This is part of a series of articles intended to illustrate the usefulness of treating atheism as a social justice issue, rather than trying to wall atheist discourse off from social justice discussions. Read the introductory post here. As I intimated in the panel discussion of masculinity we had last weekend, the fight over women’s …
Category Archive: crommunism
Mar 04 2013
Atheism is a social justice issue – a primer on intersection
One of the current fights happening within the atheism movement is a dispute (often heated, usually stupid) over whether or not the atheist community should concern itself with so-called “social justice” issues. I say this fight is “stupid” because the idea of someone insisting that people not talk about some topic in order to live up …
Feb 26 2013
Special Feature: Real Men Don’t Talk About Misogyny
This past weekend I convened an all-star panel to discuss a topic whose time has definitely come: masculinity and misogyny. Our discourse within the atheist community has hit a sticking point (for many) in the form of the role that feminism plays in understanding not only our own internal community dynamics, but the world around …
Feb 25 2013
Reflections on the Oakville Klan story
I want to follow up this morning’s post with a couple of things that were sitting in the back of my mind as I was reading. Canada’s polite racism, and the ‘tone’ crowd One of the defining features of racism in Canada is that it usually comes disguised in very neutral, inoffensive language. Canada’s myth …
Feb 22 2013
Reflecting on the Yee Clun case
There are a couple of things from yesterday morning’s post that I think bear further examination and reflection. One of the good ones Yee Clun was lucky, in a sense, that he was able to muster support from well-regarded white Reginans. What Backhouse found extraordinary is that, with only a couple of notable exceptions, the …
Feb 12 2013
Wandata’s Trial and today’s Canada
While reading the chapter that informed this morning’s post, I was particularly struck by the number of parallels between Manitoba in 1902 and Canada in 2013. Now, to be sure, this is more than likely to be a big ol’ ball of confirmation bias – I have learned more about Canada’s history with First Nations in …
Feb 03 2013
“Why isn’t there a white history month?”
One of the staples of black history month is legions of white people generating faux outrage in an ever-expanding variety of media wondering why there isn’t a “white history month”. There’s a black history month, the argument goes. Isn’t the goal for everyone to be equal? Why can’t we celebrate white history? Is it because you’re racist? I …
Jan 29 2013
Who’s laughing?
A little while ago I got into a silly fight with someone who I used to (before this fight) think was a pretty decent person. Ze had posted a comic that poked fun at people who misrepresent themselves on social media. Because it was the internet, a lot of the panels made fun of fat …
Jan 28 2013
On the wrong side of justice
This post is going to be a bit of a pedantic rant about a figure of speech, but I hope you’ll bear with me because I don’t think it’s a trivial issue. Progressive liberals often describe conservatives as being “on the wrong side of history” when it comes to things like gay rights, gender or …
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