Changing On The Fly

Happy new year! This is our first episode of 2020, and it's nice to have you with us for a new decade of hockey and resistance :)

Our esteemed guest on the show today is Matt Hern. Matt lives in Vancouver, where he’s an activist, scholar, and writer. While he writes on a variety of fascinating topics ranging from free schools to global warming to parenting, he’s one of the most exciting and engaged radical sports philosophers that ...

We are at a watershed moment in hockey history right now. Many of us know that hockey has had a racism problem for a long time, but now the conversations are coming to the surface in ways that they never have before.

And Courtney Szto is one of the most important people driving those conversations. She's our guest on this episode of Changing on the Fly, and we got to talk about everything from Hockey Night in Punjabi to the changin...

It's official. Don Cherry, the long time host of Hockey Night in Canada, has been fired. FINALLY. It comes after his most recent racist tirade (far from his first) on live TV against immigrants in Canada.

We break down Don Cherry and his penchant for biggotry with Kristi Allain. Kristi teaches in the department of sociology at St-Thomas University in Fredericton, NB, and has penned several articles and studies on Cherry's hate-spew...

Welcome back to Season 2 of Changing on the Fly! Our guest on this episode is Erica Ayala. Erica is an NWHL analyst, broadcaster, and an expert on women’s hockey. We talk here about the women’s hockey strike in Sweden, the Dream Gap tour in women’s hockey in North America, and so much more.

Follow Erica on Twitter @elindsay08

If you like this podcast, then support us! www.patreon.com/changingonthefly

Read Hemal Jhaveri's artic...

This is our last episode of Changing On The Fly for season 1! We'll be back with season 2 in the fall.  So as we head out for the summer, we leave you with this very special episode.

Fred Sasakamoose is a Cree elder from the Ahtahkakoop Cree reservation in central Saskatchewan. He famously became one of the first Indigenous people to ever play in the NHL, putting on a Chicago Blackhawks jersey and playing 11 games for the team...

On today’s episode, we’re finally bringing you part 2 of a 2 part series called Pucks, Punks, and Politics - conversations with punk rockers on hockey, radical politics, and the art of getting loud. Our first part of this series was with Chris 2 from Anti-Flag, and if you missed that you can go back and listen to Episode 10.

Today’s episode is with Jord Samolesky, the drummer of the seminal Winnipeg punk band Propagandhi. Aside fro...

On episode 11 of Changing On The Fly, we tackle the devastating news that the Canadian Women's Hockey League (CWHL) is shutting down its operations after 12 seasons. The announcement from the league came just one week after the Clarkson Cup championship match, and the day before many players from the league were set to fly overseas to Finland for the women's world hockey championships. Bad timing to say the least.

We break down and...

Chris Barker (aka Chris #2) from the long-standing Pittsburgh punk band Anti-Flag joins us on this episode to talk hockey, punk, and politics! Chris is a busy guy, and is often found playing bass and singing for Anti-Flag, recording album after album, and touring the world playing to hundreds of thousands of fans. But while he's not on stage, he looks for every opportunity he can get to play or watch hockey. Chris came on the podca...

A History of Le Smashy-Smash

There have been at least 8 recorded hockey riots in Canadian history. While often dismissed as simply drunken hooliganism, these events actually reveal important social & class tensions, and we can learn a lot from them. On today's episode of Changing on the Fly, we walk you through a brief history of hockey riots, starting with the Maurice Richard Riot in Montreal on March 17, 1955, and ending...

Today on the podcast, we go to Alberta.

The Calgary Flames and Edmonton Oilers are sworn enemies on the ice, their rivalry known as the 'Battle of Alberta'. And off the ice, the way these cities approach their hockey infrastructure couldn't be any more different. Calgary residents recently voted in a referendum to refuse the city's bid to host the 2026 Winter Olympics, and the city is also adamantly refusing to pour public money in...

On this episode of the podcast, we bring you an exclusive and candid conversation with Jessica Platt of the Toronto Furies! On January 10, 2018, Jessica made history when she came out as the first trans pro hockey player in Canada. And she did so in a beautiful message posted to Instagram, encouraging other young trans athletes to be their true selves, and follow their dreams. In our interview, Jessica tells us her story about grow...

On this episode of Changing On The Fly, we kick it with Tomas Jirousek, an Indigenous student athlete at McGill University in Montreal. He's a rower & former hockey player hailing from the Kainai First Nation in Alberta, and he's been leading the charge to get McGill to change their racist varsity team name - The Redmen. The McGill admin is poised to make their final decision on the matter in January, so shit is about to get hi...