October 13, 2025
SHARE
CANADALAND
#1244 Black Rights in Canada Took This Fight
“At that period, everybody thought revolution was going to happen.” -Michèle Stephenson
Jesse Brown
Host & Publisher
Bruce Thorson
Senior Producer
Tristan Capacchione
Senior Production Supervisor
max collins
Director of Audio

The Civil Rights Movement of the ‘50s and ‘60s in the United States gave the world iconic, inspiring, and sometimes horrific moments, burned by repetition into the public imagination. Even as a Canadian, you know the sights and sounds of that civil rights fight. You can picture MLK preaching his dream.

But what did the civil rights struggle look and sound like in Canada? Does anything come to mind? Perhaps Viola Desmond, challenging segregation at a cinema in New Glasgow, Nova Scotia, recently memorialized on the ten dollar bill. 

Why so few images in the collective conscience? Where are the Canadian sights and sounds of the era?

Today’s guest has the answer, and the footage to back it up. Filmmaker Michèle Stephenson has just premiered her new film True North

 

Host: Jesse Brown

Credits: Tristan Capacchione (Audio Editor & Technical Producer), Bruce Thorson (Senior Producer), max collins (Director of Audio), Jesse Brown (Editor and Publisher)

Featured Guest: Michèle Stephenson

Fact checking by Julian Abraham

 

More information:

 

Sponsors: 

Squarespace: Check out https://squarespace.com/canadaland for a free trial, and when you’re ready to launch use code canadaland to save 10% off your first purchase of a website or domain.

Douglas: Douglas is giving our listeners a FREE Sleep Bundle with each mattress purchase. Get the sheets, pillows, mattress and pillow protectors FREE with your Douglas purchase today.  Visit https://douglas.ca/canadaland to claim this offer.

BetterHelp: Visit https://BetterHelp.com/canadaland today to get 10% off your first month.

 

Can’t get enough Canadaland? Follow @Canadaland_Podcasts on Instagram for clips, announcements, explainers and more.

If you value this podcast, support us! You’ll get premium access to all our shows ad free, including early releases and bonus content. You’ll also get our exclusive newsletter, discounts on merch at our store, tickets to our live and virtual events, and more than anything, you’ll be a part of the solution to Canada’s journalism crisis, you’ll be keeping our work free and accessible to everybody.

You can listen ad-free on Amazon Music—included with Prime.

More from this series
“In the corner in the room there was a screen and there I could see the numbers going up. Then I figured that this is the amount of eggs that they're retrieving and it felt like a scoreboard in the operating room.” - Sana Al-Badri (IVF egg donor)
July 13, 2026
 It was an awful time. And to also be told, “You were unethical by using this facilitation letter." It was, it was like I was in some kind of nightmare. -Investigative Reporter Laura Robinson
July 6, 2026
The Theresa Kielburger lawsuit, Jesse’s union negotiating tactics, a new JSP.
July 2, 2026
Today, we’re headed to “Bovine University” to figure out what’s at the heart of an Ontario law, and why animal rights activists are unhappy about it.
June 29, 2026
 Things that are misleading, like “mystery illness,” I hope are lost from the general vocabulary in the public media sooner rather than later. -Dr. Michael Coulthart
June 22, 2026
“Nothing about this World Cup is uniting the world. If anything, it's dividing it further.” -Karim Zidan
June 15, 2026
“ If you don't know who Cohere is, you will.” -Mark Carney
June 8, 2026
School prisons, inappropriate relationships, teen pregnancy rates, and the mysterious Bioscience building in Edmonton.
June 4, 2026
all podcasts arrow All Podcasts
CANADALAND