The hockey world, especially at the NHL level, has been extremely quiet on racial justice issues for too many years - until now. The Black-led uprising for Black Lives Matter following the police murder of George Floyd in May 2020 finally prompted an outpouring of statements from the NHL and several high profile players. We have never seen anything like this in professional hockey before. To help us make sense of the moment, we hear from two of the finest journalists reporting on sports and soci...
Jun 24, 2020•40 min•Season 2Ep. 6
Happy new year! This is our first episode of 2020, and it's nice to have you with us for a new decade of hockey and resistance :) Our esteemed guest on the show today is Matt Hern . Matt lives in Vancouver, where he’s an activist, scholar, and writer. While he writes on a variety of fascinating topics ranging from free schools to global warming to parenting, he’s one of the most exciting and engaged radical sports philosophers that I know. Matt put out a book back in 2013 called “One Game at a T...
Jan 16, 2020•49 min•Season 2Ep. 5
We are at a watershed moment in hockey history right now. Many of us know that hockey has had a racism problem for a long time, but now the conversations are coming to the surface in ways that they never have before. And Courtney Szto is one of the most important people driving those conversations. She's our guest on this episode of Changing on the Fly, and we got to talk about everything from Hockey Night in Punjabi to the changing face of hockey today. Follow Courtney Szto on Twitter Like this...
Dec 16, 2019•32 min•Season 2Ep. 4
It's official. Don Cherry, the long time host of Hockey Night in Canada, has been fired. FINALLY. It comes after his most recent racist tirade (far from his first) on live TV against immigrants in Canada. We break down Don Cherry and his penchant for biggotry with Kristi Allain . Kristi teaches in the department of sociology at St-Thomas University in Fredericton, NB, and has penned several articles and studies on Cherry's hate-spewing rhetoric. Find her on Twitter @Kristi_Allain. Plus we hear s...
Nov 11, 2019•33 min•Season 2Ep. 3
Welcome back to Season 2 of Changing on the Fly! Our guest on this episode is Erica Ayala. Erica is an NWHL analyst, broadcaster, and an expert on women’s hockey. We talk here about the women’s hockey strike in Sweden, the Dream Gap tour in women’s hockey in North America, and so much more. Follow Erica on Twitter @elindsay08 If you like this podcast, then support us! www.patreon.com/changingonthefly Read Hemal Jhaveri's article about Auston Matthews here ....
Sep 30, 2019•37 min•Season 2Ep. 1
This is our last episode of Changing On The Fly for season 1! We'll be back with season 2 in the fall. So as we head out for the summer, we leave you with this very special episode. Fred Sasakamoose is a Cree elder from the Ahtahkakoop Cree reservation in central Saskatchewan. He famously became one of the first Indigenous people to ever play in the NHL, putting on a Chicago Blackhawks jersey and playing 11 games for the team in the 1953 season. But the road to there was paved with trauma, trage...
Jun 15, 2019•24 min•Season 1Ep. 13
On today’s episode, we’re finally bringing you part 2 of a 2 part series called Pucks, Punks, and Politics - conversations with punk rockers on hockey, radical politics, and the art of getting loud. Our first part of this series was with Chris 2 from Anti-Flag, and if you missed that you can go back and listen to Episode 10 . Today’s episode is with Jord Samolesky, the drummer of the seminal Winnipeg punk band Propagandhi . Aside from being a very busy touring musician for the last few decades, ...
May 28, 2019•37 min•Season 1Ep. 12
On episode 11 of Changing On The Fly, we tackle the devastating news that the Canadian Women's Hockey League (CWHL) is shutting down its operations after 12 seasons. The announcement from the league came just one week after the Clarkson Cup championship match, and the day before many players from the league were set to fly overseas to Finland for the women's world hockey championships. Bad timing to say the least. We break down and analyze what this all means with two of the most passionate voic...
Apr 16, 2019•54 min•Season 1Ep. 11
Chris Barker (aka Chris #2) from the long-standing Pittsburgh punk band Anti-Flag joins us on this episode to talk hockey, punk, and politics! Chris is a busy guy, and is often found playing bass and singing for Anti-Flag, recording album after album, and touring the world playing to hundreds of thousands of fans. But while he's not on stage, he looks for every opportunity he can get to play or watch hockey. Chris came on the podcast to talk about his working-class Steel City, the anti-fascist &...
Apr 01, 2019•56 min•Season 1Ep. 10
A History of Le Smashy-Smash There have been at least 8 recorded hockey riots in Canadian history. While often dismissed as simply drunken hooliganism, these events actually reveal important social & class tensions, and we can learn a lot from them. On today's episode of Changing on the Fly, we walk you through a brief history of hockey riots, starting with the Maurice Richard Riot in Montreal on March 17, 1955, and ending with the most recent, the Vancouver Stanley Cup Riot of June, 2011. O...
Mar 18, 2019•55 min•Season 1Ep. 9
Today on the podcast, we go to Alberta. The Calgary Flames and Edmonton Oilers are sworn enemies on the ice, their rivalry known as the 'Battle of Alberta'. And off the ice, the way these cities approach their hockey infrastructure couldn't be any more different. Calgary residents recently voted in a referendum to refuse the city's bid to host the 2026 Winter Olympics, and the city is also adamantly refusing to pour public money into building a new arena for the Flames. Meanwhile 3 hours up the ...
Mar 04, 2019•58 min•Season 1Ep. 8
On this episode of the podcast, we bring you an exclusive and candid conversation with Jessica Platt of the Toronto Furies! On January 10, 2018, Jessica made history when she came out as the first trans pro hockey player in Canada. And she did so in a beautiful message posted to Instagram , encouraging other young trans athletes to be their true selves, and follow their dreams. In our interview, Jessica tells us her story about growing up, falling in love with hockey, her struggles that forced h...
Jan 30, 2019•33 min•Season 1Ep. 7
On this episode of Changing On The Fly, we kick it with Tomas Jirousek, an Indigenous student athlete at McGill University in Montreal. He's a rower & former hockey player hailing from the Kainai First Nation in Alberta, and he's been leading the charge to get McGill to change their racist varsity team name - The Redmen. The McGill admin is poised to make their final decision on the matter in January, so shit is about to get historic. Then we take you to a recent demonstration held at McGill...
Jan 10, 2019•27 min
On this episode of Changing on the Fly, we take on the double-headed beast of toxic masculinity and homophobia in hockey. We start by looking at the greatest and oldest fountain of toxic masculinity in hockey broadcasting, Don Cherry of Coach's Corner. But then, to look at something uplifting and inspiring, we'll hear about one of the most widespread activist movements to combat homophobia in sports, the You Can Play project. Our guests on today's show are: -Dr. Kristi Allain, professor of socio...
Dec 03, 2018•39 min
Changing On The Fly is going live! On this episode, we'll hear a round-table discussion called "Power Play: How Women Can Change Sports Journalism and Hockey". The event was recorded in the Feminist Media Studio of Concordia University on January 31st, 2018. The guests are: -Meg Hewings, General Manager of Les Canadiennes -Robyn Flynn, sports reporter for TSN 690 and The Athletic -Safia Ahmad, former sports reporter for The Link, and current Media Relations Manager for Les Canadiennes **Like thi...
Nov 12, 2018•1 hr 1 min
How did Gritty, the new mascot for the Philadelphia Flyers, become the new mascot for the American anti-fascist movement? Gritty is a huge, ugly, scary orange monster, who comes to us at a time when there is an equally huge, ugly, scary orange monster in the White House. We're joined on this episode by Mark Bray, history professor & the author of "Antifa: The Anti-Fascist Handbook" to talk about Gritty, hockey, and what the antifa movement actually is. Since we're talking about Pennsylvania ...
Oct 31, 2018•35 min
If you look at the face of hockey, it's about as white as the ice the game is played on. But if you start to scratch the surface, you start to notice that not only is the game much more diverse than you think, but also that people of color have a long and celebrated history in the sport. Yet still, racism and racial discrimination run rampant throughout the sport today. On this episode of Changing on the Fly, we take on the topics of race and racism in hockey. We'll hear about the amazing histor...
Oct 17, 2018•32 min
Welcome to the very first episode of Changing on the Fly, a podcast about hockey and social justice! On this episode, we lace up the skates and hit the ice to talk about colonialism in hockey, and the Indigenous hockey experience. What does it mean to call hockey "Canada's game" while Canada is a country built on stolen Native land? We're gonna take a deep dive into hockey's role in Canada's residential schools, the presence of Native mascots in sports, and the changing role of Indigenous hockey...
Oct 03, 2018•37 min
The new podcast series Changing On The Fly hits the ice October 3, 2018! Here's just a small taste of what you'll hear :) **Want to support this podcast and get some great perks in return? We've got a Patreon page: https://www.patreon.com/changingonthefly **Subscribe now on Apple Podcasts, Stitcher, or follow us here on Soundcloud! Featuring the voices of Damon Kwame Mason, Shireen Ahmed, Don Cherry (barf), Kristi Allain, and Robyn Flynn. Music by The Kendallz. Artwork by Loki Design. www.changi...
Sep 18, 2018•2 min
