Shari Graydon’s Post

I have a feeling this conference is going to be epic. If you're in Montreal -- or can get there for Friday and Saturday -- you won't be disappointed!

This list – and the larger phenomenon behind it – is both delicious and effing infuriating. Because how many other overlooked women entrepreneurs never get the chance to deliver on their brilliance because male venture capitalists failed to recognize and fund their potential?

You know that feeling when you say “yes” to a request even though your crammed schedule advises against it? But you agree anyway because it aligns with your values and feels like an opportunity to make a tiny difference to women who are facing the kinds of challenges that should have been eliminated from the planet by now… And then, as you’re devoting what would have been recreational time on a lovely weekend to fulfilling your commitment, you start to question whether or not you’re even the (mythical) “best person” to be sharing insights on the "Social Responsibility of Journalists"… (And yes, the irony of me, having written a book called "OMG! What if I really AM the best person?" confessing this is not lost on me.) But you write and record your presentation as promised, and you send it off to the woman you’ve never met but feel great respect for, given the nature of her own advocacy work… And even though when you do, you’re still wondering, “will my insights even add value?”, you feel good about having made the effort. Because the situation for women in #Afghanistan is as or more dire than it’s ever been. And every time you learn a bit more about how they’re treated and what they’re facing, it makes you despair about the state of the world. You feel helpless to make a difference. But then a few weeks later, you receive a very thoughtful “Letter of Appreciation”, and you are struck by an insight you heard years ago: Many people don’t donate -- time or funds -- to causes they care about merely because they were never asked. Thank you, Freshta Hemmati, for asking. Thank you for doing the challenging work you do. And thank you for taking time to craft and send me this beautiful letter. And to everyone else, check out the AJSO Afghanistan Journalists' Support Org -- because you, too, might be able to contribute to their efforts.

I wasn’t expecting him to sport horns, exactly. But prior to Tuesday night’s vice presidential debate between JD Vance and Tim Walz, I understood the former to be a younger, angrier, scarier manifestation of craven political opportunism. His willingness to embrace a man he’d once labeled “America’s Hitler”... His deeply retrograde statements about women… His demonizing lies about immigrants… His allegiance to far right ideologues advising a RAGE ('Replace All Government Workers') program once power is attained… They all added up to creating the image of a man whose singular lack of charm would be no match for Tim Walz’s straight-talking progressive dad-next-door charisma.   And yet the JD Vance who showed up on Tuesday night gave an astonishing performance. He appeared collegial and gracious. He built verbal bridges across the partisan aisle and expressed human empathy for Walz’s son. Yes, he completely dodged the appropriately tough questions posed to him – about the war in the Middle East, about climate change, about the need for gun control. But his non-responses were so smooth and articulate, so reasonable-sounding (despite containing outright lies) that the effect was disarming. Even his jaw-dropping pivots from defending the indefensible to stretching credulity by blaming every social and economic ill on Kamala Harris were slickly executed. In the process, he somehow managed the alarming feat of normalizing Trump’s grifter-circus vibe. He was controlled, not rambling; he spoke in complex, complete sentences, not incomprehensible digressive tangents; he cited policies not personal grudges. It was easy to imagine that some on-the-fence viewers not sufficiently familiar with Vance’s history or the issues he was lying about, might feel reassured by him. They might reason that Trump’s vulnerability to flattery,  failure of impulse control, and inability to consider the country’s interests ahead of his own, could be countered by Vance’s seemingly steady hand. But this would be a dire mistake. It would roll back #reproductiverights and almost certainly lead to more of the already-witnessed tragedies in which women unable to access care have died. For more context on the reproductive freedom stakes for American women in this election, see Roxanne Szal's analysis in Ms. Magazine linked in the comments section below. (Photo by Ricky Carioti / The Washington Post via Getty Images)

If you want to stand out on a #panel... ... become a sought-after #podcast guest... ...or liven up your #presentations to colleagues or clients... ...#stories make a world of difference. You don't have to be Jane Austen or Jody Piccoult, Toni Morrison or Celeste Ng. You just have to: 1. be human; 2. pay attention to your interactions with others; and 3. invest a bit of time in identifying relevant contexts and crafting your delivery. You've already got number 1 covered; 2 is easy; and we can help you with 3. Our next Storytelling to Increase Your Impact workshop starts October 29th. A few spots still remain. You can register via the link in the comments below.

Health care inequities are rampant and life-threatening -- especially when exacerbated by #misinformation... If you identify with one of the equity-deserving groups listed below, you may be able to add value to this #research in ways that will support others... (Sharing to expand audience)

17 million Canadians watch women’s sports. I’m not one of them.  To be clear, I don’t watch men’s sports, either. But after spending four hours with a team of whip-smart and dedicated advocates who work at Canadian Women & Sport | Femmes et sport au Canada, I was left to wonder: What if I’d grown up seeing athletes I could identify with competing at the top of their game?  Instead, my formative years taught me by osmosis that the field was a near-exclusive male preserve… that my country’s national sport, celebrated every Saturday night, was played, coached, and colour-commented solely by men.  Maybe if the 1976 gold medal gymnast Nadia Comaneci weren’t the only world class athlete I could name from my childhood, I would get as excited today about watching sports as I do about tucking into the next season of My Brilliant Friend, Hacks or Abbott Elementary.  In fact, I ran competitively and played softball in grade school. Although the lure of performing in theatrical productions won out over track and field once I hit grade 9, I did join the cheerleading squad.  (But I am ashamed to say it didn’t occur to my pre-feminist self to question the default tradition at my school that saw our all-girl squad shaking pom poms at boys’ games, but not girls’.)  Despite the lack of role models, however, the visceral enjoyment I experienced from a young age of moving my body and feeling the beat of my heart, adrenaline through my veins, and the elation of exhaustion well-earned, fueled a life-long exercise habit.  It didn’t give me the kind of community and social relationships that so many team players develop, but it did help to frame my sense of my body as an entity that could be trained to master skills, rather than an object to be decorated for, looked at and desired by others. That’s a gift that every girl should receive. And it’s just one of the benefits that comes from ensuring our sports infrastructure supports both boys and girls in engaging in athletics. I learned a lot from sharing media interview skills and preparation strategies with Canadian Women & Sport | Femmes et sport au Canada last week, and I really appreciate that Allison Sandmeyer-Graves, Stephanie Talsma, Marijke Vandergrift, Christianne Varty, Jacqueline Tittley, Camille Wallace… and their colleagues are working to ensure girls and women have equal opportunities to enjoy the physical and mental benefits that #sport has the capacity to deliver. You can learn more about their impactful programs for players and parents, coaches and organizations at the link in the comment section below. Photo of the remarkable Canadian soccer star, Christine Sinclair, by Andy Jacobsohn, Associated Press

"It is not enough to acknowledge past wrongs; we must take decisive action." Yes: land acknowledgements are literally the *least* we can do. And since no photographic record exists of the unconscionable removal of thousands of children from their parents' loving arms, artist Ken Monkman's painting does the necessary work of a thousand words.

Is it possible to make a meaningful vs performative land acknowledgement? Let me try: As an urban-dwelling, condo-owning, white person whose connection to the land is mostly limited to walks along the small river running through my downtown-adjacent neighbourhood, it’s been easy for me to feel removed from Canada’s historical dispossession of #Indigenous peoples. Then a few years ago, a conference speaker challenged me to think differently. In line with an insight I share often – audiences remember less what you say, than what they thought about what you said – I don’t recall her precipitating comment. But it inspired the following reflection...  My late mother grew up on a beautiful and fertile piece of farmland in the Niagara region bordering the south shore of Lake Ontario. She spoke with pride about having descended from “United Empire Loyalists.” That meant nothing to me as a kid, but the Canadian Encyclopedia will tell you that UELs were American colonists who “supported the British cause and Crown during the American Revolution.” That dangerous stance made them vulnerable to mob violence. Their property was vandalized and confiscated. Not surprisingly, close to 50,000 of them migrated north of the border. In appreciation for their loyalty and losses, the British government compensated them with land. #Treaty land.  This understanding of the origins of the property I visited and loved as a child has changed how I think about the following passage from the #TruthandReconciliation Report: “For over a century, the central goals of Canada’s Aboriginal policy were to eliminate Aboriginal governments; ignore Aboriginal rights; terminate the Treaties; and, through a process of assimilation, cause Aboriginal peoples to cease to exist as distinct legal, social, cultural, religious, and racial entities in Canada.” I didn’t personally terminate treaties, champion assimilation or play any role in creating the terrors of residential schools, but my privilege is still implicated in this history. I am a settler.  My mother’s maiden name was Secord, and my maternal family tree can be traced back to the inspiring Laura Secord, who is believed to have played a small but important role in the war of 1812. The statue of Ms. Secord just north of the War Memorial in Ottawa is one of the few on or near Parliament Hill celebrating a woman. I have embraced this connection, affecting her sombre expression in pursuit of a family resemblance in the 17-year-old photo below. But my pride in my heritage is now complicated by my expanded understanding of at least one explicit way in which my family benefited from others’ dispossession. I cannot own one without acknowledging the other. This is part of my truth. And alongside my colleagues at Informed Opinions, I am actively seeking #reconciliation opportunities, both personal and organizational. More on that in the weeks and months to come. #NationaldayforTruthandReconciliation