The view from Pete

There's always more to the story

Category: human rights

  • And we are worse off for it. By now you’ve been well acquainted with ‘wokeism’ and the smear the far right have coined against anyone or anything that highlights systemic injustices faced by minorities and the historically oppressed. But the opposite of ‘woke’ isn’t merely to disagree. The folks on the right are actively moving…

  • We’re in the final hours of 2022, and to many, glad to be done with it. The new year awaits, but how are we going to be any different than 2020-22? Excusing the fact that a global pandemic interrupted our world, what have we learned? Some might argue that the pandemic brought out the worst…

  • Starting with MySpace 20+ years ago, now facebook and twitter, social media is facing a reckoning. The legal framework for social media to exist and thrive has been based on the limited immunity that each organization has through actions of various governments. This means that users can post whatever they want, but social media operators…

  • Generally speaking, voters outside the anti-union right wing tend to support pro-labour parties. That said, we don’t expect or demand that a government ‘from our side’ to deal out the best terms and big cash settlements (in public sector bargaining) or unduly pressure corporations in the private sector, but that the bargaining teams finally sit…

  • This may come as a surprise to many, but the economic upheavals we’re experiencing today were destined to happen long ago. They’ve just been made more profound and extreme by the pandemic. But we came so close to getting it. So close. The inherent weaknesses in capitalism’s true form, neoliberalism, were laid bare for all…

  • As you know by now, the Supreme Court in the USA has revoked ‘Roe V Wade’, the constitutionally significant court ruling from the 1970’s which paved the way for legal access to abortion services in America. Everyone and their pet rock wants to chime in; not all of it is helpful. Those on the right-wing…

  • In uncertain times, folks can reach for more bold solutions when the same-old no longer works. These are some of those times. The Neoliberal economic philosophy hasn’t worked for large swathes of society, and those for whom it works are already the wealthiest and most powerful among us. Through no fault of our own, the…

  • There was a series of social media posts circulated by various prominent conservative political leaders and thinkers in Canada which elevated the angry rants of some white-nationalist, covid-truther EU politicians as evidence that the world hates Trudeau and is harming Canada’s reputation around the world. Bunk. I am no Trudeau fan whatsoever, but I don’t…

  • It actually makes sense…not the talking point, but the effort to cast Ukraine in terms of America’s culture war. That makes it especially nuts given that Ukraine is probably as socially conservative as many right wingers thanks to the deep Orthodox Church influence in Ukraine society. But, Republicans need to find room to the opposite…

  • Oh, they’re loud, and they’ll muster a gathering of supporters at the nations’ capitol as promised, but not likely in the numbers they’ve been promoting. Numbers – like half a million people, 50,000 trucks from across the country. Now I could be wrong with the numbers too, but it doesn’t invalidate the next point I’m…