All right, we have a fun topic tonight or today tonight today. It depends where you are in the world We have people all over the world watching this. So hey, we have a fun topic. We're talking about Like bits of digital currency versus drinkable ketones and it seems so kind of complex the difference between the two and like is it really? Like how can you compare the two? But let's talk about the like what I want to actually talk about is the like the impact it can make right so Just for fun as you come on. What's up, Mike? What's up, Michael as you come on like how big do you think digital currency? I use Bitcoin as that kind of poll because people know what that is But how big do you think that's gonna become in the future? Do you think that's gonna become on your standard? versus drinkable ketones and What I can tell you is what I know And I'm gonna look at the numbers a little bit here But this to me, this is a big deal because right now in this weird world we're in I'm obviously in the keto space I actually own some digital currencies also But when I started thinking about it like look at the demographics of where we're on the world what phase we're in I'd love to share my viewpoints of the significance of the two Because I think if you're looking at it from objectively, I think you're gonna see probably the same way I see it now some financial people might not necessarily always agree with me And I'm definitely biased first off and foremost. I am biased to the keto space Because it's what I specialize in I'm fascinated with the digital currency, but I also think it's the wild wild west I think that right now in the digital currency world like what is real what's not real What's gonna be the thing that's gonna stick is it gonna stick is it you know I mean like I think we're in this really early phase of it all Although I I do believe it in the future. It's gonna be something real Who and what is gonna be the real part of it? I don't know yet But as for keto, I just I had a call with our CEO And good friend of mine Brian Underwood and we've been chatting a lot lately about this is that people don't even understand Like when you look at the science and you look at what's happening in the space of drinkable ketones It is groundbreaking. It's something we've never seen before in the history of the world It's all new and when you're in the health and wellness space or the supplemental space This is something that you don't really see in almost in the lifetime like really over the last hundred years Maybe protein is the only thing that has come in a supplemental health world That has been backed by so many different variety of people Vitamin D is kind of becoming that thing fish oil vitamin E vitamin E Or vitamin F for a fish oil was talked about in the 70s and poo barred and all this time And now it's finally catching likes now Right at the same time it doesn't it's not gonna have nearly the impact on the global world or the global impact and have such a huge ripple effect as ketones will so my vote is ketones right now are A bigger play or a bigger opportunity For your own health for opportunity if you're looking at it from a business side of things Then even digital currency and here's the reason why When you start looking at it, we have a bunch of patents and a bunch of science that just came out It's why I'm a little excited about it It's it's stuff that's been ongoing right when you look at studies and you do patents and it takes time It takes years.  Hopefully Hopefully Some of this will get to come out in keto Academy that's coming up in a couple weeks But most likely not all of it will be because it's just a lot of movie parts when you comes to patents and when it comes to Research and studies, but you think about this way The majority of our population and if you're not to renew right now If you're like if you're a person right now looking for an opportunity, right? We have this we call a soft economy. Some people will call it a recession We like to call a soft economy because we think words matter And if you're depends on who you are you might think it otherwise But there's a huge opportunities around a down economy or a soft economy There's a huge opportunity when in 0809010 or 11 There's a lot of big companies that came out of that because they took advantage of the timing of it All right, and so right now in the timing if you're looking for more of a You know, maybe you're partially retired or you want to be retired soon You're looking for maybe a way to create income over your retirement over the next five or ten or twenty years There's something you should pay attention to if you're somebody that's looking to create an additional income through your you know Like I'm a 46 year old father or four. I want extra money for my family to do cool stuff, right? I want security and safety or maybe a young entrepreneur and you just want to take a hit about new hottest thing Either way you should look at this right now if you're into health and wellness You should also pay attention or what I'm about to say so So here's the deal is that the research that's gone going on here right now is that if you look at the population, right? The majority of America. I'm just talking about America. I know there's a lot of Canadians that hey really quick on the chat Facebook, let me know where you're at. Let me know that this is working. I'm on my stream yard So sometimes I can't see the chats, but hey if you're on the chat right now Tell me where you're from And is this interesting to you at all so here's the deal The in America the majority of the American population is above the age of 50 Maryland in the house, but oh So the majority of the population is above 50 so more people Right now in America are are above the age of 50 It has to do how our population turns has happened in Italy quite a few years ago And it has a huge impact on the ripple effect of our future, but that's not what this goes about So think about this. What is the most important to you thing to people above the age of 50? What is the thing that's the most important to people above the age of 50? It's primarily their health Primarily their house second secondary if you ask them what's the most important thing that you want to prove and above the age of 50 They will tell you their health. It's not what weight loss not fat loss. It's their health Right, that's what the most important thing is the second most important thing is is usually relationship with their family And the third most important thing is is their financial situation Those are the three things that are the most important health and retirement right there. Whoever said that French, Mexican in the house That's the thing that's most important to people above the age of 50, right? It has to do with health Family and money. That's it Outside of that. It doesn't matter that much and when the majority of the population is in that state Bitcoin cool, but how much has it served those three things? Yeah, if you take advantage of the opportunity potentially I mean if you invest in this Bitcoin, you know, seven ten years ago Awesome, you could have made a lot of money if you'd have sold in time now It's down, you know, 30 40 50 percent people have lost a ton of money and doesn't mean it's not gonna grow back I don't know. That's not my space but think about this What is the most important thing of the people above 50 that they want for the generation before them? They want what they're looking for now meaning that my mom and my friend and people above the age of 50 they want For their children what they want for themselves now. They want them to get healthier They want them to have quality time with their parent or their kids. They want them to be financially stable so If that's the most important thing and you have the biggest breakthrough This is where keto comes in not keep not the key genetic diet. I want to be clear This is not talking about the key genetic diet. I'm talking about drinkable ketones And only in the form that your body can utilize When they come in play here They're the biggest breakthrough. We will see of at least this decade If not the century and for surely in my business in my life career This is the biggest breakthrough now. I hope something else comes out this bigger I can't fathom at this moment Maybe my son can or my daughter can but I can't fathom at this moment anything It's gonna come through that's gonna change so many lives the way this does not a diet a drink, right? So you have something then the science that's coming in is extraordinary what this does for the body's health for the body's strength To fight off Challenges that's pretty good wording right there. I got to use that later for the what it does for the longevity of the brain Right how ketones impract cognition and brain long-term starting at the age of 3 I was on a call to lady. She's literally in her mid 30s and she's already have a cognitive decline and she says to me She's like do I have to take this forever?  So, you know, you have something that people need forever So this isn't something that they need once in a while, right? This isn't something you need when you work out or you're just trying to lose some weight This is something that you actually need forever and the science and like this is the part of it that because I get excited about because most people When they think about drinkable ketone, they think about weight loss most people that's most 80% of people 85% of people come for weight loss and Yes, that's true Tamra. You have to invest in yourself. I completely agree with that But if you're if you're looking at the future, you want to invest in yourself and how it can impact everybody else Entrepreneurs or people that have changed the trajectory of the world didn't just think about themselves They thought about the ripple effect of generations to come So there's a bigger picture here Tamra that I wanted I want to be clear about because I'm not thinking about myself I'll be okay Right, I've gained enough knowledge wisdom and understanding of understanding where I'm at. I will be just fine But the thing that defies me as a good father or an ancestor is what happens seven generations from now When my seventh generations of my Trudrector of my history comes back and they talk about me. This is just how I think y'all if you this is too above your Above your brains, then that's okay. That's how I think I think about this because I always wondered how my family got to Where they are I'm like how many mistakes did they have to make to get to Minnesota like what a bad place to Stop if you look at where they had to come through like they chose to stop in Minnesota Like keep going to California or stop in Wisconsin at least But why did you choose where you choose because they didn't have any choices, right? So I'm like, I don't remember any of my ancestors I don't know who any of them are three four or five generations ago. I have not a clue Why because they didn't make that big of an impact. They got me here, which is great I'm not to say that this bad thing, but if they look back and say hey, listen, what was that impact? Who's that person you're thinking about generations to come my family's from Minnesota? Hey, some people thrive there It's just not my family. My family does not thrive in Minnesota. That is for sure Blonde hair blue eye not blonde hair or not blue eyes. Just so I just all I got to say so here's the deal Why I'm back on track. So when you think about this is that People are looking for better. They're looking for answers right now people spend Billions of dollars to lose weight less and they all it's like 97% of them fail within three years Billions of dollars. So basically most likely if you're on a weight loss journey, you're gonna fail Statistically, it's so heavily against you. Why because you're focused on the wrong thing, right? So why I love what we're doing is that we're not just focused on weight loss We're focused on in bettering people mindset thinking thoughts energy movement nutrition and supplements ketones that elevate your body's ability to be primitive So it's bringing the natural primitive state of what humans are supposed to be awesome, right? And then supporting you with the ability to elevate the things that you really want in your life You want a high quality relationship? You want high quality relationship with the people you care about you want entrepreneurship You may want financial freedom. Maybe you want positive attitude. Maybe you want longevity Maybe you want a quality of life. Maybe you want to travel more and That's what makes this thing so special So when you think about Bitcoin or digital currency, which I think is going to be huge I think it's I don't think it's going away. I think there's a huge upper. Why do I invest in it? I think it's gonna be a big thing But when you're looking at right now, what is the biggest thing that can make the biggest impact in the entire world? At the moment is drinkable ketones. It's simple Why because you have the one thing that everybody needs and actually wants They don't just need it, but they actually want it people want more month more money. They don't necessarily need more money, right? They're they're hoping to get more, right? But people actually want and need Better health better joint mobility better brain focus better relationship with their family Better financial freedom because there's a way to do that with what we're doing, right? Take advantage of the financial opportunity that comes with the movement that's happening right now But here's the challenge if I would have told you right now, Susan If I would have told you right now Go back in time in 1999 invest in Amazon But I told you right now in 1999 go invest in Google If I told you right now in 1999, maybe 2003 or 2004 go invest in Tesla If I would have told you right now in 1992 Go invest in Apple But that's what I would have told you to do that's what I'm telling you right now. I'm just telling you right now I'm telling you what's happening, right? So I've been in those situations. I learned about Apple I'm in the weird world, right?  I'm always I don't think deep enough I don't think about the bigger picture. What's gonna happen? What's gonna happen that we're right now in the country of America? Our Grandparents my grandparents or my parents are my parents are going to outlive My children and grandchildren Scystically for the first time in human history the generation right now the baby boomer generation is gonna outlive their grandchildren The first time in human history based off of statistics now We might come up with medical emergencies or medical mysteries to keep people living longer, but that doesn't mean they're gonna function long So people are looking for health by better in their life If you know anybody that's been part of our community has been drinking ketones for any extended amount of time I know I know the the the French the French of Mexico, Mexico land, Mexico land I know Miguel is on here right now and he started ketones. He stopped ketones Got crappy he got back on ketones committed to our community and it's completely transforming his life because he committed to better and he hasn't stopped and The currency of that is unbelievable. It's generation only passing on now You can make general race on you make billion dollars and pass them on the generations awesome good I'm all about that too But this is huge what we have in our moment right now What we have in our hands right now is something that we you'll probably never get access to the timing right now So if I could tell you to right now to go back to 1999 investing Google best in or 2000 invest in Google That's in in Facebook invest in Tesla invest in Apple. Would you do it? Damn right you would you would put as much money as you could you would you would I mean You maybe sell off a kidney or two You'd maybe sell up a few things right Jeff Jeff. Hey Jeff. We need a chat you need to come to Jeff I need to see you and national buddy. I miss you. I want to I want to spend some more time with you But here's the deal. I think we better have an extra extra extra bed in our room, too But here's the deal Is too many people don't see the depth we call depth of vision the depth of what's going to happen? The biggest movement in health and wellness and I could even per se potentially medicine The research that's being done isn't being done by just some schmucks It's being done by some of the major institutes in the entire planet This is not going away and the data that's coming back is extraordinary something that we've never seen Universal maybe in the history of research. This is a big deal And it's not about a diet one of the things that Brian under and I were talking about that's been a little bit Frustrating to us because I'm a keto diet guy. I used to be I'm not I'm trying to transition away from it To kind of find a hybrid to it all right and he goes p two people are thinking that we're about the diet You know, there's governors. There's I mean, we have a lot of cool people. We were like, I don't want to do that I don't want to do kids like that. We're like, that's not the diet.  You just drink it It gives you the benefits without dude. Come on stop the diet Now at the end of days the diet might be right for some people, right? But it might not be I have a guy He's a bodybuilder does 300 grams of carbs a day and drinks ketones Why cuz he kicks ass when he drinks ketones I professional Olympic athletes that never did the ketogenic diet and won't but they drink ketones Why because they're awesome. So this is not about a diet. This is about a product that elevates your life Scientifically back completely in all categories the most recent study we got or the most recent information we got was like we're on over almost a half a billion servings worldwide in the world and People are raving about it all over the world places that people are literally having to fly in in They're literally flying to America get product to fly to do their country Think about that. They're getting out of jet spending $2,000 to fly to our country stock up their suitcases to fly back with product And people think well, it's maybe a little expensive. No, it's not This is the most affordable product that you're ever gonna get to change your life forever as long as you're willing to commit to it So I'm getting super excited. So but if you're really looking to change your life and get healthier than ever There's no question. We have we have in two weeks. We're gonna have one of the largest keto educational events in the world And I want to change the name. I'm talking to a doctor or CEO. I'm like should we change the name It's called Keto Academy Does the name itself make people think that it's about the ketogenic diet? Is that messing is that is that hurting us, right? And and and I don't think it is I think that's a good title But I think we should have a subtitle that says a product that elevates cognition life better physical Presence our physical appearance metabolic health a product that completely will transform your life And a company that supports it by the science and research that we do And so it's like I want to I want to put that in there because I think too many people don't join or don't be part Of this because they're thinking they have to do good tonight. That's not what this is We encourage healthy eating. We encourage fasting science supports that too. We encourage moving your body You encourage all those same thing Right you encourage all that Everything that we're recommending is the same as you've heard for your whole life The only thing that's really different is guess what we have a product that transforms and is changing the world and You can take advantage of it by drinking it be a customer of ours We are launching literally one of the biggest Movements in our new program that we're launching. It's called the VIP program and this is for customers I'm not gonna get too many details because we literally just talked about today, but it's coming and hell's coming with me And I'm just kidding. It's you may know the movie reference. Put it down. Put it down. Put it down So here's the deal is We want to make this so simple for people to get healthier live better feel better, right? We want people to realize it's not about a kid in fact It's about a product that you can drink to elevate your ketone levels that improves the quality of your life If you want to can connect that to a lifestyle or a diet plan that helps enhance your life further awesome We'll support you in that I have three four thousand vegans that use our product that do not do a kidney They can't even do the kids a guy is a vegan. It's almost impossible. It's possible, but almost not possible, right? We have bodybuilders professional athletes moms and dads across the country that are just trying to figure out their day They need better also. It's about drinking a product and finding a journey From there you have the opportunity to take advantage of the biggest Financial opportunity of your entire lifetime. This is the Google. This is the Amazon. This is the Tesla This is the Apple of the early 2019 in your hands right now if you want to take advantage of it for me when I saw this I said there's no way I'm missing the boat again because I've missed the boat How many of you right now? I've missed the boat in some opportunities because you didn't take action when it was in front of you How many of you had a chance to take an event of an opportunity and everybody on your house, right? No matter how old you are. There is a time the microwave oven the VCR the DVD player the Automobiles, I mean there's been so many financial Microsoft there's been so many opportunities in your life that you had the advantage of that you never took advantage of The question is is that if you believe this is a big I know how big this is going to be I already know that I knew it seven years ago. I know it to be bigger now My belief then was like here my belief now is way up here. Why? I'm on calls with doctors and researchers all over the world. I just got a call with we're not even open in Panama I just got a call one of the huge practitioners of Panama going how can I get this? I go we don't even we don't ship the Panama like they just want what we have I have pharmacies that are trying to find a way that they want they can get it in their facilities This is a big deal and guess what nobody knows about it yet your neighbors don't know about it yours This is what's so cool about this is you have opportunity, right? You don't have to sell you have to share at a high level and let me freaking talk That's why I don't get a mom with me All the doctors all the moms and dads across the country just put mom with me I'll talk to them there's nothing they can say that's gonna stop me from believing how great this is because I have all the science and data Right up here of how powerful this is the opportunities now the question is is do you want to play a role or not? What role do you want to play and? Here's the coolest thing as well about our community and this is supposed to be like a five-minute live And I'm just I'm ranting so I hope you guys are okay with this and if you're fired up as I am like Sure the shit out of this video, but here's the coolest thing is The people that I know that have the greatest success in what we do when I when I joined this I asked our CEO. I go. Why did you choose community-based marketing? And he said a lot of things the first thing he said though that mattered the most to me was if we didn't choose community-based marketing Would you have an opportunity to even play a role? I go probably not Probably not because if we just put on the shelves of Whole Foods what role would you to play? I go I went to because you think it's gonna be huge. I think it's gonna be enormous He goes community-based marketing gives every single person the ability to change your life You have the opportunity and the people that I know that have had the greatest success in our company are not the doctors I don't know one doctor actually.  You have an opportunity to change your life for every switch You do with it that matters We have a system and a program that takes you through all that process But that's what I realized is that the smarter I've been in this the harder it has been to grow the business The more I can play dumb better Brenda 69 years old also Let's do this. I guarantee you at 69 years old Brenda wants to a if she's not retired She wants to retire B She wants to travel the world more and she wants to have a body and help to do it with see she wants maybe a vacation home Or she wants a Something that she can maybe pass on to her family or friends That's just that I've been on a call to know that that's probably what she wants and most likely she doesn't have some of those things Guess what you can find that here 55 years old You know me 55 year old women and men that I meet that can't retire They're sick and tired of their careers and they have no alternatives.  Could you imagine waiting to live your life for 10 or 15 years? We had news that a good friend of ours that literally got a bad news We don't know how long she may or may not be around and I pray and hope that she gets through it all But the reality is is do you want to wait 10 years to hope that your life lives better? No, you want to start living it now financially health wise abundant wise Representing wise to your family and your loved ones So anyway, I'm just gonna say Bitcoin has no shot in hell right now to take over this conversation The thing is is you hear about Bitcoin Bitcoin all the time because all these Financial gurus are putting in your face all the time But what really opportunity to buy one Bitcoin like $30,000 when I was at his peak It was like $77,000 who even has the money to buy a one coin to buy ketones It's $5 you can get it for free if you really want to you can promote it You can sell it you can do anything you want with it if you're really into do the work And you're willing to learn the lessons the one biggest thing I'm gonna tell you before I get off here right now We literally have people all over the world watching this the biggest thing I'm gonna tell you right now is this is that if you want to get healthy Commit to that like too many people try ketones. Don't try to get healthy. Go get healthy. We have a formula. Yes It works for everybody.  I'm being a little mean right now. Oh your belly was a little upset Oh, you didn't you didn't lose weight fast enough. So what? The end of the day anybody that's drank ketones for three years or more It's completely transformed the entire directory of their family's future Everyone not one knows my sister literally bitched him on for eight weeks because it didn't work for her She's got a hundred pounds now Like it works. I guarantee it. The science is a hundred percent concrete that this will change your life forever It may not meet your expectations fast enough guess what but it's doing exactly what it means for you right now The rest is up to you The same thing is about the prove it opportunity if you want to be part of our prove it opportunity take advantage of our dollar keto club Guess what it works the opportunities there are when I signed up.  I talked to people. I followed the process I listened to my mentors. I listened to my coach. You don't guess what there's other people that joined the same time I did that didn't follow the process. They didn't listen to the coaches They didn't they didn't commit they didn't introduce it to other people guess what they made no money They didn't build a business. Did it work or not work? Did it work for them? No, but they didn't work for it So that's the thing that I realized in this industry when people go what's network marketing or it's MLM or a strike sales We call it community-based marketing because well, we're doing a little differently But the difference the one thing that isn't different is that you have to still commit to what you want I heard a statistic and it pissed me off a lot and I don't want to believe in it But but it basically what they're saying is the top 5% of people provide for the other 95% And I was like man that really sucks because it tells me that most people are gonna fail and not meet their expectations And I believe in everybody I truly do.  I have a lady. I just talked to her life is completely transformed and changed forever Is she a millionaire? No, she's not. Is she made a million dollars? Not absolutely nothing close Her life has changed and if she wants to she can look at how bad her life is now or how much she's changed She's changed so much in five years What she needed wasn't a million dollars. She needed everything else she got And now she's realizing that and she's on a path and trajectory that will change her future forever So I get super excited about this because I just want more people to understand that there's a home here And there's no bigger opportunity in the world right now From a health or financial situation to change your family's life than what we're doing than a company that supports Y'all if you just knew who I mean, it's unbelievable. I've literally met Jason Joseph McClellan, the third Jarek Robbins Mel Robbins David Goggins. I've met who's the dude that prices right dude. I love him I can't remember his name Jack comedian dude. I can't remember his name The people we meet are extraordinary But here's the coolest thing and they've been a magnificent to meet these individuals I mean, I've had so many pictures and I've got I mean literally What's his name Andy Graham are saying to my daughter and her one-year-old like I mean, I've got that's part of our community Not Pat St. Jack Price is right not prices right family feud family feud and The people that have really made the biggest difference are Kate Higdon Francisco Calero Alexander Gonzales Cameron Moss Michael Rutherford James Rice Ethan Godwin Joe Rochester the people that I met in this community. Those are the people that have made the biggest differences Steve Harvey. Yes. I might have met Steve like awesome guy amazing But I would put the people that I've met within this community way bigger why because they're more like me I have very little to relate to Steve Harvey. I don't I don't have a lot of related by freaking funny He's very wise. I love it. I love his psychological content But I don't have the same related villages. They right is what I've seen here So if you're looking for better in your life right now if this is speaking to you at all Hopefully you're juiced up if you're part of our private community, you should be hopefully a little bit juiced up What I'm gonna say is this I'm gonna give you a hi. I call it C1. I'm kind of designed to be the C1 I'll tell you what to do. I don't mind doing that number one is come to our keto Academy. It's extraordinary It's freaking free. It's literally the top thought there's an entire planet and I'm gonna be hosting it At least I think I was told I was I was all so most likely it's me So I'll be hosting it and we're gonna break down Why this is such a huge conversation and why you should care a lot for yourself or your family for loved ones But if you're thinking about this is like I want to financially. What does it take to financially change your life? $500 a thousand dollars. Yeah, I mean people want millions of dollars. That's great And you have to work for a million dollars. You have to work for $500 But what would $500 or $1,000 extra a month you get healthier than ever in your life And you help a few other people do the same thing How different would your life be in ten years that that's what your expectation really was huge game change Absolutely game changer And if you're looking for an opportunity right now, I would say get on a call If you're a part of my team get on a call and let's talk, but let's have a real conversation Let's not talk fluff like I already I'm in love with what we're doing. I know where we're going I know the future of what we're doing. I understand the complexity of it all I understand the the the do's and don'ts I understand the the mindset that people come in that have tried and way before and go I'm not doing one of those before I don't want to sell my friends to be the chief If you lose your friends over this you did it wrong You just didn't do it the right way You should ever lose your friends over anything if they're really your friends and at the same time You should be able to help your family and loved ones and even your friends live a better life Which is what I've gotten to do So if you're really looking for better, let's have a real conversation And what that looks like and are you really committed to that? So if you're committed to your health or committed to your opportunity of financially change your life forever So I think I stayed compliant through this whole thing. I did my best I do pretty good on that. I've been I've been well trained with that said and done y'all I need to go eat. I'm I'm hungry. I've been fasting. Am I fasting right now? I will be doing a zoom about fasting tomorrow night 32 minutes in I'm pretty juiced and fired up and listen if you're not part of our community right now And you have to stumble on this video I should have said this way earlier because you might not be still watching at this moment and reach out to me and Let's get you set up. Let's figure it out If you're following somebody else or somebody else invited you to follow me We'll talk about that and we'll make sure you get signed up underneath them because we're a team And we're a community. We're a family.  Let's mission to a million Let's change millions of lives around the world because we can do that We can help millions of people make millions of dollars. We can help many people live better We can help millions of families become a better example and Ladies you kind of run the show here the men it's time for you to pick it up Gentlemen it's time for you to pick it up Stephanie. Good night. Men.  Let's talk about it. Let's get going. Let's freaking make a difference Let's not sit in our hands and hope that life's gonna get better and dive a freaking heart attack Before we even even try like i'm just sick and tired of getting on these calls and stories of people digging People out of the bad stuff. Let's get ahead of the bad stuff and start living the good stuff now Fire it up y'all. Good night. Appreciate y'all. Cheers


What's up guys take down here welcome back to the channel today is another hockey card insert video what I've picked up this year and Opened up in packs a lot of people just want to see the inserts and that's what I'm going to be showing you in these videos So today is kind of a mixed one. I do have some lead leaguer lead League leaders stuttering already do have some foil cards. I do have some Jersey card I want to share with you guys and my mini cards. I got this year. So we're just gonna get right into it I'm gonna start off with the random ones And I do mispronounce names quite often I do apologize if I mispronounce name, let me know in the comments down below I get a lot of hate for a lot of people are raging because I get names wrong It's just something I've always I always have a problem with names and I work service by the way I'll work automotive service and I got to go over the PA and Call customers all the time every day.  Believe me. I know but let's just get back into the video here I have an award winner for Austin Matthews and I got these supper deck Just grew up on blaster boxes for me, which I very explained on this channel and this one here is actually a collector card It says congratulations. You have received a limited edition card of Austin Matthews This trading card has only been made available for individual collectors as a thank you for making a product your choice So it's not something that's sold in stores. Normally. It's a specific collector item I got the rookie card for Nolan Patrick, which I am loving and it's the same thing on the back. I Always pronounce this one wrong Brock Bozer. I just don't follow Vancouver often other than the second Twins I got League leaders for Sergey Bob Ross ski Which I love collecting goalie stuff I did mention that in a previous video insert video Sydney Brazby his 1000th career goal. This is his season highlights It's actually a career highlight is what I would have titled it and then I have been Bishop's foil card And I love this card because I love LA. He's in LA Jersey, but it is a Dallas stars card So to me that was amazing. That's I seen that I don't often see it like that and I'm gonna show you guys my mini cards next. So we have Thomas to tire I can't really put it too close. It's not gonna it's gonna blur the name out and want you guys to see it a little bit Jonathan and ruin Tuka Rask, which I think Boston's gonna be doing pretty good this year already eliminated to Toronto So let's see what they can do against lightning Ryan Getzlav and Kyle Terrace Who got traded away from the Sen's but we got a good player Matt to Shane I'm a sense fan if you guys can tell And I got a black foil card for Alexander Barkov Comment down below if I pronounced that one right, but I think I did And the last card is my game Jersey card for David Beck as I remember whenever I Opened this one in the pack early this season I was pronouncing it David Beck's and a lot of people hated me for that So I think I'm pronouncing it right when I say David Beck as Which this is the first Jersey card I got I did get another one at the flea market the other day This is the first one I opened up and this is the 2017 2018 video So I'm not gonna be sharing what I got at the flea market because it's 0809. So Hope you guys did enjoy this might be the last insert video I make but I do have a bunch of inserts I got from 2013-2014 blaster box I did manage to get I didn't do an unboxing on the channel just because it was Kind of boring and I screw up a lot of the names just because I wasn't watching it back then But anyways, I'll leave this video here comment down below if I miss parents any names It actually helps me out a little bit don't rage too much But I understand a lot of people do and I'll see you guys in the next video Please take care. Hope you guys did enjoy peace


So wait a few seconds here before, just in case anyone's entering the room. So welcome everyone. Today's event is called the background on the criminalization of HIV in Canada. My name is Sierra Mateo. I am a 3L student at the Schulitz School of Law and the current co-chair of the Dalhousie Criminal Law Students Association. Today's event was put together by the Criminal Justice Coalition and the DCLSA, the Student Association. Before we get started, I just wanted to acknowledge that Dalhousie University is located in Nagmahi, the ancestral and unceded territory of the Nagmah. Here today and every day here all treaty people. So unfortunately, Megan Longley, our third panelist today, could no longer join us, but we're still very, very happy to be joined by both Richard Elliott and Alexander McClellan today. So as you saw from our promotional material, Richard served as executive director of the HIV legal network from 2007 to 2021. And his current work is as a consultant focusing his efforts on HIV, health and human rights. Alex, as well as a professor at Carleton University, and he had the exciting opportunity to present his research findings on the criminalization of HIV non-disclosure as an expert witness to the House of Commons, the Standing Committee on Justice and Human Rights. So thank you both so much for joining us. It's unfortunate that Megan couldn't be here, but we do this for the best today. So for anyone joining us in the audience. If you have a question that comes up during the event, please feel free just to put it in the chat at the bottom of your screen there. I will be monitoring the questions and then close it to the end. I will be just posing those questions to the group. So that's it for me. I will hand it over to the experts now. Thanks, Sierra. I think I'm going to kick things off. Thanks very much for the invitation and I'm glad that Alex could join this discussion as well, because he's done some of the groundbreaking research in Canada on the harms of HIV criminalization to people living with HIV, along with a lot of other stuff so it'll be really important to hear that in our discussion. I'm glad that I would kick things off with a bit of an overview about the state of the law related to HIV criminalization in Canada. And then also speak a little bit about some of the advocacy efforts to date to address the state of the law which gives rise to a number of concerns. So I want to speak to both of those in that order. So for those who are not familiar with the issue, just to let you know that since the first recorded prosecution in Canada for alleged HIV non disclosure to a sexual partner. And that's mostly what we're talking about in Canada when we're talking about HIV criminalization. But it's not entirely. There have been to our knowledge 224 prosecutions to date. There have been to be amongst the world leaders in the number and I put that term in quotes in terms of prosecuting people with HIV edged non disclosure. Unfortunately the situation we have learned in a number of other countries has actually gotten worse. And that is the reason that Canada is no longer in the top five, but it's hardly a group in which we want to be. There's a lot of information about the details of those prosecutions and some of the trends and patterns, including demographics in a document that I'll share a link to later in the chat that the legal network has produced. But it's a significant resort to the use of the criminal law. And I think it's worth also noting that while the law I'm about to outline in theory applies to other sexually transmitted infections or at least some of them. There have been a few cases in relation to some other sexually transmitted infections, the overwhelming majority of the cases of the use of the criminal law to deal with these allegations of not disclosing a sexually transmitted infection have been in relation to people HIV for alleged HIV non disclosure. Now there is no specific offense in our criminal code that deals with not disclosing or transmitting HIV or another sexually transmitted infection to a sexual partner, or possibly other sexual charges. And so the way the law has evolved has been through the decisions of first prosecutors, and then subsequently courts in deciding to lay charges, and then in the interpreting and application of those charges, under other offenses that are already found in the criminal code so offenses of general application offenses such as common nuisance administering a noxious thing. There was no negligence causing bodily harm or causing death depending on the circumstances that are alleged, and most, particularly, especially since the late 90s charges of assault or particular sexual assault. And specifically, most often the charge of aggravated sexual assault with serious form of sexual assault, as people will know, in the criminal code. There is a lot of throwing different things at the wall and seeing what would stick by prosecutors and courts and conflicting outcomes in the first decade or so of resort to using criminal charges in cases where people are accused of not having disclosed their status to a sexual partner. In most of those cases I should note there was no transmission or no allegation of actual transmission the majority of cases in which people have been prosecuted have not involved actual transmission they've involved allegations of exposing a partner to a risk of acquiring HIV that is perceived by prosecutors and police and the courts to be too high in their view. So that's one important thing to remember. But since the late 90s, as I mentioned, the main charge that has been laid against people has been the charge of aggravated sexual assault. And that follows a decision of the Supreme Court of Canada in a case called Courier, which was the first case on this subject, and it established the basic legal framework that has since been applied in the vast majority of cases. And the gist of the decision was that the Supreme Court said in a split decision that in some circumstances, not disclosing HIV or another sexually transmitted infection, could amount to fraud that would vitiates a sexual partner's consent to sex and as people will perhaps know, under section 265 of the criminal code consent can be rendered invalid in law consent to sexual activity can be rendered invalid in law in a variety of ways and fraud is one of those. So the Supreme Court affirmed that in some cases, not in every case but in some cases, not disclosing that you have HIV to a sexual partner would amount to such a fraud.  I've also said without much consideration of this that it would meet the requirements for the offensive aggravated sexual assault because there would be in its view endangerment of life and that's one of the ways in which sexual assault or an assault is elevated to an aggravated status. The court was clear in that case that there was not a blanket obligation to disclose that was a central point in the case, but rather they said that the duty to disclose will arise when there is a significant risk of serious bodily harm that's the key phrase from the courier decision that's the threshold. Excuse me, a majority of the court in that case, and this is relevant for how things evolved later, said that something like condom use may, or in the case of a minority concurring judgment on the part of some judges including now Chief Justice Beverly McLaughlin would in fact prevent from being a vacant risk of transmission and so in that circumstance, according to the majority you may not have a duty disclose according to one of the concurring minority judgments you would not have a duty disclose. And so, so there was a clear recognition from the beginning that there was a need to not cast the net of criminalization too widely that mere non disclosure should not in and of itself be a criminal offense there had to be a certain level of risk and a certain potential harm associated with that risk in order to trigger the application of the criminal law. So fast forward from there to another key case in this area from the Supreme Court of Canada in 2014 decision called maybe or in that case the Supreme Court of Canada affirmed the basic legal framework that they had set out in courier and went on to clarify in their words that this significant risk of serious bodily harm would in the specific case of HIV be met if there was a quote real list ability of transmitting HIV so that is the key HIV specific updated formulation of the legal test, if you will. So, and they did that because there have been a lot of criticism about how the courier test had been interpreted and applied by lower courts and by prosecutors there have been a lot of uncertainty. And there have been importantly developments in the scientific knowledge about HIV, including factors associated with possibility of transmission or not, including for example, significant new developments in the evidence base about the relationship between the viral load that someone has and the possibility of transmitting through sexual activity to a sexual partner. And so there was a need a scene on the part of the court to revisit to some degree what the phrase the law should be but they affirmed the basic legal framework and recast the significant risk of serious bodily harm test in the HIV context as a realistic possibility of HIV transmission test so that's the key phrase for HIV. Keep in mind that the overall framework is still, if there is a significant risk of serious bodily harm then a duty to disclose would arise, and that could apply not just to HIV but potentially to certain other sexually transmitted infections. I note that because it's relevant of course to some of the ongoing advocacy that is currently underway. Now, one of the significant problems and there are others that we can speak about is how this test this legal test has actually been interpreted and applied by police by prosecutors and by courts who have these cases brought before them to adjudicate, and are required to apply the legal test, at least the lower courts are required to apply the legal test that the Supreme Court of Canada has articulated. And what we were seeing that the interpretation and the application of the criminal law and this particular test has been very, very broad. And that's given rise to obviously a whole bunch of concerns. There are some inherent harms in turning to the criminal law to deal with HIV transmission or exposure. But of course those harms are magnified the broader you cast the net, right. And the net has been cast quite widely in Canadian law, unfortunately. And I'll explain what I mean about that in a moment. But this has led to some ongoing concern and advocacy by community organizations, importantly by people living with HIV, but also from scientific experts who have increasingly over the years in various jurisdictions including Canada, have spoken out and said that we have real concerns about how the criminal legal system in many cases is not actually being informed by the science that we have and over extending the ambit of the criminal law, at least from the perspective of the science that we have about HIV. There are indeed important other important reasons to be concerned about the overextension of the criminal law. That is an important one that it is not in touch with the best available scientific consensus. In Canada at the moment where we now stand is that it is reasonably settled. As a result of a number of different court decisions in different jurisdictions, and the adoption in some jurisdictions in Canada of prosecutorial policy that is pretty unlikely. You would be prosecuted and highly unlikely that you would be convicted for allegedly not disclosing your HIV positive status to a sexual partner.  As a situation in which there is no realistic possibility of transmitting HIV to a sexual partner, and that's very solidly based in the science and there's well established scientific consensus on this point that someone who has a suppressed viral load does not transmit HIV sexually. And so the significant possibility of the realistic possibility of transmission test would not be met in that case, and that's been accepted. It has also been accepted, including by the Supreme Court of Canada that if someone has not a suppressed viral load, which is normally defined as being under 200 copies of HIV per milliliter of blood, but rather a low viral load so viral load that is somewhat higher than suppressed, but still low.  In that circumstance, there would be no realistic possibility of HIV being transmitted and therefore no duty to disclose and therefore you haven't committed a fraud if you do not disclose and therefore you have admitted the offense of aggravated sexual assault. Beyond that things are actually murkier. And actually, there are some recent troubling signs. So, situation where someone uses a condom, for example, but does not disclose their status to a sexual partner. Unfortunately, we had hoped would be recognized by the courts as a situation in which there isn't a realistic possibility of transmission for the purposes of triggering criminal sanctions, and therefore someone would not be convicted if they did not disclose their status to a sexual partner. Unfortunately, although we had some incurring, we had at least one encouraging decision from Nova Scotia, a trial court decision, a couple of years ago, and a suggestion from the Supreme Court of Canada in its first case on this in 1998 the courier case that that condom use might or would be sufficient to reduce the risk enough that there'd be no longer a duty to disclose. That in fact is not where the law has currently settled at this point and it remains unsettled. And most worryingly, just a couple of years ago the Ontario Court of Appeal in the first appellate court decision to address this point, since short of the Supreme Court of Canada. We expressly affirmed that no using a condom is not sufficient on its own in a case in which there was no dispute that a condom had been used by the accused person. There was no allegation by the crown that the condom had not been used properly or broken. And there was no allegation that the accused person had actually transmitted HIV to their sexual partner. And yet the Ontario Court of Appeal in a rather, I would say inflexible and rigid of the framework as articulated by the Supreme Court said, no, we think this is sufficient to actually uphold a conviction for aggravated assault. Keep in mind these were consensual sexual encounters, but for the allegation of not disclosing your HIV status, and there was condom use and no allegation of transmission. And what we know from decades of experience and the scientific consensus is that in that circumstance, the risk of HIV transmission would be negligible at most and we're talking exceedingly exceedingly small like infinitesimal or zero. So, and yet the Ontario Court of Appeal thought that this was an appropriate case in which to actually convict someone for non disclosure and so that person, you know, is spending years in prison for aggravated sexual assault. With respect to the question of oral sex. Again, we had some encouraging decisions along the way, not very many, including again, a decision from a trial court in Nova Scotia, suggesting that in that circumstance, there was a sufficient risk of HIV transmission and so there was no crime and not disclosing your status. Again, the Ontario Court of Appeal, unfortunately in a more recent decision, just earlier this year has again disappointed the hopes of activists who had hoped that we might at least reign in the criminal law on this front, and has in fact gone out of its way to say, oral sex alone without disclosure could in the right circumstances be a sufficient basis for convicting someone for allegedly not disclosing. Even though, again, the scientific consensus is that the risk of transmission in that circumstance is effectively zero. It's so close to zero as to be effectively zero. Absent some very exceptional circumstances. So, this is what I this is what I'm referring to or these examples what I'm referring to when I say the criminal the courts have cast the net of criminalization really really widely here. And the more they do that the more they give rise to the harms of criminalization, because the less you actually tie criminalization to harm or a serious risk of harm, the more you're actually criminalizing people just for being HIV positive and not disclosing that fact. So this gives rise to one of the many concerns about HIV criminalization. And we can talk about what some of the others are and I know Alex is going to touch upon some of those as well. So, there's been a lot of advocacy, I'll just say a couple of words about what that advocacy is involved and where it's gotten us to and where things stand now in terms of trying to change the scope of the law. In a number of these court cases that have arisen. There have been community organizations like the one I used to head and still do work with to support accused persons and their defense lawyers in making sure that they are equipped with good arguments with the best available as well as connections to experts whose testimony is going to be really key, given that so much of the scope of criminal liability depends on how this test of realist ability of transmission is going to be interpreted which requires resort obviously to scientific evidence. And in effect, although as I've just outlined the results have been decidedly mixed you know there have, there have been the sort of rhetorical recognitions that well there shouldn't be a blanket obligation to disclose, even though a number of provincial attorneys general over the years have gone to court arguing precisely that those have been rebuffed. In terms of actually limiting the scope of criminalization in a real meaningful way. Really the major success has been in getting courts to recognize the science of undetectable equals untransmittable so someone who has an undetectable or suppress viral load does not transmit HIV sexually therefore this threshold for triggering criminal liability is not met. That's been mostly it. There has also been an effort to get policy updated in a number of jurisdictions across Canada policy to which prosecutors are supposed to have been deciding in any given case, whether to actually proceed with a prosecution. This also has been important, and there's been some success but again it's been the results have been mixed. Three jurisdictions in Canada now have formal policy in place. The most significant and furthest reaching one is at the federal level, a directive that the federal Attorney General issued to the public prosecution service of Canada in 2018. Which they said there shall be no prosecutions in those places where prosecutors federal prosecutors handle them for in the case where someone has a suppressed or an undetectable viral load full stop. That's good. It's really just recognizing what the science already tells us. There's been a statement in the directive that that there should generally be no prosecutions in cases where someone has used a condom for example, or someone is on anti retro viral treatment, which would then lower their viral load, or only engaged in oral sex absent exceptional circumstances. So that's good, but it's not really a sort of a categorical ruling out of criminal prosecutions in those circumstances which is what would be preferable amongst other limits. In BC and Ontario, there is also policy in place from their prosecuting authorities. That is goes at least as far as saying someone with a suppressed viral load will not be prosecuted for not disclosing, but that's pretty much all that you can say definitively about their policies. The policy does suggest that the fact that someone uses a condom may be a factor to be considered by the prosecution in determining whether it's in the public interest in a given case to pursue a prosecution. That's obviously one of the key two key tests that a prosecutor has to consider in each case, but that's about as far as it goes and so people living with HIV are left in this still murky legal terrain with the threat of criminalization hanging. Through those different avenues we've achieved as advocates, some successes, but they are limited and it's become increasingly clear, especially with the two recent Ontario Court of Appeal decisions that I mentioned about condoms and about oral sex, that it is likely that the courts and prosecutors are able or willing to get us out of the mess into which the years of accretion of prosecutorial and court decisions, including from the Supreme Court have gotten us. And therefore, if we really want to get to the root of this problem here, we need to actually change the underlying law. The courts have interpreted things in the criminal code in certain ways and to find some parameters far too broadly in the view of those of us were concerned about this. And so it is now up to Parliament as part of the ongoing dialogue between Parliament and the courts to actually step in and remedy this and reform the law. And so there has been a coalition for a number of years called the Canadian to reform HIV criminalization, of which Alex is the chair of the steering committee and he can say more about that in a moment. And of which the HIV legal network is a member that has been advocating for reform to the criminal code. And earlier, I was going to say earlier this year but last year a few months ago. The government of Canada, the federal justice minister announced consultations about possible criminal code reform and the coalition and others have been participating in that consultation and making our recommendations about what changes might be needed to the code to actually limit the criminal law to a much more appropriate and very limited set of circumstances. The gist of which is to prevent the end of the use of sexual assault charges as an inappropriate tool for criminalizing HIV known disclosure in for a whole bunch of reasons, and to limit any use of any criminal provisions to cases where there is action commission of HIV, and there has been transmission with there's been action with the purpose of transmitting HIV. So to set the bar much, much higher, and that would capture only a very few and quite rare set of circumstances. That's where things stand at the moment and we will see if 2023 brings any sort of efforts to actually introduce amendments to the criminal code. And I hope that gives you a sort of summary if somewhat whirlwind overview of the state of law and policy in Canada and some of the current advocacy, and happy to expand on any of those points in the comments to follow but I should turn it over now to Alex to fill in more of the picture. Thanks. Thank you, Richard. And I just wanted to highlight. Yes, I did present my research at the House of Commons Standing Committee on Justice and Human Rights, alongside Richard, and many other amazing people who were part of the Canadian College to reform HIV and if you're interested to see our testimony you can see it all here on the multiple days, but there was over 30 witnesses who presented and helped inform that process. I'll say upfront, I am not a lawyer, I am a activist and criminologist. I come at this work from a different perspective, and I always value deeply being able to present alongside Richard and other lawyers that I work with to provide the technical expertise and the legal legal expertise needed. I am going to be presenting briefly on my doctoral research and I'll just present a link here to a booklet that I've made that provides outcomes of it for those of you that are interested in in it and want to know more. I think Richard really just gave us a really excellent overview of what the picture looks like. Legally and my work has tried to kind of understand how those laws are embodied by people and how what law means on the ground for those that impacts, and what are the actual impacts. For many years we have known that HIV criminalization has deterred people from testing for HIV testing, accessing counseling and support has created a chill in relation to people living with HIV accessing services but also other people from getting HIV testing. We haven't really known or we hadn't known previously to some of the work that I've done. What are the impacts on people who've actually been charged and what are the experiences of people who have been prosecuted in relation to this and so I went across the country and interviewed 18 different people who have experienced either were threatened with charges because we know in a context of ongoing intimate partner violence and just disproportionate power relationships between men and women and relationships that HIV criminalization or the specter of HIV criminalization can be brought forward in those relationships and used as a coercive means against women and threaten to threaten them with potential criminalization so I interviewed a number of women in those circumstances, but also talked to people who had been either charged with aggravated sexual assault charges in the context of an ongoing criminal trial or had served their time and were prosecuted and subsequently registered as sex offenders. And so I spoke to them about the law and their experiences being criminalized from their own perspectives so often they had different understandings of what happened to them than the specifics of the law itself. And so they were just have an embodied understanding of what happened to them and talk to them about their lived experiences. I kind of often know that, or often noted that, you know, though, we don't get to hear the voices and experiences of criminalized people that often, specifically people living with HIV and anyone else criminalized the criminal justice system produces a dichotomous narrative of either victim or perpetrator. And perpetrators don't usually or people who are framed as perpetrators don't usually get to tell their side of the story they lose a sense of autonomy and subjectivity and being able to speak for themselves. And in the context of HIV criminalization, all of this people I spoke with did not understand themselves in that way, and felt very confused by the charge of aggravated sexual assault where they were framed as a potentially a violent rapist who was trying to infect someone else with HIV and nothing could be further from the truth. All of the people I spoke to specifically had been doing things to try and protect their partners had been taking antiretroviral medications had been following drugs from their doctors to take their medication. And also, if that wasn't possible, based some women I know who I interviewed would, in the context of power differentials and relationships, would try and assert the use of a condom as a way of disclosing their status or trying to protect their partner. But we know, you know, I mean, I don't know I'm a gay man but in the context of a straight relationship. If a woman is the one who not doesn't get to decide to use the condom and that's the kind of horrific outcome of the 2012 decision is it privileges the person who can use the condom. And if a woman doesn't end up using the condom, because her partner doesn't use it. She's charged with aggravated sexual assault and she could be end up on the sex offender registry and I interviewed one of women who that happened to. She tried to give her partner a condom. He didn't use it. She's the one who's on the sex offender registry now. And that's the horrific outcome of that decision. There are many different impacts on people's lives as a result of HIV criminalization, and the experience of being criminalized and I think one of the ones that we has really come to light in the discussion of speaking to people directly about their experiences is the impact of being on the sex offender registry, and the impact of being prosecuted with a sex offense and so one of the, one of the charge that would be known as a dirty charge in prison. So that was quite horrific for people in many aspects of their lives so first of all their privacy would be violated in the media. There's often sensationalistic media coverage of people's stories because these stories bring up all this, all this, these past issues about sex and fear of the other.  And although those that number of people makes up less overall in terms of the number of cases, but they make up more of the media and some more of the media publications on that on that issue. But there's sensationalistic media people have access, lose access to privacy immediately. And so often they're framed right away in the media as violent perpetrators. As a result of that they'll lose access to all aspects of their social and civil life, often experiencing stigma and violence in their daily life if they're out on bail. People know in their neighborhoods that they are have HIV that they're charged with these charges and can end up facing forms of violence and stigma and discrimination in their communities. And they are incarcerated if that does happen the people I spoke to, often have their privacy again violated inside because their HIV positive.  On both sides of two women that I spoke to who had actually been assaulted by their partners, and, and they were living with HIV their partners weren't living with HIV. And as a consequence of them not disclosing their HIV status to their partner they were charged with aggravated sexual assault and they ended up on the sex offender registry. And there's a really disproportionate impact and vulnerability created because of criminalization for women living with HIV, quite a high portion of the women living with HIV or criminalized our indigenous women living with HIV, who have been subject to ongoing sexual violence throughout their lives, and consequently get framed as violent perpetrators in the context of HIV non disclosure. And I think Richard brought this up in terms of like knowledge of HIV and what's kind of what's, what's working within courts in terms of moving things forward and updated scientific understandings of HIV and the scientific consensus around transmission and undetectability equaling non transmission is something that's being brought forward quite widely but in the context of HIV criminalization. So the people I spoke to all of the people who were tasked with criminalizing them, police courts judges, sometimes even their lawyers had very limited information about HIV at all, or the risks involved and as a result, people were coached to coach to plead guilty. In cases where they are there was evidence that they should not apply guilty at all but it was just like a full on panic around HIV, and total lack of knowledge and that's why the work that the HIV legal networks been doing and the leading work that Richard's been doing around educating lawyers has been really really helpful so that we can get people not to plead guilty and to fight back on these cases. A further consequence of criminalization and a kind of just an outcome in general of the Canadian prison system is people face horrific violence inside as a result of their charges. Being incarcerated in Canada, anyone who's incarcerated is vulnerable to violence those institutions are extremely violent and, and people are very vulnerable in that circumstance, but in the context context of being charged with aggravated sexual violence, having HIV the people I spoke with faced intensified forms of violence, often ending up in protective custody which is essentially, or administrative segregation which is essentially solitary confinement. And a couple of other things I guess, a couple of many of the people I interviewed or actually all of the people I interviewed I should say, had a challenge in terms of accessing justice, and being able to pay for and get expertise. When they did get expertise to through the legal network and stuff like that their cases ended up ending up more in a beneficial outcome but people had limited access to, to justice really hard time getting access to the means to support themselves and represent themselves in court. One of the people I spoke to as a result of being criminalized had long periods of suicidal ideation and many who actually tried to kill themselves, many living today with post traumatic stress disorder and forms of anxiety and depression as a result of going through the criminal system and being framed in this way. A number of the people.  And they also had to then describe themselves their sexual desires as pathological and shameful and a problem when they were actually just normal adult sexual desires the only thing that happened was that they had HIV, but the fact that they were put in those treatment programs they had to follow the logic of the program. People were told by the psychologist running those programs that they didn't fit the criteria to be in those programs but to meet the standards of the correction service Canada to have their risk class classification lowered so they could be released. They had to frame themselves in a pathological way within those the context of that and that having a charge of aggravated sexual assault and it and being on the sex offender registry. We had a number of the impacts of being charged in relation to aggravated sexual assault and HIV nondisclosure. I will say a couple things quickly just about the, the work that we've been doing, and the work that Richard mentioned from the Canadian Coalition to reform HIV criminalization. We formed in 2016 and a lot of the work that had been done prior very leading work by Richard who's a foundational legal analysis like informed a lot of my work in my dissertation and a lot of other people across Canada have been inspired by the work that Richard has done. But prior prior to the formation of the of the Canadian Coalition to reform HIV criminalization. There wasn't a lot of work of having people's lived experience involved and having people with lived experience of criminalization involved and at the forefront of this movement. And increasingly we've been building that capacity and working to ensure that we're working to mobilize the leadership of some people who have had lived experience of criminalization to kind of lead our movement and speak publicly about their experiences because I think in tandem with the legal and human rights analysis having people's lived experience there has been really helpful in shaping public discourse and gaining empathy and kind of building momentum to call for why we actually need change. I think we didn't have a full understanding of the impacts of the harmful impacts of the sex offender registry until we started talking to people on the sex offender registry about how harmful those impacts are. And a number of people who I spoke to in my study. I mean many have gone on to continue their lives and just want to move on with things and actually are continually surveilled indefinitely for the rest of their lives on the sex offender registry with no means to get off of it. And they often find that going into check into the police station when they have to where they have their whole body exam and then they have to give information about where they live and what they're doing and where they're going. They find that often really triggering they think they might be arrested again they have a fear of going back to jail is really brings back all of the kind of harm and stigma. So one of the things we've been trying to do and work on is ensure that we can undo the harms of the sex offender registry and move this out of the classification of being understood as a sexual offense, because it is not that at all. That's one of the work that some of the work that we're doing kind of with trying to call for the criminal code to be reformed, but I would love to open it up for a discussion and also just to chat with with everyone if people have questions or with Richard and we can kind of talk further about anything that I missed but also any other developments that would be useful for people. Yes, thank you both so much. I really appreciate not only the education and the knowledge that you have on a subject matter but also as very clear the passion that you have towards advocating for these groups and so that's very much appreciated. I just wanted to add one other thing before we open up for questions and I should have said it in my overview, the penalties that the law provides Alex alluded to to one of them. In the case of a conviction for aggravated sexual assault as probably many who are listening will know the maximum penalty prescribed in the criminal code is life imprisonment and the available data. So it's partial that I'll share in one of the links in a moment suggests that in the case of convictions for aggravated sexual assault that are based on alleged non disclosure of HIV. The penalties that have been imposed actually are substantially higher than in quote normal sexual assault cases so what we normally think of a sexual assault of coerced or forced sex. It is also the case that until very recently, it was mandatory that a person convicted of that offense would be designated as a sex offender. There's been a slight loosening of that although the full implications of that remain to be seen as a result of a difficult decision, but there, it's highly likely still that if you are convicted of aggravated sexual assault for allegedly not disclosing, you will be declared your order to register as a sex offender.  Obviously, if you are not a citizen of Canada and you are convicted, it is highly likely that you will be deported as because of the interplay between the provisions of the criminal code and what the immigration and refugee protection act says about expulsion or the possibility to Canada based on criminality or serious criminality to use the language of that act. So those are very serious consequences for engaging in consensualist activity without transmitting without intent to transmit in some cases in circumstances where there are some proactive measures to reduce the possibility of transmission. You know, this is in my submission a wild overreaction on the part of the criminal law to, to the conduct in question. And the other thing to just note is that Justice Canada itself has recognized that certain communities are disproportionately affected by this.  And as recognized by Justice Canada, Indigenous women and gay men are also populations who are disproportionately affected by this, because we are significantly overrepresented amongst the population of people living with HIV. So any criminal law regime that hangs over people living with HIV is also going to particularly affect those communities as well. And sentencing outcomes also seem to be correlated with race as well with black and Indigenous persons who are convicted, receiving stiffer sentences than white people who are convicted. So we have some systemic problems here, which is partly why we need to go to the root of the problem and just get the criminal law as much as possible out of this domain. I should also thanks for that Richard and thanks for all those clarifications and adding to the understanding the context I should also note that in talking to people about their experiences. One of the things like we think of this as activists or as advocates as a criminal law issue and it's really interesting or when you talk to people not interesting but you talking to people at their experience, understand how public health law and criminal law intersect and can reinforce each other. And so one of the concerns I guess that I have as we move forward with reforms is that we might default to kind of coercive public health measures which could be equally or similarly harmful. And so in some instances in people's process of criminalization they would have had a public health order enacted against them or legal public health order. Public health orders if not followed correctly or if allegedly not followed correctly by public health officials could lead to police being called or or a criminal charge later not because of the public health orders themselves but complaining or rising up higher in terms of how the charges will be elevated and and then in court fast past failure to comply with public health orders could be used to justify intensified treatment by the criminal criminal system. And so it just been important to understand the intersections of public health line criminal law combined, but we do have a question I just realized for you Richard. I mentioned that amending the criminal code would be one of the best ways to help this issue for conviction to limit the circumstances is there any reason this kind of change hasn't happened. Is there resistance to slow wheels of bureaucracy. Yeah, great question. And it hasn't happened. Because I don't think that there has been any appetite on the part of decision makers to actually recognize the problem that there is a problem and to take steps like legislative reform to deal with it until very recently, and it remains to be seen of how much appetite there is and for just how much reform. There is. There was, there was also earlier period in this ongoing struggle, a real concern that turning to parliament to intervene would not necessarily lead to better outcomes conceivably possibly worse outcomes. It's to, I think, make as good an estimation as one can of what the likelihood is in a given parliamentary configuration of actually having enough support from enough MPs and then enough senators, which is a whole other matter to actually get enacted that are needed. And for quite a long period of time, there was not thought to be a that appropriate configuration of parliament that, you know, a majority conservative government that was strong on quote law and order as it likes to portray itself. And that had shown that it was quite happy with the state of legal affairs was not going to be a parliament that was actually to pass the kinds of reforms that are needed. In recent years, there seems to have been a growing recognition, at least in some quarters, including on the part of the current Justice Minister, that there is a problem, and his predecessor as Attorney General and Minister of Justice was, you know, got the ball rolling. When she issued a directive to the PPSC, the Public Prosecution Service of Canada, and, you know, issued a report from Justice Canada basically saying we have a problem here and something needs to be done. A couple of years ago, the Standing Committee on Justice and Human Rights in the House of Commons did a study and, as you've heard mentioned already, and made a number of recommendations, including recognizing that there is a need for law reform here. So that also I think helps get us closer to that ultimate goal. There will, and frankly underlying a lot of this, of course, is unexamined HIV stigma. It is still the case that I would sit us based on my experience of speaking about this over many, many years that the large majority of people will say, but of course someone with HIV should disclose. I have a right to know if my partner has HIV. It's on a really basic level. It's that kind of simplistic assumption and often reinforced by a lack of good information about HIV and how it's transmitted and not. That is, you know, the initial stumbling block here and that can be said of parliamentarians and policymakers just like everyone else. So that is a big hurdle to overcome. But I think through some of the work that's been done by advocates through some of the research that's been done by people like Alex to document the full range of harms. And the fact that scientists have also started to speak out and say we're really concerned that the criminal legal system is just not in tune with the science here. The number of feminist legal academics and women's rights advocates have also been very critical for a whole bunch of reasons about the use of sexual assault law to prosecute allegations of non disclosure. I think those things are starting to come together. And the conditions may be aligning for some possible reform, but may, and I'm going to be really caveatting that all over the place because we're just in a process of the government doing some consultation. And there's a lot of work still to be done between them hearing concerns from people, and then being willing to actually draft legislative amendments that are robust and that will properly limit the law. And then actually getting those through the parliamentary process so there's, you know, we're not, we're not there yet by any means, but we're closer than we've ever been before in 25 plus years of advocacy on this issue. Thank you for that Richard. I think, just along the same vein here we have another question in the chat, just asking about the status of advocacy efforts with parliament which I think you just touched on as well. But perhaps if you could discuss any of the advocacy groups and their ability to influence the prosecutorial policy that was also tacked on to the question as well. I mean, yeah, a little bit. Sure. I mean, you've been involved more in calling for prosecutorial guidance, which has been a strategy that's been called for for many, many years and been pushed for in Ontario specifically. And primarily by lawyers initially but also then before the Canadian coalition reform HIV criminalization came about. I would definitely say that advocacy groups have the ability to influence prosecutorial policy over time I mean I think in terms of the change that happened on in Ontario that was a pretty groundbreaking one that was that happened as a result of over 800 people mailing letters to the to the Attorney General's office, having multiple protests at the Attorney General's office, having petition to the attorneys Attorney General's office multiple op ads multiple news articles, many experts leading and calling for change and so consistent and constant pushing does work over time slowly in certain ways. The change doesn't always end up being the one you wanted to be necessarily but yes, I think would say Sophie that advocacy groups to have the ability to influence policy. And that's one of the reasons why we formed our coalition in 2016. We're connected to international network of organizations working to counter HIV criminalization around the world. This is a global advisory panel of the HIV justice network in Europe, which is a global network and Richard you're on the steering chair of the board chair chair of the board yeah okay. But one of the we actually formed our coalition at the HIV is not a crime conference in the US, which is a leading conference in North America on movements and specifically leading in the US around different states working to counter illegal HIV criminalization legislation. And so that work and being connected to global movements where you've seen people repeal harmful laws those are HIV specific laws which is very different than what we'd be advocating for in Canada we don't want to repeal aggravated sexual assault from the criminal code we want to change how it's being interpreted and that it can't be a limit the scope so that it can't be applied to HIV criminalization cases. We're connected to those movements and experts around the world we've seen that advocacy groups can influence policy and can change policy. There's been numerous states in the US where movements of people living with HIV and legal experts and advocates have mobilized for change, and have gotten laws either to be modernized or repealed harmful laws to be repealed and being connected to those movements has really influenced our work as the Canadian coalition and so one of the things we did strategically is form this coalition which is across Canada involving human rights experts, legal experts people on the ground who've been criminalized people who work in HIV organizations all together who can speak with one voice about what we want so in advance of the government's consultation that just took place and just ended the Minister of Justice's consultation, we conducted our own consultation, which involved many many people living with HIV and experts around across Canada, who informed us on what they want to see as a path forward and you can see the report and the outcomes of our consultation online, and we've used that to create a platform to call for change which is what we're pushing for in the current consultation process and so, being coordinated with advocacy groups can lead to change and hopefully I'm cautiously optimistic around the outcomes of the consultation we'll see we have to be really really cautious about what can happen and also whatever gets drafted could end up changing in multiple different ways once it's out in the world and we have to be really careful about how we move forward but have cautious optimism about it all. So we have about four minutes left. Something that I've been curious about I'm going to be a little bit selfish and ask a question of my own here. I'm just curious if there's been any efforts to approach this from a charter perspective. I know you've mentioned the human rights side but I'm just curious about that side of it. Sure. Yeah, I'm happy to speak to that we so so the HIV legal network and some other organizations like the HIV AIDS legal clinic in Ontario and an organization called Cuxida in Quebec that has an HIV and human rights program. Along with a number of organizations of people living with HIV and frontline ASOs AIDS service organizations in various configurations have intervened in some Pellet proceedings over the years including at the Supreme Court of Canada. And in those submissions we have, depending on the facts of the case and you know the space we have as interveners to you know for our written submissions and oral submissions have specifically spoken about the charter concerns that are raised by overly criminalization of HIV and in particular questions of equality and non discrimination or section 15 of the charter. So as I said in my remarks at the beginning, the wider you cast the net of HIV criminalization, the more you're approaching just recognizing people for living with HIV and having sex. Not because you're actually tying the application of the criminal law to actual harm or actual serious risk of serious harm, which ought to be, you know, a fairly high bar before you start deploying the criminal law against people. And so we've made we've made that point, amongst others in our submissions as one of the, you know, public policy arguments basically about why HIV criminalization as it currently stands is too broad and should be range in. We haven't spent. We haven't put a huge focus on that argument, in part because some of the exchange with courts from the early years but judges from the bench, including during the courier hearing and Supreme Court of Canada in 1998 suggested that that argument wasn't one that was going to gain a lot of traction. And so you want to be strategic as an advocate of course when you're going in front of the court and you have your five or maybe 10 minutes to make your own submissions and you have X number of pages in your written submissions. You really want to focus on the things that you think are going to be the stronger arguments and are going to persuade the court to adopt the position that you're putting forward. I don't see it has not seen would be one of those arguments, unfortunately, that's why we have not put too many eggs in that basket and we've advanced a whole range of other arguments about why the law should be limited in various ways. I think that the fact that we have data showing disproportionate impact on certain populations that I mentioned, and the Justice Canada's own report has recognized that you know also gives rise to other aspects of the quality concerns so not just based on each basis but certainly sexual orientation and race. But again, I, I'm not super confident that the courts are going to care about that enough, frankly, to have it serve as sufficient basis certainly not on its own to actually have the courts all from the fairly broad net that they've cast so far and say okay we're dialing is back we got it wrong we realize that now, and here's a much more limited legal framework that you should apply. I think that damage is done, you know the horses bolted the cat is out of the bag, and the court, the court, the Supreme Court and lower courts are just not able or willing to deal with this they've been given multiple opportunities, including the Ontario Court of Justice and frankly they've screwed it up more often than they haven't, then they've gotten it right. And so I don't think applying a charter argument here is going to get us very far, unfortunately. Sorry to be cynical, but one might call it realistic to know absolutely that makes sense. So it looks like we're at time here. I just wanted to give another huge thank you to you both for joining us today. Our chat was busy. We had some interested listeners today. And for anyone who wasn't able to watch this recording will be posted on our social media and shared within the next couple of days. Also if anyone watching has any questions for our panelists specifically, you can send them to our email dclsa.com and I will try to connect you to our panelists. I'll flip you a Word document that has links to some of the things I shared and outshared and a few other items as well that you might want to share with with people. That's wonderful. Thank you so much Richard. All right. Thanks very much. Thanks for having us. Take care everyone.


It's the project of Mosque-Tano-Tapajós! Owners of the Azure Business Company Cargill? There are not too many photos of them online because they are notoriously private. You would be too if your company was labelled as the worst company in the world due to its destruction of ecosystems like the Amazon and the Sahado to grow soy for animal feed in Europe and China. Last month at COP, the Cargill family took a big step towards repairing their bad karma. Their company Cargill committed to ending the destruction not only of forests like the Amazon but other critical ecosystems like the Sahado and the Pantanal in Brazil, Argentina and Uruguay by 2025. Huge, right? So then why are indigenous groups still angry? Because Cargill, despite their big promise, have not yet withdrawn their support for the ferrogrão, a proposed mega freight railway project that would cut through the heart of the Amazon. The proposed 1,000-kilometre railway designed to transport soy to northern ports will impact six indigenous territories including those of the Munduruku, Panara, Kayapo and Shingu indigenous land. If built it would destroy 800 square miles of Amazon primary rainforest. That's an area 14 times the size of Cargill's hometown of Minneapolis. Including lands that are currently federally protected as indigenous territory. The roads built in order to complete this project will open these lands up to more land grabbers and illegal miners and loggers who already invade and burn and murder those who seek to protect it. No wonder indigenous people are so angry. The Cargill-McMillan family have a moral duty to live up to their grand promise of zero deforestation. But given the company's history of repeatedly making and breaking promises, it's hard not to be skeptical. And like all New Year's resolutions, the proof will be in the days and months that follow. To the Cargill-McMillan family, I say withdrawing your support for the ferrogrão would be a huge step in the right direction and would signal to the world that you plan on keeping your word. Why not be the family that changed the course of history and became leaders in conservation rather than destruction?