Brooklyn Cooper

RED DEER, Alta. – The Red Deer Museum & Art Gallery (MAG) hosts a Family Day event on Monday afternoon.

Staff and volunteers welcome Central Alberta families to Our Stories: This is Us – Family Day at the MAG.

Michael Dawe, Red Deer historian and guest speaker at the Red Deer MAG, presents a storytelling performance to a crowd of families. 

Both Dawe’s father and mother’s side of the family are from Red Deer. “I’m the fifth generation of my family to live here,” he says. 

One of the most impactful transformations for Dawe was to witness the dramatic change in Red Deer’s population over the years. “When I was a kid it was about 18,000,” says Dawe. “Now it’s 100,000 plus.” 

Dawe joined the Red Deer Archives Committee in 1970 and worked there until 2017. Dawe has since shifted his focus and works as a councillor for the city. 

Lorna Johnson, executive director at Red Deer Museum, says this Family Day event has been taking place for at least 10 years. “One year we had over 1000 guests,” Johnson says.

Although last year was a slow year because of the Canada Winter Games, which took place in Red Deer and the surrounding area, staff and volunteers are hoping for a bigger turnout this year. 

Johnson says the new Anne Frank exhibition at the museum has attracted a lot of people.

“We’ve found that weekends have been really busy since we’ve opened that exhibition,” says Johnson.

The Anne Frank exhibition is a travelling exhibition from the Anne Frank House that uses images from the Frank family and quotes from Anne Frank’s diary. Each panel displays information surrounding the Second World War and the persecution of the Jews.

Megan McCullough, a grade 12 student, was given the opportunity through a social studies class to create an art project that would contribute to the Anne Frank exhibition. The project is called Let’s be Frank: Teens Tackling Racism.

McCullough’s project, titled Love, was a book folding piece. “I decided on Love because it’s universal and it can be applied to so many themes,” says McCullough. 

Megan McCullough, grade 12 student from Red Deer, stands next to her artwork displayed at the Anne Frank exhibit #artwork #MAG pic.twitter.com/Fr4sLeugek

— Brooklyn Cooper (@Brooklynacooper) February 17, 2020

This is the first book folding project that McCullough completed by herself. “I did it with my grandma in Palm Springs, she always used to fold books when she was down there so I thought I would do that for this project,” says McCullough.

The Red Deer MAG brought families of all ages together to celebrate traditions, heritage and modernity.

Brooklyn Cooper

EDMONTON, Alta. – In a forum on Monday Jan. 27, Johan Lidberg, Australian deputy head of journalism at Monash University, says national security in Australia is failing. 

“It is beyond anything that has ever happened in recent memory,” says Lidberg. 

Lidberg, editor of the book In the Name of Security, believes a bill of rights needs to be implemented in order to stop this growing issue. 

Whistleblowers and journalists in Australia can be prosecuted for doing their job in relation to political figures. 

While Australia is a democracy, the government has the power to control the flow of information.

He says this lack of security goes way beyond media freedom, it’s about civil liberties such as freedom of speech and media freedom.

“It has turned into an Australian sport which is extremely disappointing,” Lidberg told an audience of about 40 people while speaking at the MacEwan University Feigel Conference Centre.

Lidberg demonstrated this crisis by showing a video from MediaWatch ABC of the severity of the security issue in Australia. In June 2019, the Australian Broadcasting Corporation office was raided by police in response to journalistic work alleging unlawful killings by Australian troops in Afghanistan. 

The five eyes are an anglophone intelligence alliance comprising of Australia, Canada, New Zealand, United Kingdom, and the United States. Of these five countries, Australia is the only country that does not have media protection laws. 

Lidberg believes that in the future people will choose where to live in the world based on the security they desire to have.

He says climate has become harsher for national security, especially now with the current wildfire crisis in Australia.

Jordan Mennis, Canadian resident who recently traveled to Australia for recreational purposes, says conditions are unlike anything she ever expected. 

Mennis has been in Australia for 3 months and says conditions have worsened over time.

“The air quality has affected me,” Mennis says. “But only for about three days when it was really bad, and I could not go outside.” 

Mennis says 10 million hectares of land, which is approximately the size of England, have already burned.

According to Lidberg, more than 11.5 million people have been directly impacted by the wildfires. 

“My personal experience overall has been mostly unaffected as I’m living on the coast rather than inland where most of the fires are burning,” Mennis says.

“The fire season gets longer and longer every year,” Lidberg says in fear.

Brooklyn Cooper

EDMONTON, Alta. – In a speech earlier today, Johan Lidberg, Australian deputy head of journalism at Monash University, says national security in Australia is failing.  

“It is beyond anything that has ever happened in recent memory,” says Lidberg. 

Lidberg, author of In the Name of Security, believes a bill of rights needs to be implemented in order to stop this growing issue. 

He says this lack of security goes way beyond media freedom, it’s about civil liberties.

“It has turned into an Australian sport which is extremely disappointing,” Lidberg told an audience of 40 people while speaking at the MacEwan Feigel Conference Centre.

He says climate has become harsher for national security, especially now with the current wildfire crisis in Australia.

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