The recent assault and murder of London-based marketing executive Sarah Everard by Westminster Metropolitan police officer Wayne Couzens has shone a spotlight on conversations surrounding gender-based violence as well as the role police forces play in exacerbating the threat this poses to women’s safety worldwide. Besides the fact that harassment and assault is far from being an unusual occurrence for women — an already distressing reality — the brutality that has been shown by actors of the law supposedly there to ensure the population’s security further contributes to ongoing feelings of fear. As such, the role of Couzens in Everard’s killing has further opened the debate to questions regarding whether increased policing, particularly that of a male-focused nature, is an appropriate response to growing concerns about the violence faced by women, considering that it tends to be one often proposed by state institutions.

Activists for Montreal’s homeless and Indigenous populations, two communities disproportionately affected by COVID-19 in Canada, have been advocating for these groups’ increased protection since the beginning of the pandemic nearly a year ago. The inadequacies previously seen in the country’s health and social policies have only been magnified in recent times. Despite advocates’ constant efforts, […]

Brazil is often celebrated for hosting part of the Amazon rainforest, known for its sheer size and diverse ecosystems, but the country also boasts another, lesser-known wildlife reservoir towards its western border: the Pantanal. This biome, a vast wetland of approximately 200,000 square kilometers spreading over parts of Brazil, Bolivia, and Paraguay, is home to […]

At the June 2020 General Assembly, United Nations (UN) Secretary General Antonio Guterres declared that the impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic are falling “disproportionately on the most vulnerable: people living in poverty, the working poor, women and children, persons with disabilities, and other marginalized groups.” His statement accurately depicts the asymmetric effect that this pandemic […]