Posts By Crommunist

0 Flirting with free speech

March 10, 2011
by Crommunist
· blog · Canada · civil rights · critical thinking · free speech · news · politics

There’s an interesting wrinkle in the debate over free speech, which has to do with the issue of truth. If I say that Stephen Harper is the worst Prime Minister we’ve ever had, that falls under the category of political criticism and opinion, which is protected speech. However, if I say that Stephen Harper raped a 12 year-old girl in 1997, that falls under the auspices of defamation and is punishable under law (where I would have to produce some evidence or face a legal repercussion). Both of these things are reasonable statutes – while we should be allowed to criticize our political leaders (and each other), it would certainly be harmful to society as a whole if people were allowed to level damaging accusations at each other without restraint.

There is, however, a large middle ground where the line between these two things blurs. If I say, for example, that Stephen Harper seems to me like a guy who would rape a 12 year-old child, that’s still my opinion, but it’s definitely defamatory. What if someone tells me that they heard that Stephen Harper did something like that, and I repeat their lie based on faulty information? Is that my fault? What if I am a prominent public figure? Does my position as an opinion leader impart on me some responsibility to check into the factuality of claims that I make before I repeat them?

What about if instead of being a singular opinion leader, I am a news organization? Do I have a duty, both to the public and to the rule of law, to ensure that the things that I report are based in fact? The CRTC seems to think so:

The CRTC has withdrawn a controversial proposal that would have given TV and radio stations more leeway to broadcast false or misleading news. Indeed, the broadcast regulator now says it never wanted the regulatory change in the first place and was only responding to orders from a parliamentary committee. The committee last week quietly withdrew its request for regulatory amendments in the face of a public backlash.

The CRTC has been in the news quite a bit recently for its approach to telecommunications, the Fox News North issue, and now once again for its withdrawal of its own proposal over false news.

There are two issues to consider with this move. First, it is notoriously difficult to establish a standard for “truth” outside the realm of science. If we look at what is happening in Libya right now, it is both a populist uprising against a brutal dictator, and a band of anti-government rebels using unlawful force against the legitimate ruler of the country. Both of those completely contradictory claims are completely true, depending on the editorial position one takes. How could one determine which of these claims, if made from a media outlet, would be considered “false or misleading”? Are the Democrats in Wisconsin bravely refusing to capitulate to an over-reaching and clearly corrupt governor, or are they fleeing the legitimate government and abdicating the legislative role they vowed to uphold? Again, these are both completely true claims, and if station A adheres to the first, while station B trumpets the second, which one is lying? Both? Neither?

The second issue to keep in mind is that, thus far, this has never been an issue in Canada. The CRTC has never had to prosecute or fine a television or radio station for broadcasting false or misleading news. There’s a great diversity of opinion among the various outlets, save for the fact that we don’t have an outlet that specifically caters to the bizarro-nut right wing (we also don’t have one that caters specifically to the bizarro-nut left wing, if that helps). It’s a sort of non-issue that, if the CRTC is to be believed, was raised about 10 years ago (before the days of the Harper government) and was quietly shelved for most of that time. Given that there’s never been a challenge to the ruling, it’s hard to claim that this is an unreasonable restriction of free speech.

These two issues aside, there is still an underlying conflict at the centre of free speech when it comes to truth. Since truth is always a shifting target outside of science, banning false or misleading news is a tricky issue. By any objective standard of truth that we could agree on as a society, religious statements are all false and misleading, as are ghost stories and UFO sightings. Clearly we are not comfortable banning those statements. What do we do when someone does make a blatantly false claim in a news outlet, given that we have no precedent? While we can trumpet “extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence” until the cows come home, can we turn that into a general rule for the state to follow? Or must we let the liars continue to lie, with our only recourse being to counter their false speech with true speech?

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0 What does religious oppression look like?

March 9, 2011
by Crommunist
· blog · civil rights · forces of stupid · free speech · law · news · religion

I’ve spoken at length before about how, in this country at least, claims of “religious persecution” is more often than not just a complaint based on loss of privilege. To be sure, occasionally there is actual oppression that happens on religious grounds (I have an example of that going up for Movie Friday), and that is certainly deplorable. However, most of the crying that happens over “religious persecution” in Canada doesn’t even glancingly resemble actual persecution.

So what does religious persecution look like?

This:

Pakistani Minorities Minister Shahbaz Bhatti has been shot dead by gunmen who ambushed his car in broad daylight in the capital, Islamabad. He was travelling to work through a residential district when his vehicle was sprayed with bullets, police said. Mr Bhatti, the cabinet’s only Christian minister, had received death threats for urging reform to blasphemy laws.

To be clear, Mr. Bhatti was not killed because he is a Christian. Mr. Bhatti was killed because he has spoken in opposition to Pakistan’s blasphemy law – the same law that claimed the life of another minister. Mr. Bhatti was not killed because he blasphemed against Islam (which, despite being a stupid thing to have a law about, is still law in Pakistan), but because he had the temerity to point out the fact that the blasphemy law was used to persecute religious minorities and settle political scores.

Tehrik-i-Taliban told BBC Urdu they carried out the attack. “This man was a known blasphemer of the Prophet [Muhammad],” said the group’s deputy spokesman, Ahsanullah Ahsan. “We will continue to target all those who speak against the law which punishes those who insult the prophet. Their fate will be the same.”

While I hate the all-too-easy conflation of Islam and terrorism, this is undeniably a case where Muslim religious orthodoxy is being used to fuel terror. This isn’t a group making a political point and using religion as an excuse, which is the default go-to excuse of people who wish to excuse religious fundamentalism; this is a group executing people and promising to execute more until their religious beliefs carry the force of law. This is terrorism, pure and simple.

If this wasn’t enough of a reason to oppose blasphemy laws, Indonesia is reminding us of the principal reason:

Authorities in Indonesia’s West Java have issued a decree which severely limits the activities of a small Islamic sect called the Ahmadiyah. Members will not be able to publicly identify themselves and are being urged to convert to mainstream Islam… Lawyers for the Ahmadiyah say the decree violates a law protecting people’s rights to worship how they choose. But hardline Islamic groups say the order is perfectly legal, claiming that the sect’s beliefs deviate from the tenets of Islam and therefore violate the country’s rules against blasphemy.

Consider for a moment the torturous contradiction of the idea of a country that simultaneously a) promotes freedom of religion, and then b) outlaws a group for deviating from religious tenets on grounds of blasphemy. Religious heterodoxy is an inevitable product of a religiously tolerant society – belief can only be constrained through use of force, and allowing people to believe what they want means that you may not force anyone to believe as you do. By telling the Ahmadiyah (who Christians would probably like since a lot of their diversions from mainstream Islam have to do with Jesus) that their beliefs are illegal, Indonesia is putting to the lie any claim they might have of being religiously tolerant.

Blasphemy laws, like any law banning freedom of speech or expression, will always lead to human rights abuses. When the religious establishment commands state power, blasphemy laws are a thin veil that fails to mask the naked ambitions of the orthodox to punish anyone who thinks differently. As I’ve said before, freedom of religion is good for everyone, not just the non-religious. I am incredibly saddened by the death of Mr. Bhatti, and am depressed by the continued stupidity of the people of Indonesia. I am, conversely, more impressed with Canada’s ability to forebear from actual religious persecution (by and large).

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0 Well that’s good to know…

March 9, 2011
by Crommunist
· blog · Catholic church · crapitalism · critical thinking · good news · hate

Hey Jews! Good news for you guys? Remember how generations of Catholic leaders said that you were collectively responsible for a murder that supposedly happened 2000 years ago? Pope Ratzinger is letting y’all off the hook:

A new book by Pope Benedict XVI offers a sweeping exoneration of the Jewish people for the death of Jesus Christ, tackling one of the most controversial issues in Christianity. Wednesday, Benedict uses a biblical and theological analysis to explain why it is not true that the Jewish people as a whole were responsible for Jesus’ death. Interpretations to the contrary have been used for centuries to justify the persecution of Jews

Regular readers of this blog will know that I am no friend to the current pope, but I will always give credit where credit is due. First of all, it should be very clear that this is not a new pronouncement from the current administration that reverses Church policy. Jews were let off the hook for the murder of Jesus many years ago, and Church doctrine has been clear about that fact. Reminding Catholics of this fact is a positive step, and hopefully will help stem the tide of anti-Jewish sentiment around the world, at least from Catholics. There is nothing negative to be said about this announcement, which is simply an excerpt of a much longer work by the pope.

Having said all that, it is still a stupid thing to have to say. A group of people cannot be collectively responsible for the actions of a few of their ancestors. The very idea is ludicrous. First of all, there are strong reasons to doubt that the account of Jesus’ trial and execution is anywhere near accurate, or that Jesus as a single person even existed at all. Second, even granting the accuracy of the collective account in the New Testament, some of the Jews in the crowd were trying to secure Jesus’ freedom, a good many of them knew nothing about the case at all, and still thousandsfold more weren’t anywhere near Jerusalem at the time and couldn’t have done anything about it even if they wanted to. Third, even if they were responsible, Jesus’ death was part of the original plan of God, so their involvement was pre-ordained. Fourth and perhaps most importantly, the decisions of a group of people do not carry forward to their offspring. It is only the most profoundly evil mind that could possibly punish a child for the sins of its forebears (yes, apparently that is how the word is spelled).

I should, at this moment, attempt to stem the tide of “aha!” accusations from those who think that the above paragraph also applies to the issue of reparations, affirmative action, or white privilege. Reparations were a promise made on behalf of the Union government, which still exists as the United States government – promises made should be kept. Affirmative action is not punishing white people for the sins of their forebears, and I have explained in depth why this is so. White privilege refers to the fact that children of white parents start their lives with a set of assumptions that benefit them (or at least do not count against them) from day one, which means that they continue to benefit from the actions of their ancestors – Jews are afforded no such benefit, and are usually detrimentally treated for their religious/cultural affiliation (except within their own in-group, obviously).

It is perhaps not unique to religion, this punishing of children for things that their parents did, but it is certainly a hallmark of religious teaching. The doctrine of original sin, for example, is based on the slight disobedience of a fictional ancestor, and punishment is meted out against not only the species supposedly involved in the transgression, but against all other species as well. The Old Testament is replete with examples of innocents being punished for the actions of others. The Qu’ran treats nonbelief with torture – nonbelief which is surely the fault of whatever religious instruction one receives (unwittingly) as a child. Hinduism states that entire families are forever cursed to live as subservient to others based on nothing more than ancestry. The idea that guilt is a heritable trait is certainly one that, if it does not find its authorship there, certainly finds succor and support from theology.

The pope, by declaring that each individual Jewish person in the world is not responsible for the torture and murder of a person who a) may never have existed, b) even if he was, did not experience universal persecution at the hands of Jewish people, c) even if he did, whose persecution and execution were part of a divine plan… by declaring that this is not the fault of their two millennia distant descendants, the pope has basically come to the same realization that a normal and non-god-blinded person would have reached in about 5 minutes of reflection (if they were distracted). To treat this announcement as some kind of mercy or generous gesture is to grant license to the series of fallacies that the idea of deferred transgenerational responsibility requires to carry any force, not to mention the deep and abiding evil that is inherent in the idea of punishing someone for what someone else has done.

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0 You finished cleaning that glass ceiling yet, sweetheart?

March 8, 2011
by Crommunist
· blog · critical thinking · culture · feminism · gender · good news · news

Today is the 100th anniversary of International Women’s Day, which should be some cause for celebration. After all, 100 years of progress is an incredibly long time in human history. In the past 100 years we moved from horse-drawn carriages and plows to an international space station orbiting the planet. In 100 years we went from a largely-illiterate population with extremely limited access to information to a planet-wide network that puts virtually the sum total of all human knowledge at ready access from something that we can slip into our pockets. Our understanding of the universe has gone from the deterministic passage of small particles to a nuanced, varied and complex probabilistic model, allowing us to probe concepts previously written off as unsolvable “mysteries”.

Surely in all that time, with all that progress, we’ve made similar strides in the way we treat each other. The answer, as always, seems to be “yes and no”.

Why Feminism Still Matters:

Across the globe by almost every measure, women lag well behind men. Even though women do 66 per cent of the work and produce half of the food, UNICEF reports that they earn only 10 per cent of the global income and own just one per cent of the property. Nowhere in the world do women account for even a third of the national parliamentarians and, in most regions, including Canada, it is considerably less.

Still, this represents progress.

This article, published in the Vancouver Sun, is a pretty decent overview of the various stalls and starts of the movement for women’s equality, but it doesn’t do an explicit job of answering the question implied by its own title – why does feminism still matter? Why should we be focusing on issues that affect women? Anti-feminists, in their attempts to resemble reasonable and decent human beings (rather than reactionary dicks) often refute the feminist position by arguing that we should focus on having equal rights for everyone, and that focusing on women is the same as ignoring men. And while feminists sometimes just want to scream “men are doing just fine, shut your face hole!”, that’s a quick way to lose an argument for a stupid reason.

Canadian companies lack strategies for promoting women:

In the U.S., 70 per cent of companies surveyed lacked strategies for promoting women, compared to 71 per cent internationally. Despatie noted that the Canadian survey also showed that 43 per cent of companies didn’t feel they had a problem with promoting women to top jobs. To women, however, the lack of support strategies was clear. More than half (53 per cent) of all Canadian women and about 38 per cent of American women thought their organization provided “no or minimal support” for their promotion.

It’s right here that the importance of feminism is revealed: companies think they’re doing an excellent job promoting women, but the reality is that they are even worse here than they are in the United States, a place that we’re all happy to look down on socially (to my great chagrin). When there is such a huge gap between perception and reality, the status quo becomes deeply entrenched and progress becomes next to impossible. I am somewhat reminded of the bromide from Alcoholics Anonymous – the first step is admitting you have a problem.

When confronted with this kind of information, the usual reaction of the anti-feminists is to go with the old standby excuse of “maybe there aren’t enough qualified women for the positions”. To me that seems to invite the question: why the hell aren’t there? Women are statistically better educated, are supposedly guaranteed by law to be free from official discrimination based on sex, and equally intelligent as their male counterparts – wherefore the disparity?

Women are underutilized in executive workforce – study:

In both years, a full 30 per cent of the largest companies in Canada did not have a single woman in their executive ranks. “Time is up for ‘give it time’,” Gillis said, though she added that the solution is not simple tokenism. Research indicates that on average, companies with more women senior officers outperform those with fewer (emphasis mine).

That agrees very much with what one of Canada’s largest companies has found in its efforts to reduce the homogeneity of its executive ranks. “If you start to see it as one versus the other, you miss the point,” TD Bank CEO Ed Clark said of the bank’s efforts to promote more women in a recent CBC interview. “By framing it as a people development issue, you don’t get this zero-sum game; everybody wins.”

More and more we are finding that the stereotypical underperformance of women in “men’s fields” like sciences and mathematics are a product of the stereotypes, and not due to any actual difference in cognitive ability. Tearing down stereotypes is a process that requires the intentional encouragement of cognitive dissonance – creating highly visible and immediately recognizable violations of the stereotype. Faced with observed reality and “what I’ve always heard”, reality wins out in the end. Add to that the fact that encouraging women appears to have beneficial outcomes above and beyond being the right thing to do, and you’ve got the recipe for a winner.

(There is an important fact raised in that article that doesn’t fit the overall theme of the argument, but I thought it should be raised anyway. While Crown corporations had the largest proportion of women in executive positions, the private sector came in second place, a number that has increased slightly in the past 2 years. It appears that the private sector is doing a better job of promoting women than the public sector. Just food for thought.)

The premier-designate is a woman:

It may not be kosher to discuss the premier-designate (Christy Clark) in terms of her sex, given we are conditioned to believe that a person’s capability has nothing to do with gender, but it’s clearly a factor, because when it comes to positions of power, whether it’s Parliament Hill or a corporate boardroom, a skirt is still an anomaly in Canada.

And it is relevant. The majority of the population is female, and yet women remain woefully under-represented at the top -be it by historical choice or entrenched sexism. Women, despite making up the bulk of the workforce, are still traditionally considered custodians of the home and hearth and, as such, are often viewed as weaker than men, slower to decision and less likely to be strong political leaders who will go the distance.

My home province of British Columbia (or at least those who are registered members of the provincial Liberal party) recently appointed a new leader… and it’s a lady! If you scratch the surface of the image of the B.C. granola hippie yoga hipster, you’ll find that B.C. is still a western province with deep entrenched Conservative (note the capitalization) values. It is indeed, therefore, a big deal that the person with her finger on the button is a “her”. Despite the fact that the provincial Liberals would pass for Conservatives just about anywhere else in the country, a female premier (designate) is just the kind of high-profile stereotype-busting position I was talking about, and I wish premier-designate Clark success.

Ivory Coast women protesters shot:

Soldiers backing Ivory Coast’s defiant leader mowed down women protesting his refusal to leave power in a hail of gunfire Thursday, killing at least six and shocking a nation where women’s marches have historically been used as a last resort against an unrestrained army. Because the president’s security force has shown almost no reserve in opening fire on unarmed civilians, the women decided this week to organize the march in the nation’s commercial capital Abidjan, assuming soldiers would be too ashamed to open fire. But at least six of the thousands of women demonstrating Thursday were killed on the spot, said Mohamed Dosso, an assistant to the mayor of Abobo, a suburb of the city.

Women bring another set of sensibilities to the table when discussing issues, and a diversity of viewpoints is a strength. Whatever the final decision, having a plurality of insight allows decision-making authorities to consider a variety of potential outcomes. In the Ivory Coast, women have traditionally exercised a different kind of power to their male counterparts, and have been able to blunt the more outrageous actions of a male-dominated culture. Their execution by the army signals a disturbing new development in an already-disturbing conflict.

Closing thoughts

Which brings me back to the question I tried to address earlier: why does feminism still matter?

Well, do women experience disproportionately little political and economic power? Is the improvement of the standing of women irrevocably linked to the improvement of society in general? Have gains been made? Is there still work to do?

The answer to all of the above questions is “yes”. We are not yet, as a society, in a position to let feminism slide into history as obsolete. While I am primarily a commentator on race and associated issues, I am not so blind as to fail to recognize that the same societal forces that are stacked against black people are stacked against women. A victory for women is a victory for all of us, and there can be no equality until we see the advancement of women as being part of our own self-interest. In order to achieve that, people need to be talking about it.

Happy International Women’s Day.

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0 I so very much want to believe!

March 8, 2011
by Crommunist
· blog · civil rights · news · politics · secularism

The title alone probably caused a few heart attacks from the atheists who visit the site from Twitter or Facebook – please rest assured I am not talking about a deity. No, I am referring once again to the important thing that is happening. The Middle East and northern Africa are still up in arms over the protests and changes in power, and we are starting to see some of the political fallout of these actions.

Libya is still on fire

At least 30 civilians have been killed after security forces loyal to Muammar Gaddafi, Libyan leader, attempted to retake the rebel-held town of Az Zawiyah, near the capital Tripoli, that has for days been defying his rule, witnesses have said. The rebellion in Az Zawiyah – the closest rebel-held territory to the capital and also the site of an oil refinery – has been an embarassment to the Libyan authorities who are trying to show they control at least the west of the country. Eastern regions of the country, around the city of Benghazi, have already fallen out of Gaddafi’s control after a popular revolt against his four decades of rule.

Widespread fighting is happening all across Libya. What makes the situation in Libya much different from Egypt or Tunisia is the fact that the pro-government forces (including part of the military) are unashamedly attacking Libyan civilians, and the anti-government forces are responding in kind. This has the potential to turn into a civil war (although MSNBC’s Richard Engel points out that a civil war is really defined by civilian forces attacking other civilian forces, which is not really the case here… yet), with the “People’s Army” arming itself and rising violently against the government. Attempts by the government to retake eastern cities has been largely unsucessful, and the anti-government protests appear to have hit Gaddafi’s stronghold in Tripoli.

While I would very much like to believe that once the army has overthrown Gaddafi they will divest themselves of their arms and stand for peaceful elections. There is not a lot of precedent for “people’s armies” doing anything other than installing themselves as a new regime, and perpetrating the same evils of the old regime on a different group of people. One can only hope that the international community shows some uncharacteristic restraint and doesn’t listen to idiots like Joseph Liebermann and John McCain, who want to arm and train the rebels. Yeah, because that strategy’s never failed before…

Egypt’s new Prime Minister is pledging democratic reform

Egypt’s new Prime Minister, Essam Sharaf, has pledged to meet the demands for democratic change sought by protesters, and to resign if he fails. He made the comments in an address before thousands gathered at Cairo’s Tahrir Square before Friday prayers. The former transport minister told the crowds that he drew his “will and determination” from the people. Mr Sharaf replaced Ahmed Shafiq, who was appointed in the dying days of the regime of Hosni Mubarak.

Essam Sharaf is an interesting guy, who I have some hope for. Unlike many of his contemporaries in Egypt, Tunisia, Libya, and Yemen, Sharaf didn’t just suddenly discover his taste for democratic reform once the people began calling for politicians’ heads on pikes. He’s been a critic of the Mubarak government for a few years, which lends him a great deal of credibility in my eyes. The trick to democratic reform is that you cannot guarantee that the outcome will be what you like. Sharaf seems to understand this, and is pressing for democratic reform anyway. However, a lot can happen in between now and August, when the current provisional government has been ordered to step down.

I would very much like to believe that Egypt, a state with a strong secular history and many Western ties, can implement a real democratic state following constitutional reforms. The forbearance of the army during the popular uprising strongly suggests to me that they are not interested in grabbing power from the people, but instead are invested in returning Egypt to a state of relative peace and stability. Only time will tell though.

Tunisia is talking about elections

Tunisia’s interim president Fouad Mebazaa has announced details of new elections promised after the overthrow of President Zine al-Abidine Ben Ali. Mr Mebazaa said voting for a council of representatives to rewrite the constitution would be held by 24 July. He said a new interim government would run the country until then.

This is even more encouraging, because an actual date has been set. I react viscerally and negatively to any “plans” that are made without concrete details. When someone says “we should hang out sometime” or “someone should do this” or “yeah, Ian, best sex ever, I’ll call you sometime”, I immediately write off that statement (and, sometimes, the person making it). President Mebazaa has made a definitive date for new governmental elections. Good thing, right? Well…

The political confusion has been compounded by the constitutional provision limiting a caretaker president to 60 days in office, he adds. Mr Mebazaa has argued that, since the current constitution no longer has any credibility, he will stay in office beyond the limit. In his speech, he said the constitution “no longer reflects the aspirations of the people after the revolution”.

This, this, this, THIS is how it starts. First, a politician says that he is taking “temporary” power. Second, he claims to represent the will of “the people”. Third, he says that the rules of the constitution (or whatever document) do not apply in this unique situation. Fourth, he declares himself to have emergency powers until the state of _________ has been resolved, after which he will call for free elections. Fifth, the state of emergency is constantly renewed, meaning that no elections ever take place. Sixth, free speech criticizing the seizing of power is branded as seditious and treasonous, and political opposition is therefore outlawed. Seventh, meet the new boss; same as the old boss.

I want very much to believe that democratic states can foster in the Middle East and northern Africa. I’d love to see the same spirit of peaceful and organized protest carry forward into a secular state that respects free speech and individual human rights. But, as with all things, I am extremely skeptical.

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2 Divine mercy: an allegory

March 7, 2011
by Crommunist
· blog · critical thinking · crommunism · religion

Gary woke with no memory of what had happened. Slowly, fighting the urge to retch, he opened his eyes. He immediately regretted doing so, as daggers of light from a single exposed overhead lightbulb pierced through his half-lidded vision and ignited the cobwebs in his head. Raising a hand to block the offending rays, Gary became aware that he was lying naked on a hard concrete floor in a bare room. A grim-looking man with unfamiliar features stood by a solid-looking metal door. Seeing that Gary was awake, the man grunted, heaved the door open, and walked into the hallway outside, letting the door slam behind him.

“Hello?” Gary called querulously. There was no answer. Staggering to his feet, Gary steadied himself against the cold concrete wall and shook his head, trying to dispel the last of his confusion. He lurched toward the door on unsteady feet and wrenched on the knob, to no avail. Gary slammed his open palm against the door and heard a dull boom sound that was quickly absorbed into the walls and high ceiling. “Hello!” he called again “Let me out of here!”

His hand slapped the door again, eliciting the same sound and lack of response from anyone who might be listening. Gary tugged against the knob again then, his small reserve of energy spent, slumped back to the floor. Frantically, he searched his memory hoping to reveal some clue of where he was, how he had arrived there, and who or what he might have offended to deserve such treatment. Suddenly, the door made a sharp *click* and the knob turned. Gary scrambled to his feet and backed away from the door, imagining that he might be able to make a dash through the portal once whoever was on the other side opened it.

2 Movie Friday: Proposition 8 – The Musical

March 4, 2011
by Crommunist
· blog · bmusic · funny · hate · LGBT · movie

Sometimes hypocrisy goes best when set to a brilliant Broadway score:

Alternative ending: Jesus fails to pop into existence because he’s a fictional character. Batman appears instead.

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20 In defense of the “weaker sex”

March 3, 2011
by Crommunist
· blog · Canada · civil rights · crapitalism · culture · feminism · gender · law · sex

Note: This article first appeared on Monday, February 28th on Canadian Atheist. While it is CA policy not to cross-post, I felt that this case needed to be made on as many outlets as I could.

A good friend of mine posted a story on my Facebook wall last week about a police officer who fell victim to the arch-stupidity of the “she was asking for it” argument:

A police officer who suggested women can avoid sexual assault by not dressing like “sluts” has apologized, saying he is “embarrassed” by the remark and that assaulted women are “not victims by choice.”

“I made a comment which was poorly thought out and did not reflect the commitment of the Toronto Police Service to the victims of sexual assaults,” Const. Michael Sanguinetti wrote on Thursday to Osgoode Hall Law School where he made the comment. “Violent crimes such as sexual assaults can have a traumatizing effect on their victims. . . . My comment was hurtful in this respect.”

It’s a tired trope that is almost guaranteed to come up in any discussion of women and sexuality – if women didn’t make themselves so open to sexual predators then they’d be safer. It is due to the privilege of being male that this argument offends me only intellectually, since I will never be the target of a sexual assault. I will never appreciate the visceral part of the feminist response to this argument, try as I might. The reason this particular friend posted the link on my wall is that she and I have gone 9 rounds on it in the past, with me articulating the “personal responsibility” position. Don’t worry – I got better.

However, a second friend of mine saw this and posted what he thought was an entirely reasonable response. His response (I’ll call him “Billy” just so we can avoid pronoun confusion) was that the story failed to take the police officer’s side into account. It is a fact, said Billy, that women will be less inviting targets for assault if they are dressed more conservatively and hide their sexuality. Billy didn’t understand why this was such a controversial statement, and was taken aback with Sheila’s (again, for the same of pronoun confusion) full-throated and confrontational response. Billy messaged me afterward to apologize for starting a fight on my wall, and confessing that he couldn’t really understand what he had said that was so inflammatory.

The problem with this “she was asking for it” argument, aside from the fact that it isn’t true (sexual assault is just as common in Muslim countries where women have to stay covered and none of them dress sexy for fear of being arrested, beaten, or scalded with acid), is that it completely misses the point, and tries to derive an “ought” from an “is”. The mere fact that a woman is more likely to be assaulted if she wears certain types of clothing does not make it right. The solution to the problem is not for women to “dress less slutty” (a phrase which is provocative enough on its own), but for men to realize that a woman’s choice of dress is not an open invitation to sexual assault.

It seems as though this seemingly-obvious (once explained) argument still has yet to suffuse through common consciousness:

A University of Manitoba law professor has concerns about a judge’s comments at a sexual assault sentencing. Karen Busby said the remarks by Justice Robert Dewar are a legal throwback to the time when how a woman dressed or acted could be treated as implied consent to sex. Dewar said “sex was in the air” when he spared a man jail time by handing him a two-year conditional sentence instead and allowing him to remain free in the community.

During the sentencing, Dewar also commented on the way the woman was dressed and her actions the night she was forced to have sex in the woods along a dark highway outside Thompson in 2006. The man and a friend met the 26-year-old woman and her girlfriend earlier that night outside a bar under what the judge called “inviting circumstances.” He pointed out the victim and her friend were dressed in tube tops, no bras, and high heels and noted they were wearing plenty of makeup. Dewar called the man a “clumsy Don Juan” who may have misunderstood what the victim wanted.

On a Facebook wall, the kind of statement that Billy made (although, to be sure, he didn’t intend to suggest that it is a rape victim’s fault for being assaulted and he went out of his way to say so) is merely annoying. When it comes from a judge’s mouth, it carries behind it the force of law. I do not wish to derogate Justice Dewar’s abilities as a jurist – perhaps he would have handed down an identical sentence if the victim’s clothing had not been a factor. One cannot guarantee that this would have been the case for all judges, although it certainly should be.

And certainly, this kind of cavalier attitude toward sexual assault does appear in other places:

Reports that women are being sexually assaulted at a Downtown Eastside shelter are being ignored, a coalition of women and women’s groups is charging. But the agency that oversees the First United Church co-ed shelter at Gore and Hastings says it has had meetings with both police and women’s groups on the matter and is actively working to address it. “The safety and security of people using provincially funded shelters are our top priority,” said a statement from BC Housing, which funds and has an operation agreement with the shelter. “We will continue working together to make sure the shelter is a safe place to stay.” But Harsha Walia, a coordinator at the Downtown Eastside Women’s Shelter, said women have reported sexual abuse to front-line workers, police and staff at the shelter, and nothing has been done about it.

When it is a woman’s fault for being assaulted, when her mere presence is provocation enough to justify some kind of violence against her, we know something has gone terribly wrong. When we turn a blind eye to women being assaulted, we cannot call ourselves a society where women enjoy equal or sufficient rights under the law. And because language like “she was asking for it” or “don’t dress like a slut” only serves to reinforce the casual tolerance of violence against women that leads to assault, it is the job of every feminist to speak out against it whenever it comes up. It will forever be a source of chagrin for me that I didn’t always speak this way, but I bloody well will from now on.

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10 Freedom of religion: that’s not what it means

March 3, 2011
by Crommunist
· blog · civil rights · news · religion

Yeah, I’m back on this subject again. It seems as though the phrase “freedom of religion” is a commonly misunderstood construct whereby those with religious beliefs think that they can do whatever they like as long as they believe in it hard enough. As I said two weeks ago, freedom of conscience and religion means that it is unlawful to prohibit the practice of religion, or compel someone to engage in a religious act. It does not mean that anything done in the name of religion is your legal right.

To use an extreme example, preventing someone from stoning their disobedient child to death is not infringing on that person’s religious rights. Telling someone that she cannot cut the hands off of a thief is not infringing upon her religious rights. Telling someone that they cannot import 12 year-old children to enslave through compulsory marriage is not infringing upon his religious rights:

Two fathers from Bountiful, B.C., smuggled their 12-year-old daughters across the border to marry an accused pedophile and fugitive intent on increasing a harem that already included 57 wives. MacRae and Spencer Blackmore were part of a 2005 scheme to sneak their daughters from Bountiful into the United States to marry Warren Jeffs, the prophet of the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, according to Jeffs’ diaries.

There are a great many diverse religious beliefs, and some of them, like those of the FCJCLDS, are monstrously evil and destructive. A child cannot possibly consent to something like marriage, and it is destructive to that child’s psychological development to bind them to an old paedophile. There is a clear harm in this kind of behaviour. In the light of a clear harm, the right to religious expression becomes secondary.

This testimony came to light as part of an ongoing case before the Supreme Court of British Columbia testing the constitutionality of polyamorous marriages. While I doubt very much that a ban on the right to marry multiple adult, consenting people can stand up to fair constitutional scrutiny, it cannot be struck down or held up on religious grounds. Whether or not someone believes in their right to marry multiple people (which, for now, is against the law) has nothing to do with their right to practice their religion.

No matter how fucking creepy your religion might be:

A boss who frequently hugged two young sisters to dispel negative energy from them and the cart they worked on has been found guilty of sexual harassment and ordered to pay them $10,000 by the B.C. Human Rights Tribunal. Algebra and Aja Young complained that Clint Petres, of Victoria, hugged them for up to 10 seconds, sometimes rocking back and forth.

Algebra testified that the hugs made her uncomfortable. But when she declined to hug Petres, “he would stand with his arms extended until she gave in, which she did because he was her boss,” tribunal member Barbara Humphreys wrote in a judgment released Thursday.

I’m not particularly inclined to complain about my boss. He’s nice to me, he’s fair, he gives me quite a bit of freedom, and has never once demanded that I hug him to dispel my negative energy. I don’t think (and neither does the Human Rights Tribunal) that Petres’ wacky mish-mash of pseudoscientific beliefs reaches the level of religion, nor can one claim that having to put up with religious iconography infringes on someone’s right to disbelief (the two women are atheists). However, when in the workplace, that kind of externalization of what are supposed to be personal beliefs are inappropriate. Making unwelcome physical contact with your employees is definitely inappropriate.

It would certainly be wildly inappropriate to compel your employees to participate in a religious service:

A Tulsa police captain who refused to require that some of his subordinates attend a Law Enforcement Appreciation Day at a Tulsa mosque filed a federal lawsuit Wednesday, claiming that his First Amendment rights have been violated. Capt. Paul Fields also claims that Deputy Chief Daryl Webster — the sole defendant in the case at this point — retaliated against him for his “exercise of his First Amendment rights” and singled out Fields for disparate treatment.

The Law Enforcement Appreciation Day is scheduled to be held at the mosque of the Islamic Society of Tulsa on March 4. Police Chief Chuck Jordan has said the society scheduled the event to show its appreciation for the officers’ response to a threat against them.

I am loath to comment on this story because it is missing one vital piece of information: was the event held at the mosque religious in nature? If it was held at the mosque because it was a community site (i.e. for reasons of convenience rather than worship), then the objection to attendance cannot be founded on the First Amendment. However, if the police were being invited to be preached to, then refusing to participate is a reasonable objection; however, it should be noted that you don’t have the right to not be exposed to ideas that conflict with your beliefs. Regardless of whether or not the objection was reasonable, singling someone out for punitive treatment because they’re either a) xenophobic or b) unwilling to be proselytized to is a dick move.

Whatever the resolution to these stories, the fact remains that freedom of religion has a specific meaning that does not give you license to do whatever you like so long as you can find some kind of supernatural justification for it. The corollary to this is that your right to think and believe as you like ends where my rights begin, whether that be my right to security, my right to be free of sexual harassment, or my right to object to evangelism.

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0 Shawna Forde sentenced to die

March 2, 2011
by Crommunist
· blog · hate · law · news

I’ve been holding this one in my pocket for a while, hoping to have something to connect it to. However, nothing has come up and I don’t want to let it go uncommented:

An anti-immigration activist has been sentenced to death for the 2009 murder of a nine year-old-girl and her father. Shawna Forde, 43, organised a break-in at the Arizona home of Raul Flores apparently to fund her group, which campaigns against illegal immigration. But the burglary went wrong and 29-year-old Mr Flores was shot dead along with his daughter Brisenia.

I don’t like the BBC’s use of the word “activist” in this context. Shawna Forde is a terrorist who used violence and intimidation as tools to advance her political agenda. Her group, Minutemen American Defense should not be confused with The Minutemen, which is a non-violent group (one that I still think is misguided, but nonetheless non-violent) of volunteers that patrols the US/Mexican border looking for illegal immigrants. Shawna Forde was kicked out of the Minutemen for being too insane.

Shawna Forde and two other people broke into the Flores home looking for drugs that they could sell to fund their organization. They shot the inhabitants of the home, killing two and wounding one. One of those who died was 9 year-old Brisenia Flores. Less of a fuss was kicked up over this murder than the equally-tragic shooting death of Christina Taylor Green at the hands of Jared Loughner in January, a fact that may have a number of explanations of which race is undoubtedly one.

Even for a hateful monster like Shawna Forde, I cannot condone the death penalty. Not only is it not an effective deterrent for further crimes, it is far more expensive than simply jailing her for life. While it may be just to kill someone who kills another, there is no value to such a murder except removing Shawna Forde from society. It is likely to turn her into a martyr, as is evinced by her fan page. Maybe if they just flew her into the middle of the Mojave and left her out there without any supplies…

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