Here’s your Canadian Atheist Weekly Update for to .
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[] The CANADALAND Guide to Jordan B. Peterson
This week we have a pair of articles about Jordan B. Peterson that tackle the bizarre phenomenon using a novel tactic: rather than trying to engage directly with Peterson’s vague, contradictory bafflegab, they step back and look at Peterson from a different perspective. In this, the first one, Canadaland – which is a media criticism show – completely ignores the question “is he right”, and instead asks: “why do we care?” This leads to a fascinating and incisive look at the media phenomenon of Peterson.
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[] $250 fee won’t stop church from marking Ash Wednesday in LRT stations
To be clear, this is not about a new by-law or anything like that. What was happening here was that the city was letting the church proselytize on public property – ignoring the fee requirements – in exchange for allowing them to further proselytize later (in the form of providing Christmas carollers).
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[] Edmonton man says Catholic Archdiocese fired him after investigation into same-sex relationship
The allegation in the headline, if true, would be bad enough. But there’s actually more to it. Guevarra didn’t just refuse to answer a question about his private life, he also
[helped] form an LGBTQ Catholic prayer and support group without the approval of the Archbishop
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[] What’s driving populism? It isn’t the economy, stupid
This is a wonderful article taking a very frank but thoughtful look at the problem of anti-immigration and anti-mulitculturalism sentiment in Canada. They point out – as so many have already figured out – that the talk of all this populism being fuelled by economic inequality is bunkum, but then they go on to highlight the real culprit: nativism. They explain why it’s suddenly become such a hot topic since the end of the Harper era, and even outline a strategy for actually reaching people who have been seduced by populist nativism.
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[] The sparse use of Canada’s notwithstanding clause
Brad Wall’s Bill 89 – which would invoke the Charter’s “notwithstanding clause” to keep funding religious schools in defiance of a court ruling that it is unconstitutional – is working it’s way through the Saskatchewan legislature. This article gives a nice review of both the history of usage of the notwithstanding clause, and of Saskatchewan’s use of it in particular.
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[] Engaging Jordan Peterson is enlightening and frustrating
This article is the second of the Jordan Peterson critiques this weeks. In this case, it began with Prof. Myers publishing a couple of videos criticizing the hilariously bad biology in Peterson’s book. Myers was deliberately careful not to address Peterson’s broader claims about postmodernism or Marxist conspiracy plots; he focused solely on the biological claims – his own professional specialty (Myers’ specialty is, I believe, cephalopod developmental biology). Nevertheless, as Myers put it:
It sort of didn’t work
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