In 2017, Newmarket’s Glenn Marais noticed a need for more kindness in the community to push back against the uprising in bullying.
He co-ran a national kindness campaign with David Robinson called Say My Name Canada.
The campaign started when the son of a friend of Marais had been bullied. That led the Juno-nominated musician to write a song called Say My Name and he produced a video alongside it that has more than 2.5 million views on YouTube.
From the video, the kindness campaign was born and it grew as it connected organizations across the region and province. It was even endorsed by Prime Minister Justin Trudeau.
Eventually the campaign came to an end, but now Marais is hoping to bring it back by hosting a live-streamed event from Stephen Leacock Theatre in Georgina on Feb. 28 in honour of Pink Shirt Day, an annual event against bullying held in both Canada and New Zealand.
“There’s been such a rise in bullying and issues with mental health that we wanted to bring the campaign back,” he said. “We felt there’s a real need right now and not a lot of kindness going on.”
With this event, Marais says it’s like a concert with a keynote speaker. He said they’ll be talking to students about race, kindness and bullying.
Keswick High School student and social activist Elena Rinne will be the keynote speaker and be talking about her experiences and the 2SLGBTQIA+ community.
“I think having a student speak to them about her challenges will be very relatable to students,” he said. “And my experiences with bullying go back a long way.”
Marais said that he’s been speaking against racism his whole life, and it has been a passion in his life because he believes in kindness, understanding, and the power of education to change the world.
“The overarching message of this is that kindness has been proven to be an antidote to bullying,” he said. “And one of the aspects of wellness is to reach out and support other people.”
Marais said they really wanted to do this now because since the COVID-19 pandemic, there’s been a lot of talk about students and their mental health, but that nothing seems to be being done about it.
“There’s a lot of talk and no action,” he said. “We want to do something that’s an event where people can come and feel like we’re hearing them and want to help.”
From working in schools and hearing feedback from educators, Marais says the students are really suffering and there are a lot of issues around bullying as a result.
“It’s logically going to happen when you’re in lockdown for three years, they’re not just going to come back and be unaffected by it,” he said. “This is our way of trying to address the issue.”
The cost of the event is $300 per school and Marais says they’re working on getting sponsorships. He’s hopeful every school in Newmarket will be participating and wants to get as many in York Region involved as possible.
"We're hoping to find sponsorships for as many schools as we can," he said.
While the event will be live-streamed Feb. 28 at 11 a.m., it will be available for schools until March 1 at midnight. Marais says all schools are encouraged to participate in the event and to get involved they can contact him through his website here.
