Dear Journalist is a monthly podcast created by the masthead at the Review of Journalism, interviewing established Canadian journalists about lessons they were only able to learn in the field.

About the author

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Mark Henick is the bestselling author of So-Called Normal: A Memoir of Family, Depression and Resilience (HarperCollins, 2021). His hundreds of television appearances have included CTV, Global, CBC, ABC, NBC and CBS. His bylines have included CNN, CNBC, USA Today, and The Chicago Tribune, among many more. PEOPLE Magazine called Mark “one of Canada’s most prominent mental health advocates.” He is currently the nationally syndicated mental health columnist for CBC Radio, appearing on more than two dozen stations across Canada each week.

Hannah Mercanti is a fourth-year undergraduate arts and culture journalist based in Toronto. They are the host of All My Books on Met Radio and the Literary Editor at CanCulture Magazine. When they aren’t writing, you can find them drinking coffee and reading Margaret Atwood books.

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“Okay, ma’am,” a crackling voice interrupts the caller. “Ma’am, can I talk?” Minutes into her report to the Ottawa Police hotline, journalist Rachel Gilmore feels exasperated. She is reporting a violent email sent to The Hill Times’ Erica Ifill—a name-dropping salad of verbal abuse such as “woke,” “cunt,” and racial slurs—including death threats.
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The New Newsroom

From May to August 2024, Canadaland had two keen fellows, Mia Johnson and Leora Schertzer, who wrote stories for its flagship show, also Canadaland. Most mornings, they were at the office at nine in the morning—hours before podcast host Noor Azrieh arrived—and they would be the last to leave. Nobody showed up to the office that early, other than founder Jesse Brown. The fellows frequently engaged in meetings and talked about the news. The stories they produced on their own usually took a team of three to four people to accomplish, according to Azrieh. Johnson made an episode called “The Painful Truth about IUDs,” while Schertzer created “Waste Management: Sh*t’s Complicated.”