Beyond satire lies true fear

Anyone who is a regular reader of this blog knows that I am no fan of the sitting government. Frankly, I find them to be ruthlessly authoritarian and so blinded by ideology that they spend half of their time contradicting their own stated principles. Their chief strategy of governance seems to be the exploitation of bullying tactics and name-calling in the service of demonizing any opposition, which is done in the place of enacting any reasonable legislation.

I studied Shakespeare’s King Lear in high school. It is, briefly, the story of a king who gives land away to his children, and then goes mad as they betray him to seize power. While the character of Lear is compelling, I was particularly drawn to the personage of the Fool. In our critical analysis of the play, we learned a great deal about the role that the Fool or Court Jester played throughout history. While nobles and members of the court were fearful of criticizing the king’s decisions, part of the role of the Fool was to expose and satirize the folly of others, including the ruling class. The Fool walked a thin line between laughter and biting political commentary; between wisdom and, well, foolishness.

However, at some point there comes a time when the king is simply beyond satire. Where the actions of a ruler are so monstrous and horrifying that there can be no laughter levied in opposition. Wherever that point is, I can’t help but think that our current government is closing on it quickly. [Read more…]

Special Feature: I speak to the BC Humanist Association

Last week I gave a 20-minute presentation to the BC Humanist Association on the importance of understanding Black History. It is a longer version of last Monday’s post, given to about 30 Humanists at one of the Association’s regular meetings. The point I was trying to get across is that it’s important to study our history honestly, as it can help us adapt to challenges we face today, and those we will face tomorrow.

The video is below the fold: [Read more…]

Vaccines and the State

Here’s a report from Australia:

“The Australian government has decided to deprive parents of their tax benefits if they do not immunise their children against diseases.

Some families could lose over $2,000 per a child. And while the benefits of vaccination, for individual children, and for the population, far outweigh any risks, some parents question the policy, and do not like money coming into the equation.”

I think it’s trivial to say that this is a case of a government interfering in the choices of a family. Whether this interference is warranted, however… Does the government of a country have the right to financially penalise a family for making choices that don’t directly affect anyone else?

[Read more…]

Black Canadians: where, when and why

This is the second in a series of posts I am writing in my annual commemoration of Black History Month. My inspiration, and source of historical material, is a book by Joseph Mensah called Black Canadians: history, experiences, social conditions. As I work my way through the book, I will be blogging my reactions and things that stand out. You can read the first post here, and its follow-up here.

Mensah spends some time reviewing the causes of emigration from countries, and immigration to Canada. The relevant factors are the usual suspects: political instability, economic strife, security concerns – nothing particularly surprising. Considering the post-colonial disaster that is much of the African continent and the Caribbean (another major source of black immigration to Canada), it should also surprise nobody that black immigration into Canada has been happening at a steady pace as a main source of skilled and unskilled labour.

And it that case it should surprise you that black immigration into Canada has been a feeble trickle throughout its history. In fact, of the ~400,000 black people who have immigrated to Canada since such records were collected, more than half have entered since 1991. You remember 1991, right? First Iraq war, Sonic the Hedgehog, Rodney King, Smells Like Teen Spirit? That’s also the year that Canada passed the ‘halfway’ point for black immigration.

Understanding why this startling (to me, at least) fact exists is contingent upon accepting the reality that Canada has been, since its beginnings, an institution steeped deeply in the attitudes of white supremacy. Even after the era of slavery, Canada did not simply shuck its attitudes about the inferiority of black people. We continued to be a country with racism woven into our very fabric. [Read more…]

New neighbours

You may have seen in the hubub yesterday that we’ve added Brianne Bilyeu (a.k.a. Biodork) to our little collective here. We have another new face, Libby Anne of Lovejoy Feminism whose site at FTB went live today.

Go say hello!

…

Seriously. What are you still doing here? GO!

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Oh, I know what you want. Okay, just this once:

It’s a party!

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Movie Friday: Ten OTHER Things Martin Luther King Said

Because it’s Black History Month (and because I can’t get enough Jay Smooth), here’s a few choice quotations from one of the greatest Americans to ever draw breath.

He could be speaking to our time right now. In fact, he is – these themes are eternal and will not die as long as we fail to learn from them. While it is convenient and gives us fuzzy feelings to think of Martin Luther King Jr. as a patient saint who had a colourblind dream, such fantasy robs us of a much richer portrait of a tireless warrior for equality who refused to capitulate to the status quo.

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Through the hating glass

I’ve spoken about Juan Williams before on this blog, when he was dismissed from his NPR position for making an entirely fair point about his own personal fear of Muslims, and how he was having to deal with that. NPR overreacted and fired him for comments that, if taken in context, were a personal admission of a flaw rather than a demonization of Muslim people.

Mr. Williams went from NPR to a full-time position working for Fox News and didn’t show up on my radar again until a few weeks ago when he was hosting one of a ludicrous number of Republican candidate’s debates*. The video is here, but the TL/DW version of the story is that Mr. Williams tried to call out arch-sleaze Newt Gingrich on his blatant use of racist imagery in the campaign. Gingrich, as is his style, deflects the question, condescends to the poor, and then waves a miniature American flag (all to thunderous applause from a crowd who probably have fewer teeth than Gingrich has wives).

Mr. Williams wrote an opinion piece about his experience facing down the wyrm that is the GOP’s rigid hardon for exploiting the racism running rife through their base. I think it’s worth reading: [Read more…]

The bankruptcy of racism

Many of the topics we discuss here are personal, at least insofar as race is concerned. We talk about the effect race has on colouring people’s experiences, on how they may perceive identical treatment quite differently. I’ve occasionally shared some anecdotes from my own life to underscore some point or another. This is no accident – race and experiences of racism are incredibly personal, and the facts can often not be divorced from the subjective experience.

That being said, I hope that you haven’t been left with the impression that racism only has interpersonal consequences. From the get-go, I have been trying to convey the fact that attitudes about race work their way into every aspect of our lives, often without our knowledge or consent (and certainly without the consent against whom the weight of racism is pressed).

It is a fact, therefore, that if you scratch the surface of just about any human activity, you will find racism simmering just below the surface: [Read more…]

What actual honour looks like

One of the neat remnants of the British Parliamentary system is the practice of referring deferentially to colleagues by an honorific title. So if I were addressing the Prime Minister in the House of Commons, I would not simply refer to him as “Mister Harper” or “hey you Lego-haired fascist”, he would be properly addressed as “the Right Honourable Prime Minister”. Lesser MPs are still “the honourable member from (riding)”. While it may help to preserve civility, there are no conventions about what kind of language follows the honorific:

Winnipeg NDP MP Pat Martin added fuel to the obscenity-laden firestorm he created this week when he cursed at a Conservative senator who suggested murderers should be given ropes to hang themselves. On Wednesday, Martin called Senator Pierre-Hugues Boisvenu an “a—hole” for the comment that sparked controversy. When demands for an apology were made Thursday, Martin refused.

“Nobody elected this son of a bitch, he should keep his comments to himself,” Martin told the Winnipeg Free Press. He added perhaps his only mistake was that he didn’t include the required honorific when addressing a senator. “I should have called him an honourable a—hole.”

Pat Martin, incidentally, has a Twitter account and is consistently awesome.

There is again something vaguely Orwellian, however, about referring to politicians as “the honourable” when many of their actions reveal them to be something else quite entirely*. It is refreshing, therefore, to see a member of public office truly live up to their responsibility to serve the people: [Read more…]

Hey look over here!

Life is seriously cutting into my ability to read blogs. It’s becoming a serious problem. I’m starting to get Pharyngula withdrawal shakes (it’s been over a week). If someone wants to work for me as my personal assistant, that’d be cool.

Anyway, I interrupt our regularly-scheduled blogcast to bring you this important message from Hank Fox:

What if there was a Book of Good Living?

Picture it as a collection of wisdom from people all over the world.

It would be all the stuff you should probably do, and the stuff you probably shouldn’t do, and the way you do it all, in order to live a good life. The way you treat people. The things you do in the course of a day. The broad-based forethought that goes into each life, all the lessons your parents, or their parents, or the people a thousand generations back, learned from the mistakes and hard knocks in their own lives.

Always look both ways before you cross the street. When two workmen meet in a narrow doorway, the one with the heavier load has the right of way. Any architect designing a building for use by large numbers of the public – a stadium or theatre, for instance – should include twice as many bathroom stalls for women as for men. On a hot day, your dog likes ice water just as much as you do. If you eat a little bit less, and exercise a little bit more, you’ll lose weight – no diets, books or courses needed.

Go read Hank, he has good ideas and is a hell of a guy.

Also, the guys over at The Atheist Experience are displaying more stomach and courage than I can claim, by delving into the Bog of Eternal Stench that is Men’s Rights Activist forums and The Amazing Atheist: [Read more…]