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I recently completed three booklists for library customers, part of a system-wide readers' advisory project. The lists use good gender balance, and a strong representation of people of colour and LGBT themes. I did classics , award-winning nonfiction , and essay collections . I love readers' advisory, and I really enjoyed the challenge of writing about each title in about 45 words. In the list of essay collections, I included Rebecca Solnit's Men Explain Things to Me . Then I decided it was time to read it! She's a brilliant essayist, one of the best I've ever read, and an important feminist voice. This slim collection packs an enormous punch. Reading Solnit's  now-famous piece about mansplaining made me think of another, related phenomenon. Both my partner and I have noticed this in discussions online, in a context where the commenters are mostly male. Here's how it goes. A man comments.  Many people disagree with him, including me. The man attacks me. Onl...

The statement If you are exposed to any bigoted, right-wing media or social media -- whether by misfortune, sport, or a delusion that you must counter their arguments -- and someone raises the subject of slavery, you will doubtless see this trope.  They were sold by their own people. Africans sold other Africans. Slavery began in Africa, and was imported to the new world. In fact, you might hear or see some version of this any time racism is mentioned. Or as a complete non sequitur. It appears to be a wingnut favourite. They should stop complaining! Slavery is in the past! Get a life! And anyway THEY started it! Slavery was started in Africa! Blah blah blah!! Meaningless drivel!!  There are many myths and inaccuracies about slavery in the Americas -- this wrap-up in Slate is good -- but this one in particular interests me. Some facts We know that Black people were involved in the transatlantic slave trade. At any time, a handful of people, a few hundred -- perhaps over the ce...

He lives. Those of you who go back a long way with wmtc will remember how this blog was the target of trolls, back in the heyday of the blogosphere, before Twitter and Instagram existed, before so many bloggers moved to Facebook. Social media evolved, attention spans got shorter, and the trolls eventually left wmtc. All but one. You know who I'm talking about. The one and only magnolia_2000, a/k/a Mags. Mags has disappeared for long stretches of time, but he always returns. Allan says that Mags is addicted to me and will never leave -- that no matter how much time passes, we will always hear from him again. I am his obsession. Recently he's revived his pathetic attempt at bullying. I can't say I understand it. Can he possibly think I care what some random wacko thinks of my life choices?? It is utterly bizarre. Here are some recent gems from the boy. He doesn't like Port Hardy. He doesn't like Kai. He doesn't like where we shop. He doesn't like our rugs! Oh ...

During my recent attack by wingnut trolls, I learned something new: how to request that the Internet Archive remove your site from the Wayback Machine . * * * * Before I was nominated as an NDP candidate in the recent provincial election, of course my online presence had to be vetted. All potential candidates were asked to deactivate their personal profiles from social media, and in addition I was asked to delete a few random tweets from several years ago. None of this was a big deal to me. The only big deal was wmtc. Early on, I was asked if I'd consider taking down the site. My first reaction was completely negative. Wmtc is so much a part of my life. Take it down? No way! It was only weeks before the election would be called -- and I've been blogging for 14 years. That's a lot of words! There was really no way to vet everything. While the NDP was considering the situation from their end, I was also thinking more about being a candidate, and increasingly feeling like it ...

First of all, I do not apologize. I have nothing to apologize for. No one should apologize for having an unpopular opinion, or an opinion that the majority finds offensive. Second, I said nothing disrespectful to veterans. My utter lack of respect -- my undying contempt -- is for rulers whose policies send humans into unnecessary armed conflict. Those rulers pay lip-service to "supporting" troops, while their policies ensure more humans will suffer from the effects of war. If you're joining us in progress, here's what you missed.  Before the election, I took all my personal social media offline. We knew that the opposition would dedicate vast resources to digging up or fabricating anything they could use against NDP candidates. For some reason, no one directed me to remove wmtc links from the Wayback Machine (i.e., internet archives). This proved to be a grave error. A right-wing political hack who masquerades as a journalist received excerpts from some old wmtc posts...

Many years back, I used to blog about a phenomenon called fascist shift . I borrowed the term from Naomi Wolf 's essential  The End of America , but the concept was something I had been thinking about for many years. In brief, fascist shift asks, What if we're all looking for jackboots and Sieg Heil and tanks rolling down Pennsylvania Avenue, and while we're keeping our eyes peeled for a scene from a black-and-white newsreel, a different brand of fascism moves in and sets up shop? What if today's fascism is more insidious and less obvious - and what if it's dressed up in a democracy costume? What if while you're saying That can happen here  and But they wouldn't do that , it already has, and they did. When you scroll through Wolf's ten indicators of fascism , are there any not seen in the US? And have any of them been repaired or reversed under Obama? Not a one. Now, though, Donald Trump's presidential bid and the many millions of Americans who supp...

We spent our last day in Oregon poking around downtown Ashland, looking at scarves and jewelry and used books. We don't shop much when we travel, but there were a few things I was looking for on this trip, and I found them all. We also picked up this very amusing guide to New York City etiquette , and had a second great lunch at Brothers' . If you're ever in Ashland, go. We also walked around a beautiful neighbourhood with the lovely Sophia in the stroller and her mom happy to be out of the house on a gorgeous spring-like day. The trees are in full blossom and daffodils are out. In early March? We also enjoyed another dinner with D&E and Sophia. I swear she's grown since we've been here. I'm sad that I won't see her again for a long time. In fact, with my mother relocating to Oregon, and so many of my favourite people on the left coast, I find myself wondering why I'm living in the Toronto area. It's especially easy to feel that way after coming ...

From The Nation : Last night, Worker Center Watch - a new website dedicated to attacking labor-affiliated activist groups like OUR Walmart, Restaurant Opportunities Center, and Fast Food Forward  - began sponsoring advertisements on Twitter to promote smears against the protests planned for Black Friday. In one video sponsored by the group, activists demanding a living wage and better working conditions for workers are portrayed as lazy “professional protesters” who “haven’t bothered to get jobs themselves.” “This Black Friday, just buy your gifts, not their lies,” instructs the Worker Center Watch narrator. . . . Worker Center Watch has no information its website about its sponsors. Yet the group attacks labor activists and community labor groups for lacking transparency. “Hiding behind these non-profits, unions mask their true motivations, circumvent operational requirements and skirt reporting and disclosure obligations,” says Worker Center Watch, referring to labor-support...

I haven't been writing much lately, so it's good to know loyal wmtc readers are still reading every post. Well, one is, anyway. Yes folks, a full seven years after first appearing in comments on this blog in the guise of a female fan, the freak we call Mags is still spewing his bile on a regular basis. We delete most of the comments without reading, but once in a while, it's good to share. For the record, I regard every one of those (nearly) 3,000 victims of September 11, 2001, and their loved ones, among the extremely long list of victims of US imperialism. I have mourned them all. Not a one deserved their fate. I merely recognize that their numbers are dwarfed by the millions of unacknowledged victims of US imperialism and other wars the world over. And I've had my fill (and then some) of the US exceptionalism and UScentrism that fetishizes the event. I know you all know that. But some things just need to be said, even if it brings attention to the class clown that we...

In 2009, I wrote this brief history of trolls at wmtc. At that time, the sad man who calls himself magnolia_2000 had been reading and leaving comments on wmtc for about three years. Now it's mid-2013, and Mags is still reading. It's been six years.  Six years!! None of his comments is ever put through moderation. Ninety-five percent of his comments are deleted unread. But still, he continues to post. GaryStJ went away. The guy from the Naruto fan forums  went away. But not Mags. Allan says Mags is my most loyal reader, and at this point, I can't disagree.

Robert Fisk has a good piece in The Independent about the incivility (to put it mildly!) that is endemic in the comment sections of online news stories: "Anonymous trolls are as pathetic as the anonymous "sources" that contaminate the gutless journalism of the New York Times, BBC, and CNN" . Fisk wonders why newspapers that will not publish an anonymous letter to the editor will allow anonymous lies and hateful screed in comments. Surely he knows the simple answer: money. Advertisers are paying for clicks, and the idiots in the comments section are increasing the clickage. Why should we help them by reading those comments? Consider this. We know that governments pay people to troll the comments section with disinformation and misinformation, just like they hire fake journalists and bribe working columnists to influence public opinion. We know that the number of comments in any one direction cannot be taken as a gauge of public opinion. When Common Dreams respond...

Apparently this is not a story from The Onion. From Reproductive Health Reality Check : There is a branch of anti-choice activists that will use pretty much anything as a medium for their message : newspaper ads, graphic signs displayed in front of schools, bus stop benches. You would think they would know well enough to leave one place untouched, though. Wire coat hangers. You would be wrong. Springdale Drycleaners of Cincinnati, Ohio, has been etching "Choose Life" ads on wire coat hangers used to hang dry-cleaning. What's worse is that this seems to be an ongoing effort. Reports of the "choose life" coat hangers already were on the internet back in March of 2011, when Joe.My.God posted a picture of the hanger then. And before that on Regretsy in 2010. So despite over two years of attention, the business continues to think this is an excellent cross-advertising campaign. In fact, the practice was losing them customers as far back as August of 2010, but still t...

Revolutionary Thought of the Day: the KFC Double Down is a plot against white America. The Negro Rioting Plan that's been put in place is a terribly complicated strategy that has taken hundreds of thousands of Negroes to plan and thousands of years to come together. Sleeper agents, technological advances and an unwavering patience has been our friend on this path to finally achieving our rioting plans. Only one man has ever come close toppling our years of work to destroy then redistribute good earnest White folks wealth with epic rioting. That man is the brilliant and perceptive Glenn Beck. Glenn Beck has been our arch nemesis for years. His amazing detective skills has outed many of our operatives and leaked several plans to the world. Our only method of battling his spectacular abilities is to paint him as being a fucking crazy person who clearly doesn’t understand ANYTHING and is simply out to profit from fear mongering and race baiting. But we Negroes know the truth. We know ...

Have you all seen this petition? The Honourable [sic] Jason Kenney asks us to sign a petition thanking none other than Jason Kenney. Macleans found it amusing , and the National Post has the Twitter talk . But it took Dan Murphy, cartoonist with The Province , to really do it justice. Please watch and share! Note: To see this video, please click here. The auto-play was too annoying! Also, my recent Kenney-related post is running at The Mark . Also also, this cartoon at the Hamilton Spectator . Also also also, Tabitha Southey: Cabinet minister is a thankless job – unless you’re Jason Kenney .

Quick, get a dictionary and look up megalomaniac . See if it shows Stephen Harper's picture. Then again, maybe Harper had none to spare. I missed it when Kady O'Malley and Elizabeth May broke this story, so I'm glad I saw this in the Ottawa Citizen . Emphasis mine. Harper gallery leaves MPs speechless Citizens who really want a national portrait gallery in Ottawa can rest easy. The government already has one. All you need to get in is a Commons security pass, a Conservative party membership and a keen desire to view exclusive pictures of Prime Minister Stephen Harper, exclusively. Conservative MPs confirmed yesterday what Green party leader Elizabeth May and Macleans.ca blogger Kady O'Malley reported on their cyberspace sites. Photographs of Mr. Harper in various poses, at various sites, are hung throughout the private and cosy government lobby of the House of Commons. Ms. May and Ms. O'Malley were surprised and a bit speechless when they saw the exhibit recently as...

Combing through some old files, I found this lovely bit: a comment from "GarySTJ", a former troll who was obsessed with me for a time. I used to delete his comments, then paste them into posts so wmtc readers could have fun kicking him around. After being banned from wmtc, he started appearing at other blogs where I commented, hijacking the thread with insults directed at me. One blogger noted (a paraphrase), "I don't know L-girl or GarySTJ, but L-girl has an internet presence, has written a blog for several years, and is commenting on this post. GarySTJ has an anonymous profile, has never commented here before, and is posting personal attacks on another commenter. End of discussion." After that, GarySTJ must have gone into rehab, and we never heard from him again. This old email really brought me back. From: GarySTJ [noreply-comment@blogger.com] Sent: Wednesday, July 19, 2006 12:45 PM To: movetocanada@gmail.com Subject: [we move to canada] 7/19/2006 12:45:10 PM...

It has come to my attention that certain fundamental religious people believe that the death of Christopher Hitchens, who had advanced cancer, vindicates their beliefs and proves that Hitchens' atheism was wrong. This is quite strange, and quite hilarious, and also quite wrong. Let's review. What happens to atheists with advanced, terminal cancer? They die. What happens to religious people with advanced, terminal cancer? They die. What happens to all people, always? They die. I hope this has cleared things up for you.

Can it be? Are progressive people supporting right-wing libertarian Ron Paul for the US Presidency? In 2008 I wrote on supposedly liberal people supporting hillary clinton . I didn't agree with that choice, but I understood it. This... this is just insane. So Ron Paul opposes foreign wars and the federal power build-up. Ron Paul also: - opposes legalized abortion for any and all reasons - would allow states to regulate abortion, including prosecuting pregnancy terminations as murder - has signed "the personhood pledge," which would ban many methods of contraception - opposes all government involvement in healthcare, including any bare-bones safety net (but apparently making abortion illegal is not government interference in health care) - opposes all government-mandated civil rights legislation, such as laws forbidding businesses to refuse to serve people based on skin colour - opposes all health and safety regulation of business - opposes all environmental regulations - ...

By now you've probably heard about the "All-American Muslim" TV show vs. Lowe's Home Improvement vs. Florida Family Association craziness. I know "The Daily Show" has been tracking the story (of course the video is not available in Canada). But in case you haven't heard about this particular bit of insanity from TGNOTFOTE TM , this excellent column in The New Yorker 's online edition will fill you in. The Jaafars and their children form one of five Dearborn families featured on “All-American Muslim,” a reality show, on TLC, created by some of the same team behind “Real Housewives of New York.” The show has become the target of an ugly campaign by a group called the Florida Family Association, which calls it “propaganda that riskily hides the Islamic agenda’s clear and present danger to American liberties and traditional values.” That someone, somewhere, would yell at the television when presented with images of Arab-Americans getting married or rea...

"Can anyone on Capital [sic] Hill read?” demanded a sign held by a protester at one of the first Tea Party rallies, back in February of 2009. " If so read the Constitution As Americans we do not have the right: To a house To a car To an education Americans have a right to per sue [sic] happiness not to have it given to them!" The sign intrigued me, and so I took a picture of it as its author held it aloft. Nobody’s entitled to the good things in life, her sign seemed to be saying, and so presumably we should stop crafting policy to make home ownership, travel, and education affordable — a curious demand in the middle of an economic catastrophe. But I was also taken by the surface-level irony: accusing others of cultural illiteracy while herself apparently mixing up the Constitution with the Declaration of Independence, the document that actually mentions the “pursuit of happiness.” I filed it away and eventually forgot about it. Until a year and a half later, when I was...