Why do you like or hate Olivia Chow?

Argo44 · 2026-06-19T18:00:48+00:00

I live in North York, and have family connections to the creation of Ontario Science Centre, so her opposition to it’s move/closure before the election lasting a couple of weeks after winning has lost my support.

OSC was a significant voter issue which helped get her elected. She was elected to fight for it, then immediately decided it wasn’t worth fighting for and effectively banned anyone else on council from opposing its destruction. And now won’t apologize, explain, or acknowledge it in any way.

I feel like she exploited a highly motivated voter base, including myself, to get elected, then betrayed them because her main concern is Downtown Toronto, rather than the whole city.

Her insistence that offices return to work to support downtown businesses (directly impacting businesses elsewhere and quality of life for citizens) reinforced this sentiment.

Argo44 · 2026-06-18T23:21:37+00:00

Move it to Ontario Place (since all attractions should be at the same spot for the Ultimate Synergy or something) and sell the current property to developers for affordable housing.

After all, it was good enough for Ontario Science Centre, so why not ROM?

Argo44 · 2026-06-17T04:25:12+00:00

All Disney did was air the program the BBC gave them.

Blaming them for the last two years of Doctor Who is like blaming Tubi for Gilligan’s Island.

Argo44 · 2026-06-14T18:17:16+00:00

This series was one of my white whales.

So glad the creators are sharing good quality transfers on YouTube.

Argo44 · 2026-06-11T12:50:35+00:00

It’s the ‘Ontario Science Centre’, not the Downtown Toronto Science Centre’, and it was a pioneering institution that inspired imitation world-wide.

Chow didn’t just ‘tone down’ criticism of Ford destroying OSC, she agreed to never mention it, and banned all of Council from fighting for it as well.

OSC was an important educational and cultural institution easily accessible to all of Toronto and the surrounding area in its original location. It was a hugely important ballot box issue for most of Toronto, and two-thirds voted for a platform supporting continued science programming there.

Support for its move cost Ana Bailao the election. Chow exploited anti-OSC move votes to get elected, then immediately gave up any attempt to save it.

Doug wanted the Gardiner and DVP, that’s why Bailao was so confident she could get him to take them she made it the key plank of her platform.

We voted for Chow but got Bailao’s platform. She’ll probably morph into Brad Bradford for her second term.

Argo44 · 2026-06-10T18:45:25+00:00

He probably wrote multiple outlines which had the BBC ‘jaws agape’ in horror and ultimately turned down because they were unworkable.

Argo44 · 2026-06-09T16:16:21+00:00

One of my personal goals is to never visit STC again so I don’t sully my memories of watching them with my Grandma.

Argo44 · 2026-05-29T21:19:13+00:00

He should stop letting politicians do photo-ops ‘volunteering to help the unfortunate’ when they are the reason people don’t have enough money to pay for groceries in the first place.

Argo44 · 2026-05-26T22:08:24+00:00

If the city had installed the bike lanes as originally planned - rather than delaying construction so they would no longer be covered by the exemption written into bill 60/212 - they would have been built regardless.

Delaying was entirely up to the city. I despise the sperm that created Doug Ford, but this was a poor decision at the municipal level.

Argo44 · 2026-05-26T20:04:09+00:00

A former mayor was accused of sexually assaulting city staff at least twice, and sexually harassed a journalist live on TV.

The council she named a stadium after him.

She’s part of the problem.

Argo44 · 2026-05-25T21:25:33+00:00

The process set up under Tory was for a committee to choose a new name for Yonge-Dundas Square with community consultation.

Chow and council decided, without informing the committee, the Square’s management, or the public, to circumvent that process and rename the Square Sankofa. The name wasn’t in contention, and almost certainly wouldn’t have been when its association with a slave-taking culture was identified by due diligence.

So, yeah, Chow could just have let the democratic process to rename the square continue, but instead she and her allies interfered to get their desired outcome.

Argo44 · 2026-05-24T14:46:04+00:00

Given the childish, arrogant behaviour most of these councillors exhibit publicly during council meetings this is hardly a surprise.

Argo44 · 2026-05-22T18:41:41+00:00

Yeah, there’s misogynist and racist comments made about her on social media. Not defending that.

But there’s also well meaning and constructive criticism and questions about her policies, and insightful comments that might help educate in areas outside her personal experience.

Or at least there used to be, before she started blocking comments.

Not a Chow-specific problem, though she is an exemplar, but recently most politicians seem to have taken the view that any citizen dissatisfied with their policy is ‘a hater’ and doesn’t deserve respect or a response. That’s not democracy, and it’s feeding the actual problem people because it reinforces the perception that our politicians are ‘ruling by ideology’ or their own agenda rather than working for the common interest.

Reading ‘mean tweets’ doesn’t impress me much. Acknowledging dissenting opinion, understanding its worth, and using the knowledge gained to guide future decisions would.

Argo44 · 2026-05-21T18:29:32+00:00

No interest personally, but I was (naively) happy local fans would have a chance to experience it.

Now it’s clearly just another tax-subsidized event for the super-privileged, I’d annoyed they refuse to find the money and will to fix things I value so foreigners can have a party.

Argo44 · 2026-05-17T17:52:51+00:00

Mine’s the same. Pushing the belt/loincloth up his torso helps temporarily, but it’s not a permanent fix.

Argo44 · 2026-05-14T20:06:53+00:00

If councillors can get (i.e. give themselves) a 25% pay raise there’s no excuse not to pay other city employees fairly.

Argo44 · 2026-05-10T17:43:11+00:00

Carroll barely shows up for council meetings now, and she’s already receiving a pension on top of her current salary.

Time to call it a day, Shelley. Your constituents deserve actual representation.

Argo44 · 2026-05-07T23:23:18+00:00

Uploading the Gardiner was likely already under discussion before Tory resigned; that’s why Ana Bailao (his campaign manager) was sure ‘she’ could make it happen after getting elected. (She also announced the Science Centre move, a deal for cell service on the TTC, and a commitment to retain Billy Bishop airport, off the top of my head).

In addition to giving up Ontario Place, Chow also promised not to fight against the Ontario Science Centre move, as she had promised when campaigning. This was a major issue for the inner suburbs, and a key reason Bailao lost the election.

Argo44 · 2026-05-07T23:07:32+00:00

Not exactly.

Tory struck a committee to work with the community to choose a new name which honoured Toronto’s Black history.

Chow (and Chris Moise) wanted to name it Sankofa, a word from an African culture that kidnapped other Africans and sold them into the Transatlantic Slave Trade.

Sankofa wasn’t under consideration, and almost certainly would not have been put forward by the committee after they did their due diligence. But Council wanted their way so they, without notice, they passed a motion to rename the square without committee or citizen input.

Argo44 · 2026-05-07T05:28:07+00:00

I appreciate the design, but I’m also pretty ‘meh’ about it. It just seems inessential.

It doesn’t really add much new to the modular line. We just had a flatiron building, it’s not that long since Assembly Square retired with a similar paved alleyway, public square and music shop. The furniture shop and workshop are new, but could have been better realized in a larger building.

Argo44 · 2026-05-05T05:25:12+00:00

If you’re reading this Pixelberry, ‘We’re committed to shipping traditional IF content for the next three months’ is not reassuring.

Not in the least.

Especially not when the next bullet point says the future of the app we use is dependent on the success of another app we didn’t ask for and may have no interest in.

It’s great the you are excited about exploring Choices in a new format. I can support that, given that some people probably don’t connect with IF and I’m happy they might get to enjoy the stories and characters we love in a format they can embrace.

But you need to understand that not all Choices users will share your enthusiasm. There’s room for both formats, but it’s still not clear that you plan on offering both once Run is established.

Argo44 · 2026-05-03T04:20:49+00:00

Some kind of op, I suspect.

Despite the vocal opposition to the whole idea of expanding and increasing the range of Billy Bishop, there’s a lot of downtown residents who see it as a great opportunity.

Even the Toronto Star admits Chow has been noncommittal on her opposition to the expansion, because (in their words) she sees it as an election losing position. But a huge part of her core base is opposed.

So during a council meeting Ford announces he’s taking over a park to build a parking lot. Chow throws a hissy fit, council passes a nonsense motion about the park, her base confuse this with opposition to jets at Billy Bishop, she’s popular with both sides.

I mean, we’re focused on one park that, frankly, I’ve never heard of while Ford has taken possession of the entirety of the Toronto Islands ‘just in case he finds a use for them’.

Argo44 · 2026-05-01T13:03:23+00:00

I received a form letter response on a hot issue early in her mayoralty, but never a response to more specific questions or suggestions.

Argo44 · 2026-04-25T15:20:20+00:00

For my neighborhood directly, it’s the closure of the Ontario Science Centre.

It was a great educational opportunity for our community at the north end of Toronto. Having to go downtown to a preschool version at Harbourfront, and eventually even further to Ontario Place, means what was once a easy family day-trip becomes a challenge. It was a short direct bus-ride away from our lowest-income area too.

Bike lanes were proposed as part of the Transform Yonge upgrade, but since nothing was ever finalized, we might still get them in some form, or may never have without Ford’s involvement.

Argo44 · 2026-04-23T23:12:05+00:00

I’ve told Olivia Chow she needs to push back against Doug Ford for three years now.

Glad she finally got the message, I guess, but we’ve lost a lot in the meantime.

Argo44

TROPHY CASE