Wednesday, September 29, 2010
Rick Salutin out as Friday Globe columnist
Irshad Manji in as part of "radical redesign"
Posted by Bruce Wark on Wed, Sep 29, 2010 at 1:22 PM
The Globe and Mail has replaced left-wing, freelance writer Rick Salutin as its regular Friday columnist with Irshad Manji, the feisty activist described by the New York Times as "Osama bin Laden's worst nightmare." The move is part of what's being described as a "radical redesign" of the paper set to be launched on Friday.
"It's a little bit painful for readers who are used to our columnists," says Judith McGill, assistant to Globe editor-in-chief John Stackhouse. "We're bringing in some new voices to the paper."
McGill acknowledges "there's a bit of a campaign" underway to get Salutin reinstated partly as a result of a blog written by Murray Dobbin which appears today on the website of the Vancouver Sun.
She adds, however, that "hopefully we will feature him as an occasional contributor" on Globe comment pages "from time to time."
Salutin himself said he was rushing out the door when reached by phone at his home in Toronto. He added he's in his 20th year writing the Globe column and has known for some time that the newspaper was dropping it. "I didn't make a big thing of it," he said.
A report in Toronto Life magazine says that the newly redesigned Globe, "at 12 inches wide by 21 inches deep, will be tighter and smaller, a bit narrower and shorter than a traditional broadsheet."
The article, by Jason McBride, says "the paper will be printed on a blend of stocks, including traditional newsprint, but also glossy and matte paper and, possibly, a bright white stock...Pages will often be devoted to a single news story, adorned with several ads."
McBride reports that information from focus groups in Toronto and Vancouver showed that "readers wanted the paper to have a 'friendlier' look. Friendlier apparently meant more white space, shorter stories, grabbier graphics and a lot more colour."
Meantime, to promote its new paper, the Globe has been trying to entice potential readers to a website called Canada: Our Time To Lead. It encourages visitors to create their own front page and to watch a 60-second TV commercial featuring a helmeted young woman riding a bicycle while urging Canadians to redefine the country.
According to Marketer News, the Globe, owned by the super-rich Thomson family, will kick off its redesign with a series on topics that define Canadians. The series will feature what the paper calls "deep coverage and online discussion and debate" of such topics as multiculturalism, powerful women, the future of the armed forces and how to strike a proper balance between work, home life and leisure.
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Comments (15)
Showing 1-15 of 15
Well Salutin never wavered in his enlightened humanist (and yes, left) approach, and somehow he never ceased to be relevant. Infinitely more radical and smart in his 60s than his replacement -- who is a horrible mainstream hack in every way. Sad day for the Globe, who always seems to fire the wrong people in their purges.
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It is a sad, sad day for Journalism and for citizenry interested in something other than the establishment drivel. Rick: do not go gently into that good night!
As a current advertiser in the BC Globe, I'm going to have to take a hard look at what I'm supporting.
Perhaps Jan Wong will try to shoehorn herself back into her Red Guard uniform and perform one of those twirly banner dance numbers so beloved of the Dear Leader at Rick's going away party. If the shekels begin to run low, perhaps he can get himself a job producing elaborate multi-media tributes to Kim Jong-Il. Just don't piss off the boss.
"Lick Sarutin - You Are Useress!" followed by a fusillade of automatic gunfire.
The Mope & Wail's golden handshake is no doubt, much kinder and gentler.
One example of the contradictions of capitalism is provided by the issue of “free speech.” We are told, over and over again, that “free speech” is a fundamental characteristic of democratic capitalism. Yet the ability to shape the media, through ownership or the power of advertisers, through setting up think tanks to promulgate a particular point of view, to an influence on political life and political parties that is widely acknowledged, distinguishes owners from others. For example, I am writing this chapter in British Columbia, the western-most province in Canada. B.C. has two major cities, Vancouver and Victoria. CanWest Global, a single Canadian corporation with a conservative ideology, not only owns the three major newspapers in these two cities, hence in British Columbia, but also controls one of the two national newspapers and numerous small community newspapers, as well as a television network. Incidentally, the other national newspaper is also conservative in orientation. The media shape public opinion and events as much as they reflect these. Hence, hundreds of thousands of more progressive people in B.C. have no real public outlet in which to express their interests and ideas. The formal right of free speech is contradicted by vastly unequal access to actually having a public voice. The former Canadian media mogul, Conrad Black (currently in prison in the United States), was willing to lose over $200 million in the process of establishing a right-wing national newspaper in Canada, the National Post. Not many of us could do the same thing.
Thus, there is a tension between capitalism and democracy. While the latter assumes most are approximately equal in opportunities to influence events, the former ensures that some have much more chance of doing so than do others. We may all have one vote, but it is simply not true that I have as much political influence or power as does Bill Gates. Even when we confront the law as citizens, law supposedly being the formal bastion of equality, the idea that I and General Motors are both citizens and therefore on equal terms in court is not really true given GM’s ability to hire platoons of expert lawyers, to draw on relatively unlimited funds, etc. While democracy asserts power equality, capitalism produces inequality. Capitalists preach democracy, but practise power. We must distinguish formal claims to democracy and equality from the ability to actually enact these claims.
David Coburn, in Staying Alive: Critical Perspectives on Health, Illness, and Health Care, p. 67-68, http://tinyurl.com/yehawne
Mop & Pail caters to the barely literate masses with pretty pictures and single syllable words .
Very unhappy that The Globe and Mail dropped the interesting, literate and informative Rick Salutin, and, to add insult to injury, replaced him with shallow Islam-basher Irshad Manji. Manji is like a character out of Kipling. Salutin was the reason I read the Friday Globe. Now the Globe is basically wll to wall beige and right wing. Globe columnists are now interchangeable and predictable. Wente-Blatchford-Manji...anyone can devine their views on any topic and write their columns. Not so Rick. Original and progressive. I guess the Globe does not want us to get or think about the news. A sad day for free speech and intelligence.
Good riddance to bad rubbish. I wouldn't use this Stalinist creep's drivel to line my cat's litter box.
I'm worried about these posters who seem to equate age with "outdated" and "young and fiesty" with intelligence and wisdom. Rick was an inspiring flag bearer for the likes of John Kenneth Galbraith and Joseph Stiglitz as opposed to most of Canada's media that supports the economic outlooks of Allan Greenspan and G. Bush. Rick reminded us of why we do not want to pursue economic policies that favour big oil, banks, and multinationals but instead go back to the progressive social policies that try to lessen the gap between rich and poor in Canada. His replacement describes herself as an "Islamic Zionist"whatever that is and reminds me of Sarah Palin. And why does hiring her mean Rick is fired? Canadian corporate owned media is so depressing and it's shaping many Canadians' beliefs about what's best for Canada which( surprise surprise) always concludes that tax cuts for multinationals etc. makes the most sense. Sigh......
Salutin was so 1960s.
Enjoy retirement and make way for younger blood.
Now he has been replaced by an outspken lesbian Muslim who is bright, articulate and not afraid of telling the truth about the lunatic fringe of Islam. A breath of fresh air.
Salutin was recenly bemoaning the passing of 1930's Stalinist Russia. He is one of the the most irrelevant writers in Canada and that's a pretty low limbo bar to get under.
http://network.nationalpost.com/np/blogs/f…
Great report, Bruce and as far as Salutin goes, hasta la vista, baby. Don't let the door whack your ass on the way out.
@CosmoCanuck - yes. more like Fox news!
- Rick Salutin is one of the best progressive writers in Canada & the GLOBE eds. "let him go" - apparently with no explanation. And they can't have TWO journalists that are "feisty"?! They've got enough right-wing deadwood to keep 2 papers going! Incredibly disgusted with the Globe. They've been becoming more right wing all the time & this is the nail in their coffin.
johntor your preception of "Soviet era leftist thinking" is painfully outdated - everyone else, including people like rick salutin, moved past that kind of stuff years ago ...
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