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According to last week's edition of the Hill Times, Darrel Reid, former director of Focus on the Family Canada, is now the deputy director of policy and research in the Prime Minister's Office. Reid was most recently chief of staff to Rona Ambrose (when she was Environment Minister).

Just FYI, FOTF maintains that homosexual people can be "converted" through therapy, and its U.S. leader James Dobson has referred to abortion as a "baby holocaust." Reid was (and still is) a vocal anti-gay marriage and anti-choice spokesperson. He was instrumental in setting up the FOTF-funded Institute for Marriage and Family Canada, which disguises itself as a neutral research organization, but its studies so far have attacked the usual Conservative annoyances -- universal daycare, non-hetero families, etc.

If you are curious about Reid, and just how far the Christian Right has infiltrated Parliament Hill, check out this article by Marci Macdonald from a back issue of the Walrus.

-- Cross-posted to Dykes Against Harper

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March 05, 2007

On Think Tanks and Market Fundamentalists

Posted by aaron at 03:26 PM ET | Comments (7)

The CounterCulture lecture series is organized by the Simon Fraser University School of Communication. Last thursday the speakers were Donald Gutstein and Jamie Peck, two leading researchers of neo-liberal think tanks. While I already knew how evil the Fraser Institute was before, it's never been put to me in such an urgent way.

These think tanks are the reinforced concrete of the right wing propaganda structure. Not only do they play an essential role in setting the ideological agenda within the movement but by masquerading as genuine scholarly institutions they influence politicians, media, and regular people.

But it's not regular people they're after. According to Gutstein, the think tanks work on the treetops model, opposite of the grassroots model. They very conciously single out the small group of influential people whom they want to target and spare no expense reaching them. And they're certainly well funded.

Thirty years ago, the Fraser Institute was one of two neo-liberal think tanks worldwide, but now with the help of money from big business neo-liberal think tanks exist in almost every country, American state and Canadian province. While most left leaning organizations focus on one issue, are staffed by volunteers and struggle to get media exposure, the Fraser Institute is multi-issue, flush with cash and has a direct line to the Canwest plutocrats. David Asper is a former Fraser Institute trustee.

Jamie Peck, a visiting professor from the University of Wisconsin, Madison spends his time interviewing think tank "intellectuals." Like old school Maoists, these guys are "stark utopians" with a really pure idea of the future. He joked that these "market fundamentalists" will look you in the eye when they say the free market will solve the healthcare crises but will always look at their toes when discussing global warming. Which is probably why sometime last week the issue pretty much got dropped by the right.

You can read Gutstein's article on Steven Harper and the Fraser Institute in the Georgia Straight and if you're around the wet coast this month, i encourage you to check out the next CounterCulture talk:

Thursday March 15

SFU School of Communication CounterCulture Series presents,

Nandita Sharma
On
How to Stop Thinking Like a State:
No Border Movements and the Struggle Against National Forms of Discrimination

SFU Vancouver Campus
(515 West Hastings St. Vancouver)

7 pm
Room 1700 (7th Floor)

Nandita Sharma is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Ethnic Studies and the Department of Sociology at the University of Hawai'i. Her recent book, Home Economics: Nationalism and the Making of 'Migrant Workers' in Canada (University of Toronto Press, 2006), examines the importance of nationalist renditions of home, community and society to the indenturing of hundreds of thousands of people classified as non-immigrant workers. She is currently examining temporary "guest workers" in the U.S. Nandita has long been active in feminist, anti-racist and migrants' rights movements. She helped to co-found a transnational campaign, Open the Borders!, in 1999.

More entries on: Fundi Watch

March 04, 2007

All together now

Posted by Ariel Troster at 08:06 PM ET | Comments (2)

In the queer community, we have a lot of discussions about the intersection between sexuality and gender. I've been party to many dinner parties where we natter on about what really defines "us" -- is it our sexual orientation or our gender identity? We talk a lot about how as "the movement" is broadening its reach to include trans people, it's encouraging gay and lesbian folks to think about how homophobia intersects with transphobia, and how to make space and share "lessons learned" with up-and-coming activists who are struggling with issues that are so pressing ... like finding a safe place to pee -- as Ivan Coyote wrote about in a recent issue of This Mag.

Anyway, all of these discussions are really inconsequential to the fundamentalists who are so terrified of "the gay." According to WorldNet Daily's resident fundie Jim Rutz, "homosexuality is always deviant." And the latest threat to our children's moral purity? No, it's not Madonna or home decoration shows. It's soy, which according to Rutz has the ability to turn boys into girls and girls into women ...

Which brings me back to my original point. If you read Rutz's rant, what he really seems to be scared of is men becoming more like women. I find that this is the real source of homophobia -- hatred and fear of women ...

That's why Jack Malebranche is only fueling hatred against women by suggesting that gay men should redefine themselves in an effort to "remain men." (You'll note the portrait of him holding a baseball bat in a menacing manner -- lovely).

That's why I've always believed that the past battles between feminists and gay men (over censorship/pornography) and between lesbians and trans people (over access to women-only spaces) seemed so futile.

Because according to our opponents, the only thing worse than being gay is being a woman.

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February 19, 2007

Songs that make you gay and clothes that make you loose

Posted by Ariel Troster at 02:55 PM ET | Comments (9)

Given that all it took Ted Haggard was 21 days to declare that he's now "completely heterosexual" you have to wonder why the fundies are so worried about all the things that can make you gay ... all it took Ted was 3 weeks and a press release to get his straight mojo back, but Jerry Falwell and his ilk are very, worried about all of that dangerous music-sharing that's happening on the internet. Especially when people are trading in songs that can make you gay.

So without further ado, here is the official list of "bands to watch out for." As blogger SaboTabby exclaims, "now I have the theme for my next mix CD!" The list includes a few of Canadians, including Rufus Wainwright (gay, really?), kd lang, Nickleback , Arcade Fire ... Some surprises include Jay-Z (who knew?), Red Hot Chili Peppers and Ravi Shankar.

But I have to wonder if they have a secret gay infiltrator over there, because apparently Cyndi Lauper makes the "safe list." Wow, I'm sure all of the adorable queer kids who were rockin' out to a Cyndi Lauper re-mix at the University of Ottawa's Queer Prom last weekend would love to know that they were playing it "safe." Especially the boy in the ruby slippers who performed an excellent interpretive dance routine to the tune, which the super-gay DJ interspersed with booty house (you had to be there, it was very gay).

And in other news ... the teen moralists over at Rebulution have just released the results of their modesty survey! Fun! The survey was restricted to men, and asked them about what articles of women's clothing represent "stumbling blocks" in their ongoing battle to maintain their chastity.

In other words, what clothing should teenage girls avoid so as to guarantee that they won't be sexually assaulted (or worse, shudder to think, they might actually feel good in their bodies and be encouraged to set their own sexual boundaries ... noooo).

Some words of wisdom from the survey: "A tankini with shorts is immodest ... Seeing a girl stretching (e.g. arching the back, reaching the arms back, and sticking out the chest) is a stumbling block ... Lifting a long skirt any higher than the knee in order to step over something is a stumbling block."

I couldn't make this up if I tried.

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THIS MAGAZINE. BECAUSE EVERYTHING IS POLITICAL

Please note that all writers hold the copyright for their pieces and it is illegal for any portion of them to be copied or distributed without their expressed permission. So please don't steal.

THIS MAGAZINE: BECAUSE EVERTHING IS POLITICAL

May 02, 2007

Fundie newsflash

March 05, 2007

On Think Tanks and Market Fundamentalists

March 04, 2007

All together now

February 19, 2007

Songs that make you gay and clothes that make you loose