I have no idea about Indonesia and Brazil, but many parts of Canada put very specific demands on cars - for instance being able to start reliably in extreme cold, stand up to extreme weather, and extreme and rapid weather changes, being able to stand up to huge amounts of road salt, hail, ice, rocks - that probably…

A Syrian chocolatier refugee ended up in an economically depressed area of Nova Scotia, started with nothing, a year later has ten employees and is sharing the gift of really good quality chocolate with his new country.

Oh man, I can only imagine what your daily life is like that you consider people to be reasonable who would cheer at the idea of an imaginary sky deity is running politics when said deity’s own holy book more-or-less encourages separation of church and state (render unto Caesar etc.). I had some friends who very…

Trudeau is definitely much more conservative than I am (in terms of economics and the environment), so I have my problems with his policies, but I like him overall. Part of it is that the fact that I think he genuinely has Canadians’ best interests at heart, and is an empathetic, progressive guy, and that continues to…

Not just his clothes and design choices, even his slang is stuck in the 80s.

Yup. In the same way you have a higher risk of rat infestations when your neighbours are filthy hoarders, it’s hard to keep your house in order when dysfunction reigns next door.

It’s is interesting to watch people in the US freaking out about some of the shitty stuff Trump is doing, and realizing Harper totally beat him to the punch on a lot of them (like gagging government scientists, destroying scientific data, backing out of climate change agreements, appointing laughably incompetent…

We have much stricter gun laws, but it’s still difficult to completely prevent the huge number of unregulated guns in the US from making their way across the border. And most of us live pretty close to the border. My local police say that pretty much all of the gun violence that happens in my city is with guns…

I think it’s just that Kushner is a sociopath like his father and father-in-law. If something benefits him, and he’s protected, he doesn’t give a fuck who else suffers, whether he shares a religion with them or not. He’s rich and powerful and in the good graces of dear leader, so he’s going to kleptocrat it up for as…

I’m a Canadian citizen and I will avoid traveling to the US at all costs until Trump is out of office. He’s too unpredictable, and has proven himself totally willing to pull the rug out from under the feet of non US citizens with absolutely no warning. I personally avoid going to unstable countries where visa…

They’re allegedly super expensive suits, he just seems to buy them off the rack, in the wrong size, and not get them tailored. But the fabric does look cheap, but he’s the sort of guy who can make anything look cheap, because his aesthetic preferences just lean toward the tacky.

I’ve definitely thought about The Origins of Totalitarianism and 1984 a lot over the past year and a half, watching Trump’s rise to power. But I’ve actually found that my memories of the far less well-known The Myth of the State by Ernest Cassirer have served me far better for trying to figure out what the fuck is…

Beyond the people who are being fucked over by this cruel craziness and refused entry into the US, I wonder what the eventual economic losses will be to this insanity. I mean, I could legally go to the US tomorrow if I wanted, but you guys have gone full-fascist and unpredictable as hell and I will absolutely not be…

Republican lawmakers are currently putting through a swath of legislation to criminalize protest and cause great financial and legal hardships to anyone who dares protest. So it’s in their interest to somehow clarify that right wing marches etc. do not qualify as demonstrations, because they don’t want their fascist…

Admittedly poor phrasing on my part. My problem is obviously not with them, as people, but with the very idea, and reality, of children as professional performers. That’s not to say that they shouldn’t be allowed to act or sing or whatever, but clearly there is still not adequate regulation/adequate protections in…

Yeah, when it’s a he said, she said, mandatory reporter said... that’s gotta change the situation a bit.

That’s a great article - thanks for posting the link.

There definitely are restrictions for working with child actors in order to protect them, but they’re also clearly not strict enough given how messed up a lot of these kids end up being later in life. I think it’s probably exacerbated by the fact that kids whose parents are less likely to strictly enforce limits on…

Dance is another one. I find a lot of that problematic as well, particularly things like gymnastics, having lived in that world and watched girls with absolutely no hope in hell of ever going to the Olympics completely destroying their bodies and needing knee replacements as teenagers. It’s just... sigh.

This is my main problem with child performers: many of them are completely unequipped for doing anything outside of the entertainment industry. It seems a lot of child actors are receiving pretty questionable education outside of performing arts, and also aren’t encouraged to have normal relationships with regular…