Desmond Cole

Last updated

Desmond Cole
Desmond Cole at the Ontario Federation of Labour - 2017 (38674878892) (cropped).jpg
Cole in 2017
Born (1982-04-09) April 9, 1982 (age 42)
Red Deer, Alberta, Canada
Occupations
  • Journalist
  • radio host
  • author
  • political commentator

Desmond Cole (born April 9, 1982) is a Canadian journalist, activist, author, and broadcaster who lives in Toronto, Ontario. [1] He was previously a columnist for the Toronto Star and has written for The Walrus , NOW Magazine , Torontoist , The Tyee , Toronto Life , and BuzzFeed . Cole's activism has received national attention, specifically on the issues of police carding, racial discrimination, and dismantling systemic racism. [2] [3] [4] [5]

Contents

Cole was the subject of a 2017 CBC Television documentary, The Skin We're In [6] [7] and also hosted a radio show on Newstalk 1010 from 2015 to 2020. [8] [9] His first book, The Skin We're In: A Year of Black Resistance and Power, was released in January 2020 and became the bestselling Canadian book that year. [10] [11]

Early life

Cole was born in Red Deer, Alberta, grew up in Oshawa, Ontario, and went to secondary school in Whitby. [12] He attended Queen's University for two years before dropping out, stating that "University is now job training, and I think that’s nonsense." [12] After teaching French in the Durham region for two years, he moved to Toronto at age 22, [13] where he began working with at-risk youth. [12] In the spring of 2006, Cole competed in Toronto's City Idol competition and was the winner for Toronto-East York. [12] The winners of the competition were assisted in running for city council in the fall of 2006, and Cole placed third in Ward 20 Trinity-Spadina in the 2006 Toronto municipal election, at age 24. [12]

Career

"The Skin I'm In" and tenure as Toronto Star columnist (2015–2017)

Cole's 2015 essay for Toronto Life "The Skin I'm In", explored anti-Black racism in Toronto and across the province of Ontario. The piece chronicled how Cole was carded over fifty times by police in Toronto. [14] [15] The piece was the seventh most read article of the decade on Toronto Life and won three awards at the 2015 National Magazine Awards. [16] [17] The essay was subsequently the basis of a 2017 CBC Television documentary film, The Skin We're In , directed by Charles Officer. [7] [18] Cole also hosted a weekend talk show on CFRB radio from 2015 to 2020. [19]

During his time as a columnist for the Toronto Star, beginning in September 2015, Cole rose to prominence covering issues of race in Toronto. [20] [21]

Resignation from column

In May 2017, Cole resigned from his bi-monthly column at the Toronto Star after being told by his editor he had violated the newspaper's rules on journalism and activism by protesting a Toronto Police Services Board meeting over the Toronto police practice of carding and racial profiling. Commentators pointed to contradictions in the Star's admonishment of Cole, and cited the Star's long history of employing and supporting columnists who engage in activism. [22] [23]

Michele Landsberg, a former Star columnist, called the Star's treatment of Cole a blunder. She wrote that Cole felt bound by his promise to black children he had addressed during a presentation during Black History Month. [24] Landsberg contrasted the support the Star had provided for the feminist activism she advocated during her 25 years as a Star columnist, with its lack of support for Cole.

Continued activism (2018–2019)

On December 14, 2017, PEN Canada picked Cole for its Ken Filkow Prize, for freedom of expression. [25] Towards the end of 2017, speculation arose that Cole was thinking about running for mayor of Toronto; however, Cole later announced that we would not enter the race. [26] [27]

On July 10, 2018, Cole criticized mayor of Toronto John Tory for referring to two black men who injured two children with gunfire as "sewer rats". [28] Cole pointed out that he had not used animal terms to refer to Alek Minassian, who had recently perpetrated the Toronto Van Attack. Cole asserted Tory's language was a trigger for general racial discrimination and that dehumanizing offenders made rehabilitation more difficult. [28]

On October 21, 2018, the eve of the election for mayor of Toronto, the Toronto Star reported that Cole claimed candidate Saron Gebresellassi had accepted a list of contact numbers from incumbent mayor John Tory of which Cole felt the public should have been informed. [29]

The Skin We're In: A Year of Black Resistance and Power (2020)

Cole's first book, The Skin We're In: A Year of Black Resistance and Power, was announced in 2019 [30] and released on January 28, 2020. [31] The books focuses on 2017 and chronicles a year "in the struggle against racism in Canada." [32] [33] [34] CBC Books placed the title on its 2020 winter reading list, [34] and it became the bestselling Canadian nonfiction book for the week of February 9–15, 2020. [35] The book saw a surge in sales in late May to early June 2020, corresponding to protests across the United States and Canada against anti-black racism and police brutality. [36] It later became the bestselling Canadian book of 2020 and was also named one of the ten best Canadian nonfiction books of the year. [37] [11] In 2021, the book was nominated for the Shaughnessy Cohen Prize for Political Writing. [38]

In the aftermath of the death of Regis Korchinski-Paquet, Cole argued for the defunding of the Toronto Police and the redistribution of funds to mental health services and initiatives to address poverty and systemic racism. [39]

In July 2020, Cole was named one of CBC Books' "Writers to Watch". [40]

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Pride Toronto</span> Annual LGBT event in Toronto, Ontario

Pride Toronto is an annual event held in Toronto, Ontario, Canada, in June each year. A celebration of the diversity of the LGBT community in the Greater Toronto Area, it is one of the largest organized gay pride festivals in the world, featuring several stages with live performers and DJs, several licensed venues, a large Dyke March, a Trans March and the Pride Parade. The centre of the festival is the city's Church and Wellesley village, while the parade and marches are primarily routed along the nearby Yonge Street, Gerrard Street and Bloor Street. In 2014, the event served as the fourth international WorldPride, and was much larger than standard Toronto Prides.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">John Tory</span> Mayor of Toronto from 2014 to 2023

John Howard Tory is a Canadian broadcaster, businessman, and former politician who served as the 65th mayor of Toronto from 2014 to 2023. He served as leader of the Official Opposition in Ontario from 2005 to 2007 while he was leader of the Progressive Conservative Party of Ontario from 2004 to 2009.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Pam McConnell</span> 20th and 21st-century Canadian politician

Pamela Margaret McConnell was a Canadian politician who served on Toronto City Council. She was first elected to the Metro Toronto Council in 1994, representing a series of downtown Toronto wards until 2017. She served as a deputy mayor of Toronto, representing Toronto and East York from 2014 to 2017.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Viola Desmond</span> Black Canadian business woman and activist (1914–1965)

Viola Irene Desmond was a Canadian civil and women's rights activist and businesswoman of Black Nova Scotian descent. In 1946, she challenged racial segregation at a cinema in New Glasgow, Nova Scotia, by refusing to leave a whites-only area of the Roseland Theatre. For this, she was convicted of a minor tax violation for the one-cent tax difference between the seat that she had paid for and the seat that she used, which was more expensive. Desmond's case is one of the most publicized incidents of racial discrimination in Canadian history and helped start the modern civil rights movement in Canada.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Charles Officer</span> Canadian writer, filmmaker, and ice hockey player (1975–2023)

Charles Officer was a Canadian film and television director, writer, actor, and professional hockey player.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Jaye Robinson</span> Deceased Canadian municipal politician

Janet Joy "Jaye" Robinson was a Canadian politician who served as a member of the Toronto City Council from 2010 to 2024. She was the chair of the Toronto Transit Commission (TTC) from 2018 to 2022. Robinson represented Ward 15 Don Valley West. She died in office on May 16, 2024.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Doug Ford</span> 26th and current premier of Ontario

Douglas Robert Ford Jr. is a Canadian politician and businessman who has served as the 26th and current premier of Ontario since June 2018 and leader of the Progressive Conservative (PC) Party since March 2018. He represents the Toronto riding of Etobicoke North in the Legislative Assembly of Ontario.

Racism in Canada traces both historical and contemporary racist community attitudes, as well as governmental negligence and political non-compliance with United Nations human rights standards and incidents in Canada. Contemporary Canada is the product of indigenous First Nations combined with multiple waves of immigration, predominantly from Europe and in modern times, from Asia.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Jamil Jivani</span> Canadian radio host and politician

Jamil Jivani is a Canadian politician, radio host, and political commentator. He is the founder of the Policing Literacy Initiative, is a co-founder of Teachers Beyond the Classroom, sat on the Premier's Council on Equality of Opportunity and is the Advocate for Community Opportunities for the Doug Ford government.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Mark Saunders (police officer)</span> Canadian police chief (born 1962)

Mark Saunders is a Canadian politician and retired police officer who served as chief of police with the Toronto Police Service (TPS) from 2015 to 2020.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Carding (police policy)</span> Police intelligence gathering method

In Canada, carding, officially known in Ontario as the Community Contacts Policy, is an intelligence gathering policy involving the stopping, questioning, and documenting of individuals when no particular offence is being investigated. The interactions take place in public, private or any place police have contact with the public. The information collected is kept on record in the Field Information Report (FIR) database. FIRs include details including the individuals' gender, race, the reason for the interaction, location, and the names of any associates, to build a database for unspecified future use. Officially, individuals are not legally detained, but this distinction is not clear. Carding programs have been shown to consume a considerable amount of police resources, with little to no verifiable results on the level of crime. Carding is also known to contribute to a disproportionate amount of black and Indigenous people being recorded in law enforcement databases. Consequences for Indigenous and racialized populations include mental and physical health problems, loss of trust with the police, disparities within the criminal justice system, and social disadvantage, including potential loss of educational and employment opportunities.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Celina Caesar-Chavannes</span> Canadian politician

Celina R. Caesar-Chavannes is a Canadian politician who served as the Member of Parliament (MP) for the riding of Whitby in the House of Commons of Canada from 2015 to 2019. Elected as a Liberal in the 2015 federal election, she later sat as an independent member. Caesar-Chavannes also unsuccessfully ran in the 2023 Toronto mayoral by-election, placing thirty-ninth out of 102 candidates.

CBC Docs POV is a Canadian television point-of-view documentary series, which airs on CBC Television. The series premiered in fall 2015 under the title Firsthand, replacing Doc Zone, after the CBC discontinued its internal documentary production unit, and was renamed CBC Docs POV in 2017. The series airs one documentary film each week, commissioned from external producers rather than being produced directly by the CBC; some, but not all, films screened as part of the series have also had longer versions separately released as theatrical feature documentaries.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">2018 Toronto mayoral election</span>

The 2018 Toronto mayoral election was held on Monday, October 22, 2018, to elect the Mayor of the city of Toronto. Incumbent Mayor John Tory was re-elected for a second term, defeating former Chief City Planner Jennifer Keesmaat with 63.49% of the vote. Tory won all of Toronto’s 25 wards.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Toronto City Council 2018–2022</span>

The 2018-2022 Toronto City Council consists of councillors elected in the 2018 municipal election. The current council term began on December 4, 2018.

The Skin We're In is a 2017 Canadian documentary film, directed by Charles Officer. Based in part on Desmond Cole's award-winning 2015 essay, "The Skin I'm In", for Toronto Life, the film documents the history and reality of racism against Black Canadians.

Sandy Hudson is a Jamaican-Canadian political activist, writer from Toronto, Ontario, Canada. She is the co-founder of the Black Lives Matter movement presence in Canada.

<i>The Skin Were In</i> (book) 2020 book

The Skin We're In: A Year of Black Resistance and Power is a book by Desmond Cole published by Doubleday Canada in 2020.

The Skin We're In is a multimedia project on anti-Black Canadian racism in Canada. Beginning with a 2015 magazine article by Desmond Cole for the magazine Toronto Life, the project has since incorporated two related but distinct parts:

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Randy Hillier</span> Canadian politician

Randy Alexander Hillier is a Canadian politician who served as a member of provincial parliament (MPP) in the Legislative Assembly of Ontario from 2007-2022. Hillier represented the riding of Lanark—Frontenac—Kingston as an independent MPP from 2019 to 2022. This riding contains much of the dissolved riding of Lanark—Frontenac—Lennox and Addington, which he represented from 2007 to 2018. Hillier was initially elected as a Progressive Conservative (PC) Party MPP, remaining a member until he was removed in 2019. Despite announcing that he would run for election under the banner of the Ontario First Party in November 2021, Hillier announced in March 2022 that he would not seek re-election.

References

  1. ↑ "Shining a light on the police: Five questions with activist Desmond Cole". The Globe and Mail. July 14, 2017. Archived from the original on August 14, 2017. Retrieved January 28, 2020.
  2. ↑ "Racism not a big problem? Activist says survey shows Canadians 'in denial'". CTVNews. December 10, 2019. Archived from the original on December 18, 2019. Retrieved January 28, 2020.
  3. ↑ Sun, Edmonton (July 10, 2017). "Activist Desmond Cole to speak in Edmonton amid debate on controversial police practice". Archived from the original on July 9, 2019. Retrieved January 28, 2020.
  4. ↑ Canada, P. M. N. (November 14, 2018). "Toronto 'carding' activist Desmond Cole stopped by police in Vancouver | National Post" . Retrieved January 28, 2020.
  5. ↑ "Activists question Federation of Black Canadians' leadership, ties to Liberals". CBC News . February 27, 2018. Archived from the original on March 21, 2019.
  6. ↑ Charles Officer (September 30, 2017). "The skin we are in". CBC News . Archived from the original on August 15, 2018. Retrieved July 31, 2018. Following celebrated journalist Desmond Cole as he researches his hotly anticipated book, this documentary from acclaimed director Charles Officer pulls back the curtain on racism in Canada.
  7. 1 2 Otchere, Shantal (March 10, 2017). "Watch Desmond Cole's doc, The Skin We're In, on CBC.ca". NOW Magazine. Retrieved January 28, 2020.
  8. ↑ Robb, Peter. "The fire this time with Desmond Cole – ARTSFILE" . Retrieved December 28, 2020.
  9. ↑ Média, Bell. "Desmond Cole". www.iheartradio.ca. Retrieved December 28, 2020.
  10. ↑ "Desmond Cole on his new book, dismantling racist institutions and 'the pablum of diversity' | The Star". thestar.com. January 24, 2020. Retrieved January 28, 2020.
  11. 1 2 "The top 10 bestselling Canadian books of 2020". CBC Books . December 28, 2020.
  12. 1 2 3 4 5 "The audacity of Cole". The Varsity. November 6, 2006. Archived from the original on December 13, 2019. Retrieved January 28, 2020.
  13. ↑ "Why Toronto Writer Desmond Cole Sees Every Uniformed Police Officer as a Threat". TVO.org. Retrieved January 28, 2020.
  14. ↑ Desmond Cole (April 21, 2015). "LIFE The Skin I'm In: I've been interrogated by police more than 50 times—all because I'm black". Toronto Life . Archived from the original on October 24, 2018. Retrieved October 21, 2018. In second year, when I moved into the student village, I started noticing cops following me in my car.
  15. ↑ Bero, Tayo (November 6, 2019). "Canada is overdue for a reckoning with its anti-black racism | Tayo Bero". The Guardian. ISSN   0261-3077. Archived from the original on December 18, 2019. Retrieved January 28, 2020.
  16. ↑ "Toronto Life's 20 most popular stories of the decade". Toronto Life. December 26, 2019. Archived from the original on December 28, 2019. Retrieved January 28, 2020.
  17. ↑ "Desmond Cole". National Magazine Awards. March 9, 2017. Retrieved January 28, 2020.
  18. ↑ Officer, Charles (2017). "The Skin We're In". CBC.
  19. ↑ "Desmond Cole – February 9, 2020". NewsTalk 1010. Retrieved March 11, 2024. Desmond says goodbye after 5 great years at Newstalk1010.
  20. ↑ "Toronto police to begin collecting race-based data in January". Toronto. December 19, 2019. Archived from the original on December 20, 2019. Retrieved January 28, 2020.
  21. ↑ News; Canada (April 25, 2015). "Vital intelligence gathering or meddling? Police across Canada under growing pressure to stop carding people | National Post" . Retrieved January 28, 2020.{{cite web}}: |last1= has generic name (help)
  22. ↑ "The 'benevolent liberal racism' behind Desmond Cole's Star exit – Macleans.ca". www.macleans.ca. Archived from the original on February 13, 2019. Retrieved January 28, 2020.
  23. ↑ "It was wrong to rein in Desmond Cole: Paradkar | The Star". thestar.com. May 12, 2017. Archived from the original on August 9, 2019. Retrieved January 28, 2020.
  24. ↑ Michele Landsberg (April 15, 2017). "Former Toronto Star columnist Michele Landsberg calls out paper's bosses for Desmond Cole "blunder"". NOW magazine . Archived from the original on October 11, 2018. Retrieved October 21, 2018. Since the province passed new rules making arbitrary street checks illegal, Cole argued, the Board should stop making the information already gathered, much of it illegally, available to police.
  25. ↑ Jane van Koeverden (December 14, 2017). "Desmond Cole awarded 2017 PEN Canada/Ken Filkow Prize for freedom of expression". CBC Books . Archived from the original on August 2, 2018. Retrieved July 31, 2018. Cole has become a sought-out voice on issues faced by marginalized communities. In April 2017, he was removed from a Toronto police board meeting for protesting how the police board was handling the case of Dafonte Miller.
  26. ↑ "Will Desmond Cole run for mayor of Toronto? He's thinking about it: Keenan | The Star". thestar.com. October 11, 2017. Archived from the original on December 14, 2019. Retrieved January 28, 2020.
  27. ↑ "Desmond Cole announces he won't run to become Toronto mayor | The Star". thestar.com. April 29, 2018. Archived from the original on December 14, 2019. Retrieved January 28, 2020.
  28. 1 2 Muriel Draaisma (July 10, 2018). "Mayor John Tory won't apologize for calling gunmen who wounded 2 young girls 'sewer rats'". CBC News . Archived from the original on July 19, 2018. Retrieved July 31, 2018. Mayor John Tory has described men responsible for a playground shooting as 'sewer rats.' Journalist and activist Desmond Cole objects to that language, saying it exposes black people to more danger.
  29. ↑ Marco Chown Oved (October 21, 2018). "Mayoral hopeful accused of accepting 'material support' from John Tory's team". Toronto Star . Archived from the original on October 22, 2018. Retrieved October 22, 2018. Cole published the post on social media two days before the municipal vote 'out of fear Saron would continue to keep her actions from the community.'
  30. ↑ Edwards, Samantha (January 6, 2020). "10 books we're excited to read in 2020". NOW Magazine . Retrieved January 28, 2020.
  31. ↑ "The Skin We're In by Desmond Cole". Penguin Random House Canada. Retrieved February 21, 2020.
  32. ↑ "These are the books to watch in 2020 – Macleans.ca". Macleans magazine . December 31, 2019. Archived from the original on January 20, 2020. Retrieved January 28, 2020.
  33. ↑ Price, Neil (January 27, 2020). "Desmond Cole wants to dispel Canada's "magical thinking" on race". NOW Magazine . Retrieved January 28, 2020.
  34. 1 2 "The CBC Books winter reading list: 40 books to read to kick off 2020". CBC Books . January 28, 2020.
  35. ↑ "The bestselling Canadian books for the week of Feb. 9–15, 2020". CBC Books. Retrieved February 20, 2020.
  36. ↑ "Anti-racism books see massive sales spike amid police brutality protests | CBC News".
  37. ↑ "The best Canadian nonfiction of 2020". CBC Books . December 1, 2020.
  38. ↑ "Desmond Cole, Celina Caesar-Chavannes among finalists for political writing prize". The Daily Courier . Kelowna. Canadian Press. June 2, 2021. Retrieved June 2, 2021.
  39. ↑ "Police brutality continually treated like a 'one-off' in Canada, says Desmond Cole". CBC Radio . June 1, 2020.
  40. ↑ "The CBC Books Writers to Watch list: 24 Canadian writers on the rise in 2020". CBC Books .
This page is based on this Wikipedia article
Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply.
Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.