rwmtest

Prior to and during the pandemic, the issue of systemic racism has been extremely visible in Canada and elsewhere.  I felt it was time for me to continue my learning to become antiracist. For context and further reading, this month I've read the following: White Fragility: Why It’s So Hard for White People to Talk About Racism The Skin We're In: A Year of Black Resistance and Power Stamped from the Beginning: The Definitive History of Racist Ideas in America 21 Things You May Not Know About the Indian Act: Helping Canadians Make Reconciliation with Indigenous Peoples a Reality     White Fragility provides context for people where discussions of racism are new. I provided a review earlier , discussing the problem with the focus on individuals vs systems, and "racist = bad / not racist = good" simplistic binary thinking. I was born into a racist society, so even though I grew up oblivious to the concept of race, I absorbed racist ideas around me.  The only way fo...

I just finished reading White Fragility, by Robin DiAngelo . My reading this isn't very novel, as many people have.  The book is aimed at people who are identified (by others, even if not by themselves) as "white".  While I recognize that race is a social construct, it is a social construct I was ignorant of growing up.  I have had the opportunity in recent decades to become more aware of race, and thus aware of my own participation in this society. I want to talk more about the concepts in the book, but there are a few issues that hold me back. I worry that any discussion will be seen as if it were "virtue signalling", given how popular the book has become in certain circles. Since the book uses different definitions of some terminology than how others use it, I feel like anything I say won't make sense to anyone who hasn't read the book or is otherwise aware of the language in this subject area. Ms. Diangelo discusses racism not in terms of a conscious...

Youtube recommended the following video to me, so I watched.  After watching I posted a public comment, as I felt the video didn't live up to its fairly sensationalist title. I find it interesting that a traditional media style sensationalist "Questioning Conventional Wisdom in the COVID-19 Crisis" headline was used. What I didn't see was much questioning of conventional wisdom. Sure, laypersons in the media and the general public who haven't spent much time trying to understand either the medical or economic issues may think they have wisdom, but that doesn't make it wisdom. There are even people who are commenting along the lines of "Ya, they were wrong -- thanks for correcting the record" as if this were some sort of political partisan issue. But those of us who have been thinking about these things seem to all be on a fairly similar page. This pandemic, or one like it, has been predicted for decades. Viruses are a fact of life, and the intera...

In my last post I offered a geopolitical reply to a geopolitical opinion I disagree with. I was told that I was ignoring the facts, even though I wasn't disagreeing with facts, only a political interpretation of current events. I thought I'd offer some context for my thinking, in case it will help convince others to take a more positive approach to these global health issues. While I have lived all my life within Ontario, a province of Canada, I consider myself to be a human being who happens to live in a specific geographic region. As much as I can I try to live by "think globally, act locally", and to understand the different context in which other people live when trying to offer any support. The most critical issues we face as humans are not confined within the political boundaries drawn up by political entities (countries, provinces, etc), so trying to solve them cannot be confined that way. When looking at disease outbreaks there are many reasons why certain r...

While most people are taking this specific crisis seriously, and coming together as communities and global citizens, there are still people who are wanting to play political games.  While we are all stressed, and not all acting as logically as we could, we need to all do our best to direct our energy towards helpful rather than harmful pursuits. Everyone needs to recognise that this pandemic isn't human-made, and should be treated as a war against an invasion of this planet. The country that was attacked first was China, and from this every other country had warning that the battle had started. You might expect from having the least warning that China would be doing worse than everyone else, but they aren't. China has taken the fight very seriously, and has reduced war casualties in their region of jurisdiction.  They have also been actively engaged in information sharing with scientists and healthcare workers across the globe.  We need this global information sharing ...

I've  read several articles discussing how hard it is to find good candidates for party leadership races. The federal Green Party and Conservative party, as well as some provincial parties, are looking for replacements for people who stepped down or were unreasonably kicked out. I wonder if it is finally time to discuss whether we should be having these party-run leadership races at all? In her chapter in Turning Parliament Inside Out , Elisabeth May reminded us that it wasn't until the 1974 federal election that party affiliations appeared on the ballots. The law also indicated that party leaders authorized candidates to have that party affiliation on the riding ballot. It was only in the latter half of the twentieth century that Canada broke from the tradition of the leader being decided by elected caucus members as is the case in most Commonwealth countries, and adopting a more US style of having party members elect the leaders. The changes for the 1974 election happened du...

"Your right to swing your arms ends just where the other man’s nose begins.” - anonymous judge. It has always been the case that rights cannot be treated as absolute, and that one right must end where exercising that right infringes upon someone else's rights. This debate is in full swing in Canada as it relates to the religious rights of employees providing provincial services and the sometimes conflicting rights of the public that receives these services. On June 16, 2019 Quebec passed Bill n°21 : An Act respecting the laicity of the State  ( Official Status legislation ), which discusses which subset of employees of provincial services must offer that service with their face uncovered, and a further smaller subset that must do so without wearing religious symbols.   The idea is simple:  when employees are within specific positions they have an additional duty of impartiality, and must not only be impartial but be seen by those receiving the service to be impa...