Action Blast: August 19, 2026
💥 TAKE ACTION TODAY 💥
💧 One Month to River Run! 💧
Grassy Narrows youth and community members are travelling to Toronto to continue their fight for mercury justice. Will you join them?
River Run is coming up on Wednesday, September 23. Starting at 12pm at Grange Park, we’ll hear from Grassy Narrows community members about the ongoing colonial violence they face, their resistance, the wins they’ve secured, and the demands that they continue to fight for. More information about the march route and speakers will be available as we get closer to the event — make sure to RSVP to receive the latest updates!
We’re working to make River Run 2026 as accessible as possible, including ASL interpretation, an access van, partnering with Mask Bloc Toronto, and more. If you have specific access needs related to River Run that you’d like to share with us, please include them in the form when you RSVP!
Help make River Run a success - sign up to volunteer! We’re particularly looking for marshals, sound techs, and folks to pull the sound carts, but there are lots of different ways to get involved. Whatever your skills or level of experience, there’s a role for you!
On Monday, August 24 and Monday, September 21, join Running the Risk and Artists for Climate & Migrant Justice and Indigenous Sovereignty for two evenings of wheatpasting to spread the word about this year’s River Run. This is a direct way that you can support Grassy in their continued fight, and learn how to effectively wheatpaste!
Not in Toronto? There will be buses coming from communities around the province, find one near you:
♿ Toronto Disability Pride March ♿
Celebrating 15 years of Toronto Disability Pride March!
As disability continues to gain social capital, and our language starts to be co-opted, our visibility and lived experience are more needed than ever. Please join us as we take to the streets and celebrate 15 years of resistance, rage, joy, celebration, and survival.
🗓️ Saturday, September 12
⏰ 1 - 6 PM
📍Queen’s Park to Grange Park
Check out the full access guide and event info in ASL.
Looking to get more involved?
Join TDPM Saturday, August 29 from 1 - 4 PM for their annual banner making party, and help create and decide what the next banner should be!
TDPM is also looking for volunteers on the day of the march to help with marshaling, set up/clean up, and access. No experience necessary - email TorontoDisabilityPride@gmail.com.
Donate - TDPM is a volunteer-run grassroots organization, and 100% of funds raised go towards the annual banner making party and march.
Let’s roll! 🖤❤️💛🤍💙💚🖤
🍉 Tribute to Palestinian Journalists 🍉
Join Palestinian Youth Movement to honor the life and struggle of Anas al-Sharif, to mourn his martyrdom and that of his colleagues, and to understand explicitly how it is that mainstream western media enabled their deaths to occur unabated.
🗓️ Saturday, August 22
⏰ 2 PM
📍Register for location
On Aug 10, 2025, the Israeli occupation forces assassinated Anas Al-Sharif and five other journalists: Mohamed Qreiqeh, Moamen Aliwa, Mohammed Nofal, Ibrahim Zaher, and Mohemd Al-Khalidi. This targeting of Anas and his colleagues follows a long history of attacks against Palestinian journalists aimed at silencing Palestinian voices.
During the Gaza genocide, which continues to this day, over 270 journalists have been martyred with many more all over Palestine, Lebanon and the region. Over 42 journalists are currently imprisoned facing the worst conditions. These attempts at killing the truth will not succeed, we will not let the voices of Gaza die.
📚 More Actions and Resources 💻
This is where we link to external content we found interesting, challenging, or thought-provoking this month. Our movements are stronger when we listen to, learn from, and collaborate with folks whose perspectives and approaches are different from ours. Inclusion here does not imply endorsement.
Act:
The public consultation on Ontario’s framework for AI data centres closes September 12. Send your feedback to Premier Ford and Energy Minister Lecce and sign the petition calling for a moratorium on data centres in Ontario!
Elbit is Israel’s biggest arms manufacturer. No company is profiting more from this genocide, and yet Canadian suppliers continue to send parts to Elbit, and the Canadian government continues to purchase arms from Elbit. Tell suppliers and the government: Enough is enough. Not one more part. Not one more dollar. Not one more ounce of legitimacy to the engine of Israel’s war machine.
In October 2016, a tugboat ran aground off the coast of British Columbia and spilled over 110,000 litres of diesel oil in Haíɫzaqv (Heiltsuk) Nation’s waters. Now, nearly ten years later, the Nation still hasn’t been fully compensated by the federal government for the harms they have suffered to their food systems, economy, and way of life, and they continue to seek justice in the courts. Sign the pledge to show solidarity with the legal action Haíɫzaqv Nation is taking to protect not just their coastline, but coastal ecosystems across Canada.
The Canada Border Services Agency (CBSA)raided an international student protest in Calgary on August 12, 2026, a blatant assault on Charter rights to free political expression and assembly. Learn more about the protests and raid, and donate to the Legal Defense Fund to support students who have received exclusion orders, creating fear of removal and separation from the lives they have built here.
Attend:
August 22
Let the Children Learn - art exhibition & fundraiser
August 25
August 26
Doing the work: radical solidarity for a collective future - workshop (virtual)
August 29
Land and Liberation - panel discussion
Davenport Aid Brigade: What We Have Done - teach-in & discussion
Monthly Protest Against Doug Ford in Toronto and across Ontario
Read/Watch/Listen:
Grassy Narrows
Half a century after mercury contamination near Grassy Narrows First Nation, the poisoning continues to have deadly consequences — especially for youth: Children of the poisoned river.
For decades, the people of Grassy Narrows have confronted different threats - from the mercury poisoning to clear-cutting and mining. And for decades, they have fought back: Inside a First Nation’s quest for justice.
For more than 50 years, the people of Grassy Narrows have lived with the serious health effects of mercury contamination. Now, after decades of broken government promises, a new environmental threat is facing the community: Something in the Water.
The continued violence of settler colonialism imposed on Grassy Narrows and all Indigenous Nations is real and enacted by all levels of governance in so-called Canada. It is enacted in our name and carried out with exacting consequences, as intended. As settlers, we can unite in solidarity and support Grassy Narrows First Nation. Settler colonialism will never win.
Disability Justice
Why are we so quick to use disability as a shorthand for incompetence, weakness, irrationality, moral failure, or the source of harmful political views? Progressive spaces have an ableism issue, and we need to talk about it.
Decarcerating Care: Taking Policing out of Mental Health Crisis Response – a community discussion bringing together frontline organizers with a range of perspectives on how to maintain the safety and health of our communities in ways that are free from the police, rooted in survivors' experience, and designed to preserve the rights and autonomy of those in crisis.
Racism plays a huge part in disability access and who gets it. This is especially noticeable in the disparities between the accessibility of neighbourhoods predominately populated by white people and neighbourhoods that are predominately populated by people of color.
Deaf And Native Hawaiian: ʻŌlelo Sign Language Offers A Cultural Connection. ʻŌlelo Hawaiʻi Kuhi Lima is a growing initiative focused on creating hand signs rooted in ʻŌlelo Hawaiʻi, cultural knowledge, and community practice.
Ontario’s Big City Mayors plan to endorse involuntary treatment (“addiction care”) this month. This is not about compassionate care for people who are substance users, but it is about invisibilizing poor and racialized people.