I was going to write a long blog post on this but since so much has been written about it I think this captures the spirit and intent of the proposal succinctly. The bottom line on Quebec’s proposed values charter is that you can visit a hospital named after a
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THE FIFTH COLUMN: The Bottom Line on the Parti Québécois Proposed Values Charter
I was going to write a long blog post on this but since so much has been written about it I think this captures the spirit and intent of the proposal succinctly.
The bottom line on Quebec’s proposed values charter is that you can visit a hospital name…
Continue readingTHE FIFTH COLUMN: The Bottom Line on the Parti Québécois Proposed Values Charter
I was going to write a long blog post on this but since so much has been written about it I think this captures the spirit and intent of the proposal succinctly. The bottom line on Quebec’s proposed values charter is that you can visit a hospital named after a
Continue readingwmtc: fifty years later, king and his most famous speech are transformed into patriotic mush
Today, Americans will march on Washington in commemoration of the most famous March on Washington: August 28, 1963, when Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. gave his now-famous “I Have A Dream” speech. The meaning of that speech, like the man who delivered it, has been purposefully misremembered, and so, is
Continue readingwmtc: dimanno: let’s make sochi the gay games
When I read Stephen Fry’s open letter to the IOC, and the continued calls to boycott or move the Sochi Games because of the horrendous and institutionalized homophobic violence within Russia, I couldn’t help but think of the Beijing Games. I absolutely understand the uproar over Russia’s anti-gay laws, and
Continue readingThe Sir Robert Bond Papers: On bigotry and prejudice #nlpoli
The Telegram editorial last Friday offered a few comments on some recent examples of nasty words tossed at people not from one place or another. One was a letter that turned up in the Calgary Sun complaining about all the Newfs in western Canada. Another was the number of people
Continue readingwmtc: what i’m reading: two youth novels
There is so much truly excellent youth fiction out these days, and it’s not all vampires and zombies. Here are two wonderful teen novels in two totally different veins. There Is No Dog, Meg Rossoff, 2011 Like many excellent novels, Meg Rosoff’s There Is No Dog defies easy classification. It’s
Continue readingMontreal Simon: Obama, Trayvon Martin, and the Legacies of Pain
It may not go down in history as one of his greatest speeches.There were no soaring flights of rhetoric, he hardly raised his head as he delivered it.But I thought Barack Obama's reaction to the Trayvon Martin verdict was one of the finest moments of his Presidency.For this needed
Continue readingwmtc: dear liberal public: there is nothing shocking about the george zimmerman verdict
Dear liberal public, The internet tells me you are shocked – shocked and outraged – about the verdict in the George Zimmerman case. Seriously? You are shocked? You have lived in the United States or Canada all your life, and you are shocked that a white man who killed a
Continue readingwmtc: my journey to palestinian solidarity and the myth of the self-hating jew, part 3 and final
Part 1 here. Part 2 here. By now it should be clear that my abandonment of my ties to Israel, and my support for the liberation of Palestine, are not based on denial of my Jewish heritage or on anti-Semitism. This is a political issue, and a moral one. Jewish
Continue readingMontreal Simon: The Downfall of DOMA and the Triumph of Love
I've been studiously trying to ignore anything that happens in the United States these days.Because it's summer, the place is a mad house, and if I need crazy I've got Harper eh?But I couldn't ignore the screams and the tears of joy of millions of gay Americans and their friends
Continue readingwmtc: my journey to palestinian solidarity and the myth of the self-hating jew, part 2
Part 1 here. For a while I had been reluctant to write this story, because it seemed so baggy and shapeless. The best essays are crisp, with a clearly defined turning point and an easily identifiable ah-ha moment. This story has none of those that I can see. A clear
Continue readingwmtc: my journey to palestinian solidarity and the myth of the self-hating jew, part 1
The Self-Hating Jew. This is what I am, according to some. There’s a line from an Andrew Lloyd-Webber musical: “I’ve been called many names, but they’re the strangest.”* I think of this every time I hear or read the expression “self-hating Jew”. What a bizarre turn of phrase. Is it
Continue readingMontreal Simon: Stephen Harper, Rob Ford, and the Little Canada
As I paddle my way through life I'm sorry to say that so far I don't have much to brag about eh?Whenever I toot my own horn there is always somebody there, like Seb or my Mum, to gently remind me I'm not perfect. !!@#!!!But I'm proud to say that I
Continue readingwmtc: dave zirin writes to dan snyder: why the washington nfl team must change its name
Here is the definitive piece on why the NFL team in Washington DC must change its name, written by – who else – Dave Zirin: Enough: An Open Letter to Enough Dan Snyder, at Grantland. Please go and read it.
Continue readingwmtc: conversation with a cab driver
“Oh man, you live in Toronto? I love Toronto! I go there a lot. I have a friend who races horses at Woodbine.” “Woodbine, is that the one near the airport? I live right near there.” “Toronto’s a great town. I love hockey, so you know I love going up
Continue readingwmtc: what could baseball, sexual abuse, and pitbulls possibly have in common?
It’s Opening Day! It’s always a long, cold winter for a baseball-only fan, but winters for Red Sox fans have been especially long and cold lately. When was the last time we saw a meaningful game? (Don’t answer that.) I lost interest ’round about July last season, unusual for me,
Continue readingwmtc: how can we condemn bigotry on the soccer field yet support racist israeli policies?
This week in The Nation, Dave Zirin reports on some disturbing – and disgusting – behaviour from Israeli soccer fans. Not even in the earliest days of Jackie Robinson’s 1947 historic debut with the Brooklyn Dodgers did Brooklyn’s white fans walk out after number 42 stole a base or hit
Continue readingwmtc: mississauga m.p. calls for "investigation" of abortions: conservative m.p.s continue their anti-choice agenda
Wladyslaw Lizon, Member of Parliament for Mississauga Cooksville East (my own riding), is back in the news. The Conservative MP has teamed up with two of his fellow backbenchers in an attack on Canadian women’s reproductive rights. The last time Lizon surfaced, he had “alerted” Citizenship and Immigration Minister Jason
Continue readingwmtc: dyke duo dupes fox news
The wingnut media continues to redefine irony. Yesterday Fox News ran a piece called “To be happy, we must admit women and men aren’t ‘equal’”. (Sorry, no link. Linking to bigots is a violation of wmtc policy.) To illustrate their homophobic, anti-woman twaddle, they used a picture of a wedding
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