“Societies appear to be subject, every now and then, to periods of moral panic. A condition, episode, person or group of persons emerges to become defined as a threat to societal values and interests; its nature is presented in a stylized and stereotypical fashion by...
The cultural war has been in full bloom in U.S. education for at least five years. Now it has spread to public schools in Canada. This war pits left-leaning liberal teachers, administrators, parents, and school board trustees against right-leaning conservatives. The...
On May 31, 2021, I was a substitute teacher at an Abbotsford high school named after the painter Robert Bateman when news was feverishly spreading about the “discovery” of the “remains” of 215 children in a “mass grave” at the site of the long-shuttered Kamloops...
Tom Brodbeck’s opinion essays (Winnipeg Free Press, July 28, 2023), rightly points out that in Winnipeg, at least, there has been “a breakdown of accountability measures to monitor the mistreatment” of residents of personal-care homes. Obviously, the physical and...
If one was to discuss the state of the world’s democracies in September of 2019, it would look entirely different than it does today in 2022. Three years ago, Canadians generally thought that: our democracy was relatively strong and citizens would defend their...
One of the greatest books that explain how the world works is Propaganda by Edward Bernays. The man dubbed “the father of public relations” applied the psychological ideas of his uncle Sigmund Freud upon the masses, triggering their basic motivations to the benefit of...
I’ve just sent $5 to the Public Safety Minister, the minister in charge of Canada’s Orwellian-named Correctional Service. He spends hundreds of millions of dollars annually on hell-hole prisons—hundreds of dollars per inmate a day. But they do no correcting to enable...
Few will argue that federal government Indigenous policy—whether Liberal or Conservative—has failed Canadians. The federal government will be spending some $21-billion on the delivery of Indigenous programs and services this year. Yet the boil water orders will...
I have been asked to describe Canada’s Indigenous child welfare problem. I am told that there are similarities between it and New Zealand’s Maori child welfare issues. I confess that I am largely ignorant of the New Zealand situation, but I have some experience with...
The television series “The Enemy Within” begins by informing the viewer that there are 100,000 foreign spies in the United States working to undermine and destabilize America. China has sent hundreds of thousands of students to America to gain maximum access to the...
CBC Radio was once a national treasure. From Peter Gzowski through Arthur Black, Shelagh Rogers and Danny Finkleman, a turn of the knob rewarded the listener with information, entertainment, and humour. Nowadays, a push of the button is more likely to bring on someone...
Previously published in the Brandon Sun on November 7, 2018. The revision of history continues. The City of New Westminster has taken down the statue of British Columbia’s first chief justice, Matthew Begbie. According to the Vancouver Sun, the statue was “a symbol of...
On May 21, the national government unveiled a lengthy "digital charter" with the noble goals of expanded internet access and more trust online. If one peels back the feel-good 10 principles and stated justifications, however, one finds a new weapon in the censor...
In September 2018, the Office of Academic Indigenization provided Mount Royal University (MRU) faculty with a document entitled “Indigenizing Mount Royal’s Curricula: A Call For Engagement.” This document affirmed MRU’s “commit[ment] to indigenizing its curricula to...
“The term ‘politically correct’ was coined in the late 1920s by the Soviets and their ideological allies around the world to describe why the views of certain of the party faithful needed correction to the party line.1 Totalitarian movements and totalitarian...