What’s happened to free speech in Vancouver?
Excerpt from a B.C. Civil Liberties Association letter sent to Vancouver Mayor Gregor Robertson and his city council:
“[W]e are losing confidence in your political will to ensure that all voices are heard during the Olympic period, despite your repeated assertions to the contrary.”
Freedom of speech is a fundamental right for all, but you’d never know it these days in Vancouver, BC, Canada. The city recently shut down a public art space, which has operated uninterrupted since 2003 in the downtown eastside, after an artist displayed an anti-Olympic painting deemed “graffiti.”
Jesse Corcoran, a downtown-eastside artist, hung his art on a horizontal, wooden board outside the Crying Room studio gallery at 157 East Cordova Street, part of the urban area known as “Canada’s poorest postal code.” It showed the five Olympic rings; four contained a sad face and one showed a smiling face.
Although the art was not painted directly onto the exterior brick wall, the city of Vancouver forced its removal on Dec. 11, calling the art “graffiti.” It had been hanging there since September.
“There needs to be freedom to critique the Olympics,” Corcoran told The Vancouver Sun. He thinks the graffiti excuse is “a convenient way to silence this social criticism.” I agree.
Corcoran, a community-care worker, said that his art symbolized the many people who will suffer as a result of the Olympics; only a few will benefit. The homeless have been displaced by the closure of popular Oppenheimer Park in east Vancouver. Pigeon Park on East Hastings Street is fenced off for repainting and beautification. There are reports of city representatives rounding up the homeless, giving them tickets to board a bus, then driving them to suburban areas like Chilliwack and dumping them off. Whether that’s urban myth or not, it’s disgraceful.
Although Mayor Robertson has made shelter for the homelessness one of his priorities, the city seems more interested in casting Vancouver during the Olympics as a beautiful haven with no ” taint” of panhandlers, people with mental-health issues or substance-use issues. This oceanfront city is just a prosperous place with glossy new venues and thousands of happy, smiling people, right?
I think it’s ironic that Vancouver and VANOC have touted artists and their projects from around the world as part of this upcoming global event. They want to showcase the city as a great patron of culture and the arts, yet grassroots artistic self-expression such as Jesse’s gets quashed.
This sets a dangerous precedent against freedom of expression. As David Eby, executive director of the B.C. Civil Liberties Association, has said: “This [removal of anti-Olympic art] is an excellent example of our worst fears.”
Meanwhile, Canada Customs officials at the B.C. border recently detained and grilled U.S. journalist Amy Goodman, accusing her of fomenting anti-Olympics sentiment. Find out the details on my blog; it’s the second item under Media.