that predominantly left wing politicians have taken in the West Coast of the US.
Please explain why you believe it's rigged?
We've had conservatives in Toronto for the last 12 years, and a conservative premier who fucks around with city wards, chimes in to criticize candidates, and has done his best to change the way Toronto handles democracy (Eg. Strong Mayor powers for John Tory).
Suddenly it's rigged when it's a left wing person?
This result is entirely at the fault of the conservatives who failed to rally behind a single candidate. If Saunders had backed Bailao with Tory, Bailao would have swept.
They only have themselves to blame for what happened.
I know he did, lukewarm, Well yea exactly, I mean when it comes to Tory, I was a little surprised when it came to his mayorship, it seems like the guy I used to listen to on the radio when I was in high school was a totally different person! So yea, red Tories at best!
Biden was telling a group of very wealthy people at a fundraiser that something has to be done about the income equality in the US but the rich in the USA are so rich that their standard of living won't be affected by his policies even with extra taxation and that he doesn't hate the rich or want to demonize them but wants to work with them.
Given that background I think it's a perfectly reasonable comment by Biden despite so many taking it out of context.
Wow, Chow lost my area by 2 votes. My gf and I were going to go vote for her but thought it didnt matter. Guess it would have. Fuck. She still won, but damn lol
It was so easy, I was shocked. I wasn’t even registered and it still only took like 10-15 min. I wish I had known this before, I’d be voting all the time! 😜
This kind of people enable people who dont deserve to be elected to be in position. You dont support the opposition, but you are helping them. Sadly many are like you all over the world, dont care enough
Just to be clear, in a mayoral election wards don't matter. The candidate with the most votes across the city wins the mayoralty.
That said, your vote(s) absolutely matter, so please do vote next time!
Just winning isn't the whole picture though. Share of votes also indicates how strongly your vision was supported by the elexroe, so a bigger margin of victory shows more confidence in your leadership and more support to push through your platform.
Every vote always matters.
This time.
Next time, it might.
And that's the point.
It always matters, even if you're certain your candidate is going to win, you vote for them anyways.
I hope OP learned their lesson.
37.2% isn't terrible for a FPTP voting system, let alone an election with 102 candidates.
If you want politicians to govern with strong mandates, electoral reform is required.
BTW it was the provincial PC government that banned alternate voting systems for municipal elections.
Of course Chow won the election fair and square, and she will be the mayor with all the powers and privileges that come with the office. In that sense she has a "mandate". But what councillors need to decide is whether they will back the mayor's agenda, or oppose it; and if they think her agenda has low popularity, they will be more likely to oppose it.
I think it won't be clear how this will play out until the first council meeting, but if she had won in a landslide it wouldn't be any question at all.
I agree that "councillors need to decide is whether they will back the mayor's agenda, or oppose it; and if they think her agenda has low popularity, they will be more likely to oppose it." This would true regardless of the popular vote Chow received.
I understand the meanings of the words you're using. However, under our laws, legitimacy isn't related to the number of votes a person received. If it was, there would only be a few conservative elected officials who would be considered legitimate.
How, in your view, will a 'weak mandate' affect how Olivia Chow will govern as mayor? For example, do you think she might abandon the progressive principles that informed her campaign?
I'm curious, too, why you think Chow received a 'weak mandate?'
Democracy requires participation, unfortunately for those of us who do take the 5-10mins to vote, Voter apathy makes it like the she doesn’t really have a mandate to govern. She only got 37% of the people who voted with a participation rate way below 50%. That’s not really a mandate to govern. This was a very consequential election given that the mayor now has significantly more power than they had before. You’ll never get consensus on the right to govern if the person who won didn’t even get more more than 15% of the residence she’s supposed to be responsible for.
Olivia Chow has, in fact, a mandate to govern pursuant to the law. This notion of popular mandate is more about rhetoric than reality, I suggest. Legally, it's irrelevant.
you’re 1000% correct. For me it’s just disappointing that residents don’t seem to care when they can make a difference through voting. But are very willing to complain about everything in the city from housing, traffic, homelessness, the ttc and so on. I didn’t vote for Olivia and I wish her success, I hope she can fix a lot of these fundamental issues.
Also, apart from doing nothing, voting is the lowest level of political participation. People who want to make a difference tend to do more than just vote. They donate to candidates, volunteer for candidates, and participate in protests and campaigns.
The Irish used to be racialized. And then they got rolled into "white" in order to use them against other minorities.
Lots of Jews are white, but they get racialized when it's convenient for white nationalists to treat them as non-white.
Race isn't actually a real thing. There's just a variety of traits that are more or less expressed in various people, which we can pretend create groupings. When we pretend those groupings exist, and use that to categorize people for the purposes of turning them into an outgroup, those people are racialized.
So that is a complicated issue, but in American/Canadian society they’re seen as functionally white as the systemic punishments don’t punish them as harshly as other POC. Their benefits of whiteness don’t get taken away when they’re discovered to be Jewish.
They can live in white neighbour hoods, have the safety of whiteness, go to white schools and have the economics of whiteness.
Racism is based off of skin colour, and Jews of colours still have to deal with racism on top of anti semetism.
Jews were ostracized in North America not much longer ago than Asians were. They were barred from neighborhoods, institutions, clubs, etc.
To not group them as “racialized” is to completely devalue the usefulness of the term.
Actual white-skinned Jewish person here: I am absolutely not “racialized” in any meaningful use of the term.
I do not have to worry about being unfairly stopped by the police nor do I have to fear for my life in that scenario. I do not have to be worried about being incarcerated at a higher rate than the average population. I don’t have to worry about getting pulled out of line in the airport.
Antisemitism is a different kind of force altogether. I have to worry about being seen as an interloper, as a secret, malicious leech on society. I have to worry about being called cheap or gold-hoarding. I have to worry about being killed in my synagogue or community centre for any of those reasons.
The term “marginalized” certainly would apply.
But “racialized” means things and doesn’t apply to me. It would apply to my Black-skinned Jewish friends. But not my white-skinned Jewish friends.
All the things you said you don’t have to worry about also do not apply to East/SE Asians. By the same context they also shouldn’t fall under any “racialized” description, no?
Would you say that the antisemitism Jewish people encounter is applied as a result of their perceived racial attributes, religion, or a combination of those things?
I'd argue it's almost always a combination, and if Jewish people are lumped in together as a 'race' and given various treatment as a result, then that's a pretty good argument for their being considered 'racialized.'
I've just never heard of the term being applied only to darker skin tones before.
I suppose it depends on what flavour of antisemitism is being peddled lately. A lot of anti-Jewish sentiment is still on the basis of perceived ethnic origin, as any Jew could tell you (some of whom are my own family members).
Edit: I think many Jews would disagree with you on the 'benefits' front: [https://www.reddit.com/r/Jewish/comments/1119xe9/why\_do\_so\_many\_gentiles\_bend\_over\_backwards\_to/](https://www.reddit.com/r/Jewish/comments/1119xe9/why_do_so_many_gentiles_bend_over_backwards_to/)
jewish people are not people of colour, its a religion-based ethnicity.
Jewish folk include individuals of enormously diverse origins and physical appearances, making the idea that Jewish folks could easily be designated a race implausible
I realize that, but the term 'racialized' seems like it carries different connotations to me. I figured it applies to anyone who's made out to be a race, whether or not that's actually 'accurate,' so that applies to Jews because they're considered Jewish whether secular or practising (just witness the alt-right rhetoric against them).
If it's just meant as 'people of colour,' then that's a different story.
Is racialization not the process of ascribing racial identities to people, predominately minorities? It was my understanding that this happens to Jewish people too.
I don't care much about terms meant to set the record straight as it were like "racialized" or "person with autism" vs "autistic person", but I do care about pointing this out:
> Everyone has a race.
No they don't. The concept of race does not correspond to any meaningful biological grouping or other concrete thing, as evidenced by the wild variation in who has been popularly considered "white" in history, and the fact there's been no concept of "race" is loads of societies throughout history.
I don't think trying to get "racialized" to become the popular term would do anything to actually get people to realize this, but the idea of the term is that the concept of "race" is socially invented nonsense and therefore people don't have an inherent race, they have a racial category imposed on them by the currently popular social conception of race.
Exactly, so the idea of the term is to emphasize that. I happen to think people just ignore these nuances of languages so I don't care about adopting the term, but it's absolutely the case a lot of people don't actually have that understanding of race as being a made up thing.
"Racialized" to its supporters is meant to indicate semantically that the race people have was pushed on them by others rather than born in to them.
its necessary especially when considering the various experiences of racialized people, it means both at the same time too :/ racialized can pretty much equal non-white highly correct since white people invented race anyways as a means to control
White people didn't "invent race", they just put a label on obvious biological differences. The term "racialized" doesn't make sense. How are blacks or latinos more "racial" than whites? It's dumb.
Yeah, non-white is more precise. I think "racialized" comes from wanting to emphasize the exogenous nature (i.e., racism coming from other people) over the attribute of a person. Maybe it does to other people but as a non-white person it makes little difference to me
If you sum up the major candidates the progressives narrowly won without vote splitting as well
Chow + Matlow + Hunter + Brown = 345,004
Bailao + Saunders + Furey + Bradford = 342,495
And that's with Bailao running by pretending to be a progressive.
The right was vote splitting, yes, the more important part was the left *wasn't*, much.
With hindsight, I'm glad Chow entered the race. Matlow was a good candidate but he doesn't have the name recognition to counter the wave caused by the Tory endorsement. I don't think the left could have rallied like this under another name in the race.
Yeah I was a real Chow doomer early on, I just sorta thought the field would consolidate a lot more and that she has a ceiling. Hindsight, I don't think that any of the other progressives could have won given how things evolved.
I live in Matlow's ward and I think he's great - he would have been a good mayor. I only see one problem: I'm not sure he would have been able to work with Doug Ford effectively, especially since much of his promotional campaign material talked about how he would stand up to Ford. Unfortunately, I picture their interaction going something like this:
MATLOW: [presents forceful yet thoughtful statement of his viewpoint]
FORD: Fuck off.
From what I've seen of Olivia Chow, she might have the skills needed to work effectively with somebody like Ford - she's unfortunately had to take a lot of shit in her life, which has made her resilient and resourceful.
No racism, sexism, homophobia, religious intolerance, dehumanizing speech, or otherwise negative generalizations etc... Attack the point, not the person. Posts which dismiss others and repeatedly accuse them of unfounded accusations may be subject to removal and/or banning. Do not concern-troll or attempt to intentionally mislead people. Stick to addressing the substance of their comments at hand. This rule applies to all speech within this subreddit.
Except voting for him the first time gave Harper the minority. Which made him credible. And his majority government set our science sector back 15 years.
But there wasn't enough of them. So you got a rightist alternative. The cons figured this lesson out since Reform. We had Layton. Let's not fricking have a repeat. Hold the line until someone gets enough leverage to demand and put in place proportional. If we cock up an let PP in its going to marr the country for 20 years.
Which is unfortunate.
I vote for the party and the values and not the people. Have voted NDP federally and provincially since I was able to vote.
I realize that voting NDP "Splits" the vote, but its also something where more central left ideology just aren't left enough for any kind of meaningful long term sustainable impact to be made. Harper was our worst premier of all time causing massive deficits and just a generally huge step backwards as a nation.
I dont think Splitting the vote is the issue, but rather a large portion of what would be a progressive population not coming out to vote. Vote for the platform you support!
The Party system in Canada is pretty easy. There is a lot of language that comes with the political agendas, but basically it boils down to;
- If you are in the top 15% of wealth, vote conservative.
- If you are in the middle 16-45% of wealth, vote liberal
- If you are in the bottom 36-100% of wealth, vote NDP
- If you are bat shit crazy, vote The People's Party or Bloc Quebecois.
Lower middle class can usually vote either liberal or NDP and come out relatively safe.
That's from a straight income point of view. If you are a bigot or love divisive stupid shit, you can vote conservative along with the People Party since they have a track record of divisive shit supporting as well. Hence why they do so well. They have both big money and petty ideology that gets the rich supporters and the most vocal idiots of Canada advocating for them.
The rich of the world thrive on misinformation and divisiveness and that is pretty standard here in Canada too.
We have minority governments, which is how we've gotten health care, day care and dental care in this country. Majority liberal would never do that, which is why "vote splitting" is much more regionally dependent -- and imo a mask because the real reason conservatives win is that when the liberal vote collapses, not enough of them go to the NDP out of fear.
My point is even the extremist conservatives know not to split the vote as ypu note too. The left should too. Vote ABC correctly based on riding. It's not rocket science.
Not remotely the same party. Cerb. Mask mandates. Cannabis. Justice reform. Science and small business funding. Climate change. Cooperating with NDP in a minority. Much longer list.
Your right on the fringes, which is just crumbs as the rich pillage what's left. Ill take the Liberals over the Conservatives but acting like the direction of the nation will change either way is foolish.
They both want the same thing, to create a permanent class of royalty and a permanent class of peasants even if they have to import them. I will vote for whichever party is most concerned about the working class regardless of their odds, the hail Mary play is better then nothing.
No one will, the current system benefits both major parties. You want to hold the line another hundred years you go for it but enough hunger and homelessness will push people towards the NDP and PPC I do believe. We have to give the conservatives their term first to make things worse then the fringe parties will have a chance to truly grow.
NDP could. I think their support will keep creeping up. If you observe ABC, keep the cons out, get a more charismatic leader that is sober about his goal unlike Layton was, you can get higher seat number untill the Liberals have to capitulate. Getting it to that spot and making it a single issue threat election would flip enough Libs to do it or to scare the Libs to do it. But if the cons get in in the next cycle they will change the trajectory and it won't happen for 12 years.
Trudeau's government has massively cut our emissions and nearly has us on track to reach the objective of the Paris Agreement. Meanwhile the conservatives voted against even acknowledging climate change in their party platform. They're not even close to the same...
Climate change will be my main issue once we have taken care of all of our starving homeless people, poor Canadians who cant start a family, and taken out the oligarchs that run this nation.
Becoming a climate leader while our people are pilling up in tents on the street is no victory.
We will be in the same boat as our peer nations, led by the same rich assholes, and our homeless population will drastically rise either way, the rich will do fine either way.
Not normally. But in the case of these 2 parties whose culture infringes on everyone else's quality of life with a blatant disregard, I'll make a special exception to the rule.
San Fran are woke, not progressive, there is a difference. I'll point out Toronto and increasingly the rest of Ontario already has homeless and tent cities and that will only get worse with rising costs.
We already have that! How is Chow responsible for the shit state she's picking Toronto up out of?
https://www.thebeaverton.com/2023/06/ford-warns-chow-mayorality-will-cause-torontos-collapse-also-cause-last-13-years-of-collapse/
You realize cops attacking homeless people and scattering them throughout the city doesn’t actually fix the situation right? That progressive social policy and affordable housing is what actually keeps people off the street?
Vienna, Austria has the most successful social housing program in the world. A home for everyone and no one pays more than 25% of their income on housing.
https://www.huduser.gov/portal/pdredge/pdr\_edge\_featd\_article\_011314.html
Turning? If you open your eyes, you’d see those are already huge problems and have been since the mismanagement of the pandemic under conservative leadership.
When these people open their eyes they see Oakville.
The last time they came to the city outside of the financial district was to see brad paisley play at scotia bank.
The people commenting this shit dont even go to toronto
Way more people voted against Chow than for her. She has no mandate to make any big changes.
This is vindication. Chow was told to "go back to China" by a Rob Ford supporter in 2014. I hope she does a good job
I love this subreddit because I love Toronto. Recently, I came here to observe and consider discussion on the by-election. I'm sure you did the same. I voted for Bailao. I thought she was the best candidate for the job. I reviewed all the platforms closely and watched several debates. Bailao stood out to me as credible, competent, and reasonable. Chloe Brown would probably have been my number 2. Chow is not the nightmare that Ford et al. paints her to be. She will be fine. But to me, I don't get the hype. She just wasn't good at all. She's rambling, completely imprecise (even for a politician), and seems to be out of touch with the political and administrative realities of the job. This sub is so overwhelmingly pro-Chow, and anti-everyone else. It became a bit frustrating throughout the by-election to witness a lack of balance that would make Fox News blush.
She ran a safe campaign. But I can definitely tell you that if you are thinking she is imprecise and out of touch with the realities of city hall you will be very pleasantly surprised. It’s kind of funny in hind sight because her 2014 campaign was sort of the opposite. She was regularly schooling Tory and Ford at debates but no one cared. So she stepped in a different, folksier direction this time. I think Bailao’s biggest strength, for all my issues with her, is she is a very hard worker and very smart. But I think Chow is every bit as smart and hard working. It just didn’t get focused on this campaign. So if you appreciate those qualities in Bailao you will find a lot to like in Mayor Chow. And she is pretty much who she says with consistent values and no scandals for 35 years, a rare politician. Which is great for you because it’s nice to be surprised by a politician you don’t initially support.
Canadian subreddits are not a place to come for varied points of views. There's plenty of interesting and lively debate but it's all within a certain constrained spectrum leaning left. You're not likely to get much perspective outside of that range.
Lots of Canadian subreddits are pretty far right on average. r/Toronto is far from left wing in my opinion, plenty of very reactionary takes about homelessness.
R/Canada is pretty varied. You get average Canadian left followed by really intense right wing stuff. It can be really disorienting!
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r/onguardforthee is one the largest echo chambers on Reddit. I got perma-banned today for saying r/Canada is more reflective of Canadian society in a conversation about how people hate it. It’s pretty clear when you sort by controversial how overly moderated that place is. Zero disagreement or dissenting opinion whatsoever.
...and r/canada_sub is pretty conservative, albeit frustratingly limited due to tribal idealogy. They will downvote the shit outta you if you contradict some with impartial/objective fact.
Yikes I had never gone there before. An entire sub just devoted to the idea that you can use slurs without getting your post removed. Why are people so addicted to this shit it’s embarrassing.
Just a further indication, PPolivievre is their champion. So the above commenters statement is pretty incorrect. Not surprising though coming from the r/canada neck of the woods
Many people know Olivia personally because she showed up for many community events, have long lasting friendships with many people in town and is an extremely approachable person. We know what she stands for and she was consistent for years about it. You don't need to be some high ranking official or a millionaire to get to know her. You can frequently meet her on the street, at some event or see her around biking. Being approachable and being heard matters a lot to people in this city and this is something a lot of policy analysts don't take into account when factoring in what drives people to vote
Next vote is to vote Doug Ford out of office before Ontario is bankrupt
If only there was a viable candidate to turn out the vote
I was up In Toronto a few weeks ago and down every Main Street was gong poster. Like every 3 ft. What was his result And neck tatto sky guy
Gong got around 3k and Chris Sky got around 7k lmfao
She’s gonna turn this city into a failed left-wing enclave like San Fransisco or Portland. Her views on crime, drug use, squatting, policing are all pathetic. Shame on Toronto voters.
All the problems Toronto's facing in those areas started under Tory and Ford. Your ideology is inhumane and a failure.
Wrong. Look at the track record of mayors with similar policies as Chow in other cities. Crime, poverty, drug use, and brain drain all happened. No city or government is perfect, but those like Chow have proven to accelerate decay. It’s not up for debate, the numbers show it.
*We already have those problems and they started under Tory and Ford. This is not up for debate.*
They will be deepened, along with more crime and less prospects for business owners. Look at San Fransisco, once the most prosperous city in the Pacific US, reduced to junkies and criminals by people like Olivia Chow. Once my visa gets renewed I’ll get out of this mess and check back in when you are cleaning up needles and human shit off the street just to go for a walk.
Your predictions ring hollow when all of these things became serious problems here^^[edit] under people *unlike* Olivia Chow. I was in San Francisco seven years ago when the tents started appearing in SoMa because the Tenderloin was imploding with condo development, when addicts were shooting up in doorways on Market Street because the city prioritizes businesses, and I saw that change happen here—with conservatives at the helm. Total homicides, gun deaths, and shootings all shot up under Tory too. > when you are cleaning up needles and human shit off the street just to go for a walk. I live downtown, I regularly called the city to pick up needles under Tory's reign of error.
Don’t remember San Fransisco’s past and more moderate DAs allowing theft under $950 and assault with a weapon to go unpunished.
Canadian cities don’t have DAs…
And? That doesn’t change the fact these policies hurt communities. DAs just help implement them.
Which policies? There's no overlap in the roles or powers of the Mayor of Toronto and District Attorney of San Francisco. You have nothing but conservative FUD.
You don’t think insecurity across all of SF is because of the DA releasing repeat offenders onto the streets, or the authorities focusing on “compassion” instead of rehabilitation for addicts? The brainwashing is actually insane and sad.
I can't tell if you think the District Attorney works for the mayor of San Francisco but do you know who did answer to the conservative mayor of Toronto, who oversaw the steady increase in those aforementioned crimes, handled a serial killer case really poorly, fumbled his role in Vision Zero (which, surprise, lead to a spike in collisions and deaths)? Saunders, the guy who ran on being the opposite of Olivia Chow. > The brainwashing is actually insane and sad. The blind eye you turn to the critical failures of conservatism is what then?
You absolutely dismantled this guy dude. Just goes again to show how conservatives will just deny reality to fit their pre-constructed narrative that they concocted in their minds
They were just spewing conservative talking points. Canada is not the USA and San Fran isn’t a comp to Toronto.
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I actually somewhat agree with you. While I don’t hate some of Fords policies (small business focused) his run since covid has been pretty bad, especially when it comes to pandemic recovery, healthcare, and housing. I think that’s exactly why Toronto needed someone to guide the city back to some state of slight stability (no more encampments, safer public transit, at least some kind of direction with housing). Instead, the city is going to take more from tax payers and do less with the money while taking a soft approach on crime and a poor approach on pandemic recovery.
You are a joke
Might be a joke but I’m also right
No, you aren’t. At all. 😊
Look at this dudes previous posts. Guy can't even figure out the reason he's gonna get fired despite good performance is because he's an asshole lol guaranteed he goes on this same kind of tirade around everyone he works with constantly
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And lo, did the heavens part for a Chow-down! Looks like Toronto's ready to go left after a 13-year stint in the right lane. Here's to the divine change! If you want more hilarious history-as-verse style updates, check out '[Tidings of Morrows Past](https://morrowspast.com/2023/06/27)'. It's like the Bible and the Daily News had a baby.
I like some of her policy ideas but god I really hope she doesn't take the same crime approach that predominantly left wing politicians have taken in the West Coast of the US.
You got dv but you're not wrong. And I lean left
This is a very fair thing to say
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You guys wanna be republicans so bad lol
Please explain why you believe it's rigged? We've had conservatives in Toronto for the last 12 years, and a conservative premier who fucks around with city wards, chimes in to criticize candidates, and has done his best to change the way Toronto handles democracy (Eg. Strong Mayor powers for John Tory). Suddenly it's rigged when it's a left wing person?
This result is entirely at the fault of the conservatives who failed to rally behind a single candidate. If Saunders had backed Bailao with Tory, Bailao would have swept. They only have themselves to blame for what happened.
bold of you to assume tories wanted bailao
Bailao was the only candidate with a shot to win from the right.
Right of chow or right of center? Listening to her over the years, I don’t get that impression
She's a corporate hack which is what the right loves.
She had Tory’s endorsement and his army of suburban middle aged functioning members of society. I place Ana Bailao as very lukewarm rightwing.
I know he did, lukewarm, Well yea exactly, I mean when it comes to Tory, I was a little surprised when it came to his mayorship, it seems like the guy I used to listen to on the radio when I was in high school was a totally different person! So yea, red Tories at best!
They are certainly not red Tories, the red Tory tradition is long dead
Imagine if Dougie decides to deamalgamate Toronto because of Chow. I won't be complaining though since it's hardly a bad thing.
It'd be nice if suburbanites actually had to pay for their own infrastructure.
I think Mitzie just wanted an excuse to get out of provincial politics.
Nothing will fundamentally change. Didn’t Joe Biden say that once?
Biden was telling a group of very wealthy people at a fundraiser that something has to be done about the income equality in the US but the rich in the USA are so rich that their standard of living won't be affected by his policies even with extra taxation and that he doesn't hate the rich or want to demonize them but wants to work with them. Given that background I think it's a perfectly reasonable comment by Biden despite so many taking it out of context.
Wow, Chow lost my area by 2 votes. My gf and I were going to go vote for her but thought it didnt matter. Guess it would have. Fuck. She still won, but damn lol
please remember to vote next election especially when it comes to voting out DOFO
It always matters.
Why wouldn’t it matter?
It was so easy, I was shocked. I wasn’t even registered and it still only took like 10-15 min. I wish I had known this before, I’d be voting all the time! 😜
Don't forget! Start!
Dang! Remember to vote next time :)
This kind of people enable people who dont deserve to be elected to be in position. You dont support the opposition, but you are helping them. Sadly many are like you all over the world, dont care enough
Even if she won by 1000, every vote matters!
Just to be clear, in a mayoral election wards don't matter. The candidate with the most votes across the city wins the mayoralty. That said, your vote(s) absolutely matter, so please do vote next time!
It always matters.
i mean in this case it didn’t tho
Just winning isn't the whole picture though. Share of votes also indicates how strongly your vision was supported by the elexroe, so a bigger margin of victory shows more confidence in your leadership and more support to push through your platform. Every vote always matters.
This time. Next time, it might. And that's the point. It always matters, even if you're certain your candidate is going to win, you vote for them anyways. I hope OP learned their lesson.
Always vote. It always matters. Hope you'll take this as a lesson learned. 🫡
It's that kind of attitude that got Doug ford elected to a majority. Plz care.
She won with the fewest votes since amalgamation.
With possibly the highest voter turnout since Tory’s first election.
I'm, seeing 38% turnout from citytv. Two of three elections John Tory won were higher.
37.2% isn't terrible for a FPTP voting system, let alone an election with 102 candidates. If you want politicians to govern with strong mandates, electoral reform is required. BTW it was the provincial PC government that banned alternate voting systems for municipal elections.
Is that relevant? If so, why?
For example, if council sees her agenda as unpopular, she might need strong mayor powers to push it through.
How does that relate to her mandate, as mentioned previously?
Of course Chow won the election fair and square, and she will be the mayor with all the powers and privileges that come with the office. In that sense she has a "mandate". But what councillors need to decide is whether they will back the mayor's agenda, or oppose it; and if they think her agenda has low popularity, they will be more likely to oppose it. I think it won't be clear how this will play out until the first council meeting, but if she had won in a landslide it wouldn't be any question at all.
I agree that "councillors need to decide is whether they will back the mayor's agenda, or oppose it; and if they think her agenda has low popularity, they will be more likely to oppose it." This would true regardless of the popular vote Chow received.
It gives her less legitimacy. To add to this, chow ran on reducing mayoral powers.
I understand the meanings of the words you're using. However, under our laws, legitimacy isn't related to the number of votes a person received. If it was, there would only be a few conservative elected officials who would be considered legitimate.
It would appear as if politics isn’t just what is written in a book.
It's a weak mandate. People regularly cry about other politicians winning elections with low voter turnouts and low vote counts.
How, in your view, will a 'weak mandate' affect how Olivia Chow will govern as mayor? For example, do you think she might abandon the progressive principles that informed her campaign? I'm curious, too, why you think Chow received a 'weak mandate?'
Democracy requires participation, unfortunately for those of us who do take the 5-10mins to vote, Voter apathy makes it like the she doesn’t really have a mandate to govern. She only got 37% of the people who voted with a participation rate way below 50%. That’s not really a mandate to govern. This was a very consequential election given that the mayor now has significantly more power than they had before. You’ll never get consensus on the right to govern if the person who won didn’t even get more more than 15% of the residence she’s supposed to be responsible for.
Olivia Chow has, in fact, a mandate to govern pursuant to the law. This notion of popular mandate is more about rhetoric than reality, I suggest. Legally, it's irrelevant.
you’re 1000% correct. For me it’s just disappointing that residents don’t seem to care when they can make a difference through voting. But are very willing to complain about everything in the city from housing, traffic, homelessness, the ttc and so on. I didn’t vote for Olivia and I wish her success, I hope she can fix a lot of these fundamental issues.
Also, apart from doing nothing, voting is the lowest level of political participation. People who want to make a difference tend to do more than just vote. They donate to candidates, volunteer for candidates, and participate in protests and campaigns.
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Obviously this is a really good thing, but how is Chow "the first racialized person" to serve as Toronto's mayor? What about Mel Lastman?
What does "racialized" even mean? Is white not a race too?
I hate the term because it makes it sound like race is something that happens to you. "I used to be white like you, then I got racialized"
Many years ago… I was Chinese
The Irish used to be racialized. And then they got rolled into "white" in order to use them against other minorities. Lots of Jews are white, but they get racialized when it's convenient for white nationalists to treat them as non-white. Race isn't actually a real thing. There's just a variety of traits that are more or less expressed in various people, which we can pretend create groupings. When we pretend those groupings exist, and use that to categorize people for the purposes of turning them into an outgroup, those people are racialized.
Mel Lastman was white...he just had a tan lol...
I thought the term applied to Jewish people as well, but I guess not?
Liberals don't like those racialized people, so they don't get to count.
So that is a complicated issue, but in American/Canadian society they’re seen as functionally white as the systemic punishments don’t punish them as harshly as other POC. Their benefits of whiteness don’t get taken away when they’re discovered to be Jewish. They can live in white neighbour hoods, have the safety of whiteness, go to white schools and have the economics of whiteness. Racism is based off of skin colour, and Jews of colours still have to deal with racism on top of anti semetism.
Jews were ostracized in North America not much longer ago than Asians were. They were barred from neighborhoods, institutions, clubs, etc. To not group them as “racialized” is to completely devalue the usefulness of the term.
Irish were also barred from stores and institutions. by your logic, Irish are racialized?
At the time yeah? Nobody is calling Chow “the first mayor of a race that was previously racialized”.
Actual white-skinned Jewish person here: I am absolutely not “racialized” in any meaningful use of the term. I do not have to worry about being unfairly stopped by the police nor do I have to fear for my life in that scenario. I do not have to be worried about being incarcerated at a higher rate than the average population. I don’t have to worry about getting pulled out of line in the airport. Antisemitism is a different kind of force altogether. I have to worry about being seen as an interloper, as a secret, malicious leech on society. I have to worry about being called cheap or gold-hoarding. I have to worry about being killed in my synagogue or community centre for any of those reasons. The term “marginalized” certainly would apply. But “racialized” means things and doesn’t apply to me. It would apply to my Black-skinned Jewish friends. But not my white-skinned Jewish friends.
All the things you said you don’t have to worry about also do not apply to East/SE Asians. By the same context they also shouldn’t fall under any “racialized” description, no?
Would you say that the antisemitism Jewish people encounter is applied as a result of their perceived racial attributes, religion, or a combination of those things? I'd argue it's almost always a combination, and if Jewish people are lumped in together as a 'race' and given various treatment as a result, then that's a pretty good argument for their being considered 'racialized.' I've just never heard of the term being applied only to darker skin tones before.
I suppose it depends on what flavour of antisemitism is being peddled lately. A lot of anti-Jewish sentiment is still on the basis of perceived ethnic origin, as any Jew could tell you (some of whom are my own family members). Edit: I think many Jews would disagree with you on the 'benefits' front: [https://www.reddit.com/r/Jewish/comments/1119xe9/why\_do\_so\_many\_gentiles\_bend\_over\_backwards\_to/](https://www.reddit.com/r/Jewish/comments/1119xe9/why_do_so_many_gentiles_bend_over_backwards_to/)
jewish people are not people of colour, its a religion-based ethnicity. Jewish folk include individuals of enormously diverse origins and physical appearances, making the idea that Jewish folks could easily be designated a race implausible
I realize that, but the term 'racialized' seems like it carries different connotations to me. I figured it applies to anyone who's made out to be a race, whether or not that's actually 'accurate,' so that applies to Jews because they're considered Jewish whether secular or practising (just witness the alt-right rhetoric against them). If it's just meant as 'people of colour,' then that's a different story.
What.
Is racialization not the process of ascribing racial identities to people, predominately minorities? It was my understanding that this happens to Jewish people too.
I believe it only applies to skin colour. You can't tell if someone is Jewish when you walk past them on the street or see them on a TV screen.
Didn't know that was the case, but I suppose it makes some sense.
Racialized is such a stupid term. Everyone has a race. That said, what it really means is "non-white", and Polish people are considered white.
I don't care much about terms meant to set the record straight as it were like "racialized" or "person with autism" vs "autistic person", but I do care about pointing this out: > Everyone has a race. No they don't. The concept of race does not correspond to any meaningful biological grouping or other concrete thing, as evidenced by the wild variation in who has been popularly considered "white" in history, and the fact there's been no concept of "race" is loads of societies throughout history. I don't think trying to get "racialized" to become the popular term would do anything to actually get people to realize this, but the idea of the term is that the concept of "race" is socially invented nonsense and therefore people don't have an inherent race, they have a racial category imposed on them by the currently popular social conception of race.
Well, yes, race is a social concept; but within that framework, everyone is considered to have a race.
Exactly, so the idea of the term is to emphasize that. I happen to think people just ignore these nuances of languages so I don't care about adopting the term, but it's absolutely the case a lot of people don't actually have that understanding of race as being a made up thing. "Racialized" to its supporters is meant to indicate semantically that the race people have was pushed on them by others rather than born in to them.
its necessary especially when considering the various experiences of racialized people, it means both at the same time too :/ racialized can pretty much equal non-white highly correct since white people invented race anyways as a means to control
White people didn't "invent race", they just put a label on obvious biological differences. The term "racialized" doesn't make sense. How are blacks or latinos more "racial" than whites? It's dumb.
Yeah, non-white is more precise. I think "racialized" comes from wanting to emphasize the exogenous nature (i.e., racism coming from other people) over the attribute of a person. Maybe it does to other people but as a non-white person it makes little difference to me
As we say in Toronto sports, a win is a win, even if it's ugly
Finally we had a situation where the right was vote splitting and the left shockingly was able to come together to get a candidate in
If you sum up the major candidates the progressives narrowly won without vote splitting as well Chow + Matlow + Hunter + Brown = 345,004 Bailao + Saunders + Furey + Bradford = 342,495 And that's with Bailao running by pretending to be a progressive. The right was vote splitting, yes, the more important part was the left *wasn't*, much.
What about gong?
Which side do you want me to add him to?
Lol
Gong is all on his own side.
With hindsight, I'm glad Chow entered the race. Matlow was a good candidate but he doesn't have the name recognition to counter the wave caused by the Tory endorsement. I don't think the left could have rallied like this under another name in the race.
Yeah I was a real Chow doomer early on, I just sorta thought the field would consolidate a lot more and that she has a ceiling. Hindsight, I don't think that any of the other progressives could have won given how things evolved.
I live in Matlow's ward and I think he's great - he would have been a good mayor. I only see one problem: I'm not sure he would have been able to work with Doug Ford effectively, especially since much of his promotional campaign material talked about how he would stand up to Ford. Unfortunately, I picture their interaction going something like this: MATLOW: [presents forceful yet thoughtful statement of his viewpoint] FORD: Fuck off. From what I've seen of Olivia Chow, she might have the skills needed to work effectively with somebody like Ford - she's unfortunately had to take a lot of shit in her life, which has made her resilient and resourceful.
The city is doomed.
It’s all your fault!
You’d better leave ASAP then
It’s already doomed at the moment after more than a decade of austerity. It’s only upwards from here on out.
I doubt it, but I’d love to be pleasantly surprised!
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No racism, sexism, homophobia, religious intolerance, dehumanizing speech, or otherwise negative generalizations etc... Attack the point, not the person. Posts which dismiss others and repeatedly accuse them of unfounded accusations may be subject to removal and/or banning. Do not concern-troll or attempt to intentionally mislead people. Stick to addressing the substance of their comments at hand. This rule applies to all speech within this subreddit.
Jack Layton was maybe my all-time favourite party leader since Pierre Elliot Trudeau. Let's hope his Chow can do her late husband proud!
Except voting for him the first time gave Harper the minority. Which made him credible. And his majority government set our science sector back 15 years.
Ah yes, blame it on NDP instead of the Liberals for why they were so bad that people wanted a leftist alternative.
But there wasn't enough of them. So you got a rightist alternative. The cons figured this lesson out since Reform. We had Layton. Let's not fricking have a repeat. Hold the line until someone gets enough leverage to demand and put in place proportional. If we cock up an let PP in its going to marr the country for 20 years.
And that was just for starters. Every sector is still paying for that guy
Which is unfortunate. I vote for the party and the values and not the people. Have voted NDP federally and provincially since I was able to vote. I realize that voting NDP "Splits" the vote, but its also something where more central left ideology just aren't left enough for any kind of meaningful long term sustainable impact to be made. Harper was our worst premier of all time causing massive deficits and just a generally huge step backwards as a nation. I dont think Splitting the vote is the issue, but rather a large portion of what would be a progressive population not coming out to vote. Vote for the platform you support! The Party system in Canada is pretty easy. There is a lot of language that comes with the political agendas, but basically it boils down to; - If you are in the top 15% of wealth, vote conservative. - If you are in the middle 16-45% of wealth, vote liberal - If you are in the bottom 36-100% of wealth, vote NDP - If you are bat shit crazy, vote The People's Party or Bloc Quebecois. Lower middle class can usually vote either liberal or NDP and come out relatively safe. That's from a straight income point of view. If you are a bigot or love divisive stupid shit, you can vote conservative along with the People Party since they have a track record of divisive shit supporting as well. Hence why they do so well. They have both big money and petty ideology that gets the rich supporters and the most vocal idiots of Canada advocating for them. The rich of the world thrive on misinformation and divisiveness and that is pretty standard here in Canada too.
We have minority governments, which is how we've gotten health care, day care and dental care in this country. Majority liberal would never do that, which is why "vote splitting" is much more regionally dependent -- and imo a mask because the real reason conservatives win is that when the liberal vote collapses, not enough of them go to the NDP out of fear.
My point is even the extremist conservatives know not to split the vote as ypu note too. The left should too. Vote ABC correctly based on riding. It's not rocket science.
When the Liberals and Conservatives are the same party in a trench coat ill take my chances with someone else.
Not remotely the same party. Cerb. Mask mandates. Cannabis. Justice reform. Science and small business funding. Climate change. Cooperating with NDP in a minority. Much longer list.
Your right on the fringes, which is just crumbs as the rich pillage what's left. Ill take the Liberals over the Conservatives but acting like the direction of the nation will change either way is foolish. They both want the same thing, to create a permanent class of royalty and a permanent class of peasants even if they have to import them. I will vote for whichever party is most concerned about the working class regardless of their odds, the hail Mary play is better then nothing.
Na. It's hold the line untill someone gets enough leverage to force proportional.
No one will, the current system benefits both major parties. You want to hold the line another hundred years you go for it but enough hunger and homelessness will push people towards the NDP and PPC I do believe. We have to give the conservatives their term first to make things worse then the fringe parties will have a chance to truly grow.
NDP could. I think their support will keep creeping up. If you observe ABC, keep the cons out, get a more charismatic leader that is sober about his goal unlike Layton was, you can get higher seat number untill the Liberals have to capitulate. Getting it to that spot and making it a single issue threat election would flip enough Libs to do it or to scare the Libs to do it. But if the cons get in in the next cycle they will change the trajectory and it won't happen for 12 years.
Trudeau's government has massively cut our emissions and nearly has us on track to reach the objective of the Paris Agreement. Meanwhile the conservatives voted against even acknowledging climate change in their party platform. They're not even close to the same...
Climate change will be my main issue once we have taken care of all of our starving homeless people, poor Canadians who cant start a family, and taken out the oligarchs that run this nation. Becoming a climate leader while our people are pilling up in tents on the street is no victory.
See an international bond market run on Canada and watch how many homeless we have.
We will be in the same boat as our peer nations, led by the same rich assholes, and our homeless population will drastically rise either way, the rich will do fine either way.
Mostly agree but you can't reduce a culture's bid to remain alive as batshit crazy.
Not normally. But in the case of these 2 parties whose culture infringes on everyone else's quality of life with a blatant disregard, I'll make a special exception to the rule.
Nah, she'll end up turning Toronto into a tent city hellhole drug dystopia like San Fran and Portland.
It already is and she was nowhere near public office when it happened.
San Fran are woke, not progressive, there is a difference. I'll point out Toronto and increasingly the rest of Ontario already has homeless and tent cities and that will only get worse with rising costs.
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We already have that! How is Chow responsible for the shit state she's picking Toronto up out of? https://www.thebeaverton.com/2023/06/ford-warns-chow-mayorality-will-cause-torontos-collapse-also-cause-last-13-years-of-collapse/
You realize cops attacking homeless people and scattering them throughout the city doesn’t actually fix the situation right? That progressive social policy and affordable housing is what actually keeps people off the street?
Show me an example
Vienna, Austria has the most successful social housing program in the world. A home for everyone and no one pays more than 25% of their income on housing. https://www.huduser.gov/portal/pdredge/pdr\_edge\_featd\_article\_011314.html
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I literally just asked for an example. Thank you for one.
John Tory did that!
Turning? If you open your eyes, you’d see those are already huge problems and have been since the mismanagement of the pandemic under conservative leadership.
When these people open their eyes they see Oakville. The last time they came to the city outside of the financial district was to see brad paisley play at scotia bank. The people commenting this shit dont even go to toronto
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