just the juice

Namaygoosisagagun First Nation/Collins has burned to the ground. The entire community is nothing but ashes after being quickly consumed by wildfires. They did not have any support from emergency services, and no one offered aid. The community saved themselves by escaping into boats because no one came.

Mishkeegogamang and Cat Lake have lost power. Families are ending up in shelters with nothing. Armstrong, Lac La Croix, Whitesand, Gull Bay, Lac des Mille Lacs are currently in the fires path and all members are being evacuated.

All this loss, all this devastation, and it was entirely preventable.

After steadily underfunding wildland firefighting and purposefully excluding Indigenous wildland firefighters and Indigenous wildfire organizations from wildfire operations, firefighter training, decisionmaking, and resource exchanges, in 2025, Doug Ford slashed the forest firefighting budget.

It's hard to ignore his decision to cut funding and leave us out of adequate fire training (even though we've lived with forest fires for thousands of years—far longer than settlers have been in Canada—and made sure fires like the ones we're all seeing today were prevented through kinisitotēn) when, despite making up less than 5% of the population, we account for 42% percent of all wildfire evacuations in Canada.

And when we are successfully evacuated, we face discrimination and racism—like Kashechewan—because it's always been easier to blame us than it is to blame the true culprit: denialism, corportate greed, and colonization.

The people of Collins and every other impacted community deserve better.

Right now, the AFN is currently accepting donations to help Collins First Nation. If you're able to, please consider donating.

ONWA (Ontario Native Women's Association) is another great place to donate to. They have outreach vans going to motels and inns and offering food, water, resources, and cultural support to those impacted by the wildfires.

Other places to consider donating to are Mikinakoos Emergency Fund, Red Cross, True North Aid, Indigenous Climate Action. You can also send donations directly to Whitesand First Nation via e-transfer ([email protected]) and they request that you add your full name in the e-transfer comment section to receive a tax receipt.

*Before sending money, verify that the appeal appears on an official First Nation, Tribal Council or registered charity channel.

If you can't offer financial support, please consider donating items of need. Moontime Connections is currently accepting drop-off donations. If you live in the Thunder Bay area, Namaygoosisagagun Health Office is also taking in donations! They can also bemailed to Superior Inn Hotel & Conference Centre at 555 West Arthur Street, Thunder Bay, ON, P7E 5P8.

items needed are: food, diapers, medical masks, men’s and women’s joggers (all sizes), children’s clothing (newborn to size 14), children’s shoes, summer clothing, men’s clothing, toiletries (lotion, Vaseline, toothpaste, toothbrushes, shampoo, conditioner, soap, deodorant, etc.), strollers, adult depends-all sizes, dog & cat food

men just love to run their fucking mouth about what women do or do not want without even once considering consulting any actual women on the matter

might need to add panties before I wear this on stage lol

i must, obligitarily, note: a higher amount of transfem cast members (or the presence of them, period) does not necessarily mean a completely safe environment for transfems, either viewers or cast members alike. but at the very least, it demonstrates a marked effort to platform and support trans women as valued community members. an effort which, notably, dropout tv has not bothered to make. nrb in specific, the channel this happened on, is one of the botc community channels striving to make this effort, with one of the key and beloved members in their botc series being mara joy (who is a trans woman, noted not to tokenize her in specific but to highlight her)!!

so, to lay it out more specifically, sam reich made this joke on a platform that is expected to be a safe space for transfem viewers. he was a guest star on a show which has far less social pull than dropout tv, was one of the only white cishet guys in the room, and took advantage of that. i cannot stress this enough: sam reich went to a community that has a general expectation of being a safe place for transfems, as a guest, likely for the purposes of promoting his latest kickstarter, and he used that platform to make a "joke" about transfems being pedophiles.

it was also directed towards a gay man, who, like… well, we all saw the clip, it's my opinion that he looks pretty genuinely uncomfortable for a moment before trying to hide it by playing it up for the camera. tbh i find it disappointing that said joke ended up in the final edit at all! but the fact that sam felt so comfortable dropping that kind of quip given the setting and the current overall climate is so frustrating and gross.