November 19, 2018
SHARE
CANADALAND
#253 Is The Media Afraid Of The Kielburgers?
The Kielburgers' WE Movement has enjoyed more than 20 years of glowing press. They also have partnerships with 38 media organizations and a history of aggressive responses to criticism. Reporter Jaren Kerr speaks with Jesse about his investigation of WE's media relations.
Jesse Brown
Host & Publisher

UPDATE (Dec.24/18): The WE organization has responded to the this podcast and its accompanying article with a Notice of Libel, which can be read here.

CORRECTION (Dec.26/18): On this podcast, reporter Jaren Kerr states that in the special WE-related sections that run in the Winnipeg Free Press, Postmedia papers and The Globe and Mail, “all the content is WE-created.” 

In the case of The Globe and Mail, this is not accurate. After publication of this podcast, WE informed us that other than the pieces authored by Craig and Marc Kielburger, the content in the Globe’s WE sections is created by writers employed by the newspaper, which has “full authority and editorial control” over the content in those sections. WE also says it “does not see, review, or approve the content” in the Globe’s WE section.

CANADALAND regrets the error. 

Audio of Craig Kielburger’s 1996 press conference addressing Saturday Night magazine’s cover story was sourced from Judy Jackson’s documentary It Takes A Child (1998).

This episode is sponsored by HelloFresh and Audible. 

More from this series
Are tweens going to Make Podcasting Great again?
June 19, 2025
 Jesse Brown pulls a thread on his sweater and unravels a mystery.
June 16, 2025
What do you do when your recording goes south? Publish it anyway?
June 12, 2025
 Chaos can be strategy as well. -Brian Reed
June 9, 2025
  It made the media probably the next day, and then shit hit the fan. -“Laura”
June 2, 2025
 Dan Aykroyd blew in from Ottawa.  Andrea Martin came in from Maine and Joe Flaherty came in from Pittsburgh. Paul Schaffer came in from Thunder Bay. Marty Short and Eugene Levy and I came in from Hamilton. We congregated (in Toronto) because we had similar comic sensibilities.
May 26, 2025
“ It was hot girls having a blast. There's nothing wrong with that. I thought it was aspirational. I did not yet realize that we were in fact shooting porn and that that was actually happening in the back room of the bus that we were living on.” - Courtney Kocak, former Girls Gone Wild “Merch Girl”
May 19, 2025
“ My brother, first and foremost, was a good person. He was very bright, he was educated, and he was autistic. And I think had he not met the creeper hunter, I think he would still be alive today.” -Brother of “John Doe #1”
May 12, 2025
all podcasts arrow All Podcasts
CANADALAND