Gonzaga University is often recognized for basketball, but the 135-year-old Spokane institution is also known for academic initiatives. One is the Journal of Hate Studies, an annual peer-reviewed publication by Gonzaga’s Center for the Study of Hate. Fomenting prejudice or hostility against others is worth attention today after organized hate groups
Continue readingTag: civil rights
IN-SIGHTS: Circumscribed freedom
The emphasis of individual liberty has always been entangled with white supremacy, settler colonialism, climate destruction, economic exploitation, and patriarchy. These “ugly freedoms” legitimate the right to exploit and subjugate others.
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Friday Morning Links
Assorted content to end your week. – The Honest Sorceror points out the obvious unsustainability of exponential growth in resource extraction when the mass of inanimate man-made objects already exceeds that of life on Earth. And Andy Thanatogenos discusses how to live with the knowledge that we’re on a doomed
Continue readingIN-SIGHTS: It’s not pie
I review an article by The Tyee’s senior editor Paul Willcocks, wherein he gave a failing grade to BC Conservatives when an obnoxious couple disrupted a schoolyard event involving 9-year-olds. That led me to think about why anti-democratic people support dominance and hierarchy and embrace the concept of superiority and
Continue readingThe Cracked Crystal Ball II: So … The Social Woes Of Today Are The Fault of Whom?!
The political right wing's inability to understand things beyond simplistic bromides has always surprised me. I get that it makes for easy sound bite politicking, but seriously, the conclusions drawn are often laughable in their implausibility. Then we come to today's entry in "what stupidity will they say today?": The
Continue readingThe Cracked Crystal Ball II: Conservatives Are Dismantling Western Democracies
It’s been a bit of a whirlwind lately, but there are some very disturbing patterns emerging in the politics of western democracy these days. At the top of the list, is what appears to be a steady effort on the part of conservative politicians to dismantle western democracies, and in
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Saturday Afternoon Links
Assorted content for your weekend reading. – The Star’s editorial board weighs in on the reality that wishful thinking isn’t a substitute for responsible public health measures as another COVID wave builds up, while the Globe and Mail rightly criticizes the politicians acting like the pandemic is over as the
Continue readingIn-Sights: Sacha Baron Cohen, on Facebook
A comedian says he speaks as his “least popular character, Sacha Baron Cohen.”
Continue readingNorthern Currents: Canadian Freedom and Anti-maskers. Covidiots just don’t get it.
Share this: In this land we call Canada, much has been made about citizens handing over certain freedoms in order to get ourselves out of the Covid-19 pandemic. When it comes to mask wearing, the science has already been settled. Wearing a mask is one important tool among many to
Continue readingWritings of J. Todd Ring: Averting Fascism
Fascism is rising – here is how to avert it. A short video talk, linked below, sparked these thoughts, which I will share. May they bless us with the courage, and the presence of mind, to avert the rising of fascism once again – which, make no mistake, is indeed
Continue readingNorthern Currents: Racist blood quantum laws still define First Nations in Canada
Share this: Since signed into law in 1876, the Indian Act has used Blood Quantum laws to define who is legally a First Nations person in Canada. These laws were born out of racist, paternalistic ideas of controlling and colonizing First Nations People by the Canadian government. They were an
Continue readingWritings of J. Todd Ring: Covid-19 In Perspective: An Open Letter
The following letter I wrote and sent out in response to a virtual town hall meeting this evening with our local MP and a local environmental group. I am sharing it here because I think it summarizes a contextualization of covid-19 and other major issues which is critically and urgently
Continue readingNorthern Currents: Two Conservative candidates have transphobic policies. Why is no-one talking about this?
Share this: In the wake of JK Rowling’s most recent twitter debacle in which she (again) spread transphobic slander, it is clear that transphobia is still a pervasive force in our society, and yes, in Canada too. While facing backlash from many in the LGBTQ+ community and their allies, Rowling
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Monday Morning Links
Miscellaneous material to start your week. – Stephen Long writes that one of the key economic symptoms of the coronavirus pandemic has been to push people into underemployment. And CBC Radio examines how people with disabilities have been left out of both conversations as to how to respond to COVID-19,
Continue readingWritings of J. Todd Ring: The Real Resistance: Lessons From History
It does not require a majority to defeat tyranny and defend liberty, but only a small and dedicated minority – as we saw in the American and French Revolutions, and in the defeat of the first wave of fascism, which arose in the 1930’s (and was greatly loved and
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Tuesday Morning Links
This and that for your Tuesday reading. – Andrew Jackson argues that Canada has nothing to gain in trying to race Donald Trump to the bottom when it comes to corporate taxes: While marginal effective corporate-tax rates are clearly a factor in business investment decisions, they are by no means
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Monday Morning Links
Miscellaneous material to start your week. – Kady O’Malley writes that after years of delays on their promise to reassess Bill C-51, civil rights are just one more area where the Libs’ proclamations about “open government” have given way to a closed-door process where only their plans are being given
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Sunday Morning Links
This and that for your Sunday reading. – Rachel Bunker writes that Equifax represents the worst of an out-of-control capitalist system, as a poorly-regulated and unreliable credit reporting operation is making profits for itself by reinforcing existing discrimination among other businesses. – Naomi Klein discusses this summer’s spate of wildfires
Continue readingPolitics and its Discontents: *Echoes Of History – Part 111: Contemporary Economic Terrorism
I must confess that I continue to feel the impact of reading The Blood of Emmett Till. This is a good thing, as it has made me much more aware of the long road involved in the journey to civil rights in the United States, a journey that was regularly
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: New column day
Here, on how a change in government hasn’t done anything to slow the spread of Canada’s surveillance state – both in terms of intrusive new legislative proposals, and a continued determination to operate even outside the law. For further reading…– Again, Dave Seglins and Rachel Houlihan reported on the Cold
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