On Platonic Guardians

Still my favourite scene in the whole show.

    What does it mean to serve as a protector of the state? In Game of Thrones, they may have referred to the "realm," but the essential meaning remains: the protectors of community are forever invested in the welfare of its constituents—but not for power, self-interest, or pride. If not established by this post's title, I am discussing "protectors of the realm": extra-state actors who rarely hold political office, but prioritize the polis: the police usually unrecognized by the state.

    As some of the folks familiar with this blog may know, I almost dropped out of high school in grade 11. I was fortunate that I discovered a bunch of philosophy books at Chapters that became the basis of much of my future interests, research, and writing. Particularly, I became obsessed with translations of Plato's Republic, reading and rereading sections until I was satisfied and confident in my understanding. I had heard of Platonic guardians prior to reading the Republic itself, but I did not appreciate their exhaustive importance to my context until reading (and rereading) Book VI. This section provided me with the knowledge that shaped much of my future aspirations, particularly to participate in governance when- and wherever possible.

    It's 2024, so the alleged guardians of Classical Athens don't hold as much relevance as they would to a relatively isolated city-state with a stable population. However, it's a critical idea for understanding the tension between any general populace and its persistent aristocracy. Plato's philosopher kings exist with and despite the aristocracy, even when the least educated of his contemporaries could be relegated to "Aristocrat, " a term traditionally referring to a typically wealthy member of a minority-elite in a given community, or its "best citizens" in 1500s French communities. In my experience, it's rarely used in 21st century contexts, but its traditional characteristics persist in neologisms of "elite," "privileged," or the "establishment."

    I was hesitant to write this post because I feel as though discussing this passage from the Republic has been overdone to clichéd parody.  However, it was critical to my own development and motivations.  Much of my decision-making after that tumultuous year could be attributed to my aspiration to service,  toward Platonic guardianship.  

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  Since that time, I have considered myself a civil servant first and an educator or student second.  Following the Socratic tradition, education was always a means to a stronger civil society, which follows from the description and purposes of Plato's "guardian class," AKA "philosopher kings."

    If you Google this passage, you will find innumerable blog posts referencing rough transliterations of the same essential meaning:

"the reason why truth forced us to admit, not without fear and hesitation, that neither cities nor States nor individuals will ever attain perfection until the small class of philosophers whom we termed useless but not corrupt are providentially compelled, whether they will or not, to take care of the State, and until a like necessity be laid on the State to obey them; or until kings, or if not kings, the sons of kings or princes, are divinely inspired ' d with a true love of true philosophy. That either or both of these alternatives are impossible, I see no reason to affirm: if they were so, we might indeed be justly ridiculed as dreamers and visionaries." (Republic, Book VI)

    This custodial role has continued everywhere from Warhammer 40k to Wikipedia Administrators. These often extra-state actors don't always hold political office or enforcement arms of nation-states, but they frequently gravitate to these roles in order to fulfill the broader purpose of "[taking] care of the State."

    Ironically, these would-be protectors often find themselves directly confronting the faces of the aristocracy, those who treat the state as a means and not an end in itself.  This classical conflict will persist long after we're gone; the aristocracy that exists for itself isn't going anywhere.   

    Yet, we must persist.  Anyone committed to the broader welfare of the state (however the "state" manifests in each respective epoch) must confront the excesses of aristocratic power.  Most of the folks predisposed to such advocacy tend to find themselves among the aristocracy, and therefore, they are usually best positioned to police it in each instance.

    Bertrand Russell no doubt encountered this same tension, especially given his obvious and self-consciously privileged origin.  But, we cannot let ourselves become so consumed with doubt that we cease to check the power of a self-serving elite; in keeping with Russell's critique, we need to challenge their certainty.

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    When Varys approached Eddard, he likely did so from the same justification he held to continue to serve as a eunuch for the state; he was merely continuing to act as a custodian for the realm the best way that he knew how under the circumstances. Although Varys's characterization included some deliberate faults of character, he is probably the closest GoT has to a member of Plato's guardian class. He illustrates many of the conflicts and paradoxes referenced earlier, of an advisor who also polices other aristocrats and of an aristocrat consumed with doubt despite their privilege and relative power.

    Hence, Varys's death signaled the final decline of his current system of governance. Once aristocrats who exist purely for the sake of the aristocracy seize power, these protectors of the realm are usually the last barrier to totalitarian control, and therefore the former's primary targets. You know many of their names throughout the ages, but these casualties of established power were all in part chasing the same aspiration. That of personal sacrifice and service.

Drafted, edited, and published live on stream in 2 hours on April 28th, 2024.

"The protagony of vice villainizes virtue."

Excerpted from a cease and desist letter.

I presented my dissertation research at a national academic conference in May.  I had anticipated that injection into the marketplace of ideas since I started (obsessively) reading Nietzsche and the surviving Socratic dialogues in high school.  It's likely that those texts were the only reason that I reached university; as my mother could still probably attest, I almost dropped out in grade 11.  As I remarked to my current class of Writing 11-12 students the other day, my grade 11 and 12 Law teacher typically conducted all class time and assessments, including the exams, through fill-in-the-blank exercises that reiterated the courses' textbooks verbatim (every. single. class.).  My classmates and I were keen enough to know that this was dubious even as teenagers.  This teacher continued to teach at my public high school for years after I left, protected by the OSSTF no less.

Clichéd clichés, I wasn't born with a silver spoon in my mouth.  As a lower-middle class White male growing up with a single-parent mother in South-Western Ontario (with a genealogy of significant mental illness), I experienced oppression, but orders of magnitudes less than those of many of my current colleagues and friends.  This origin seems to have nurtured my empathy with those who have experienced or especially continue to experience absolute poverty—true desperation.  More than most of the people whom I've encountered in the academy, especially in its upper echelons, we often had to choose, deliberately and consistently from relatively young ages, to become the ways that we are now.  We didn't have the external pressures from our immediate communities (let alone families) to search for better lots in life; if anything, we faced opposite pressures.

However, I don't write this from self-pity.  This context is necessary to situate the subject of this post.

Why I—like those others—often confront the problem of protagony.  

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Sidebar.  I'm an English teacher.  Narrativization is an essential composite of both the learning and teaching processes of disciplinary English.  In some ways, we've never finished or transcended the Ancient Greeks' "agon".  The great contest continues unabated—among tragedians in fifth century BC Greece and among players of roles of all recreational, intellectual, and political stripes today.  However, arguably the self-consciousness of this role play and of the impulses to interpret, to retell, and to witness lived experiences through narrative has a history and developmental arc traceable to prehistory.  In other words, in some ways, the narrativization of these impulses to story can be traced to and reaffirming of the essentially human and therefore humanizing—ascriptions of prot-agon-y and antagony offering signs and signifiers of people attempting to interpret meaning from the human experience.  I don't know that we need Thomas King to confirm this, but he's still an awesome read.

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During a seminar at that academic conference, one of my department's professors contributed an interesting point regarding the liberation of inter-generationally oppressed peoples in systemically violent conflict zones.  The professor noted the importance of nurturing progatony among the oppressed.  On the surface, this object may seem rather benign and even benevolent.  However, like so many other tools of the human experience—empathy, charisma, sophistry, etc.—protagony is only as Good as the agent (self-)actualizing it.

I don't think I need to belabour societal obsession with heroes and heroism.  It's popcorn fare for the looking-glass self's validation.  These heroic narratives and narrativizations present elevated forms of protagony, appealing to their audiences' ideals.  As a gamer since toddlerhood, I grew up immersed in the protagonies of Japanese role-playing games.  It's terribly easy to inhabit these stories, since generally, people tend to find solace in the un(der)examined assumption that they may inhabit their own RPG.

But take two seconds to stare into the stars, and our collective cosmic insignificance is once again rendered obvious.  The universe probably doesn't care about us, falsifiably, and even if it did, we don't yet have the (observable) evidence necessary to validate thus.

Needless to say, we're probably not the heroes of our narratives; we might not even be Fifth Business.

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And yet, it's 2022, and people continue to heroize their choices and actions. But who among us are most predisposed to protagonization?  Our political leaders?  Sure.  Celebrities?  —I'm sure at least one or two people come to mind.  What do these folks have in common?  

Let me guess.  Do the germane characteristics validating their protagonistic candidacies involve (under-)philosophizing, a (lack of) truthfulness to their lived experiences, or a (repudiation of) the "conscientization" that this blog has alluded to since its inception?  Right.  As a virtue-ethicist, I make a point to avoid the skulljacking of virtue ethics, but the omnipresence of vice seeking validation (and most often exoneration) through protagonization has become comically conspicuous.  

Implicitly, an agent's protagonization of their actions requires an under-examination or self-deception.  Today, we endure the great irony that the people most inclined to narrativize themselves as protagonists tend to be the last to self-examine, if they ever bother to do so.  It's "those who won't take measure of their own strength, for fear of antagonizing their own weakness," as Sophie Scholl would say, who seem to be most predisposed to protagonize their actions and existences, if only as a last resort.

Crucially, this trend becomes especially worrisome among our intellectuals. After all, our "Doctors of Philosophy" have (allegedly) exhibited a threshold of love of wisdom, communicated a threshold of trustworthy truth value, and have (allegedly) habituated a threshold of consciousness and of conscientiousness critical of the former.  Intellectuals tend to be the most vulnerable to protagonizing their triumphs over adversity—as those among the most self-conscious of the gravity and magnitudes of their struggles and positionalities.

Make no mistake: A commitment to virtue can threaten the very existence of anyone protagonizing vice.  Those protagonizing vice will almost certainly experience harm in your presence, although necessarily self-inflicted. Virtue is the villainy of vice.  Moreover, the people aspiring to virtue tend to be the last people to self-identify as the protagonists of their own narratives.  Unadulterated self-examination tends to bar said individuals from the necessary myopia.

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When V for Vendetta reached theatrical release in Ontario, I paid to see it in theatres four times in just over a week (a substantial feat for a teenager pumping gas on weekends).  I knew nothing of the graphic novel at that time; I knew only that the Wachowski sisters had a hand in its production, and after ruminating over The Matrix for years, I knew that I needed to see this film—to attempt to understand it. After my first viewing, I would have rewatched it in its entirety on the spot.  The film's cultural legacy and co-opting aside, it still communicates the importance of fearlessness and of determination in the face of oppressors, of authoritarians, and of their contemporary iterations.

With few exceptions, we have almost no Disney-villain level antagonists today.  Most of the people who have been villainized have been ascribed such villainy for political purposes, usually through some collaborative gaslighting.  But this follows logically; if one has already protagonized vice, (let's call it an "hamartia" to keep my English colleagues satiated), the various varieties of prevarications tend to be one concentric circle deeper.

To conclude, the vile yet vociferous villains to virtue violate with vengeance the vocations of valor and veracity; yet, the virtuous vicars of vigorous vantage vacillate voicelessly, vetting varieties of ventures to venerably vanquish the vacuous villainy.  Voilà! The vanishing vanguard vie the vogue vignette: that the protagony of vice villainizes virtue.

Old thumbnail.

On courage

Gary Oldman deserves every accolade that he received for his portrayal of this role.

Reflecting on this post—from before I started writing it, through its major modifications while editing, to my final insights as I approached its publication—I honestly believe that this is one of the most important arguments that I've assembled in this blog to date, and it has some hot competition.  This post attempts to resolve and to delimit a broader philosophical system that I started writing about in high school as well as attempts to articulate one of the greatest existential crises posed to the academy, today.

This post lay inert, collecting digital dust in my drafts for months, labeled as "On cowardice."   As those who've consulted the terms and conditions of this blog—or lack thereof—might discern, I'm not monetizing this platform—nor do I have any intention of doing so in the future.  Hence, the writing process tends to embody Nietzschean becoming; given that I'm more or less All-But-Dissertation and that I recently discovered that my CSSE (Canadian Society for Study of Education) proposal to present my dissertation was approved, I need to false flag a justification to publish here.

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I was half way through this post when, by coincidence, I encountered what has become known as the Grievance Studies Affair, often labeled "Sokal Squared" by the academic press in reference to the more widely known Sokal Affair.  I remarked to some of my colleagues that it felt like fate that I found myself writing and editing a piece about courage just as I encountered this fearless defense of academic freedom and of the knowledge project.  

For those of you unaware of the circumstances and significances of this affair, three exceptional scholars—James Lindsay, Helen Pluckrose, and Peter Boghossian—attempted to co-publish twenty hoax journal articles, successfully publishing seven of them.   Deliberately non-sensical, the articles included a piece re-interpreting anatomical male genitalia as socially constructed concepts.  They sought to expose problems that they perceived among pay-to-publish models of scholarship and, especially, the inadequacies among the standards of rigor, vetting, and methodology of academic journals associated with what they referred to as the academic "grievance disciplines": including gender studies, decolonizing studies, and other fields that tend to draw lineage from the post-modern philosophy and critical theory of the 1960s.

If you've read this far, I feel that I should assure you, the reader, that I believe that what they did was highly unethical.  I have no doubt about the unethical character of deliberately lying to editorial boards and to peer reviewers with ulterior motivation if one construes of ethics as an ideal system of actionable dos and don'ts.  Arguably, they could have achieved the same ends without undermining the scholarship of people researching and writing in so-called "grievance studies" because, as their critics rightly contended, their actions undermined the legitimacy and capacity of those working in these fields who respect traditional research standards of rigor, validity, and reliability.  The public perception of these "grievance" fields can directly impact their funding and therefore solvency & growth. Despite the ongoing ideological culture wars in many North American post-secondary institutions that some of these fields tend to legitimize, scholars working in, for example, gender studies and decolonizing studies have done a lot of Good in the service of the knowledge and the human projects.

However, I believe that what they did was moral.  Morality, traditionally, concerns the "whys" of action in lieu of ethics' traditional "whats" and "hows".  The morality of the academy rests on some basic assumptions with origins traceable to the Socratics.  For example, the knowledge project depended and continues to depend, in part, on the assumption of academic freedom, its associated rights and freedoms of speech and of association.  Although those scholars had adverse, if not arguably malicious, motivations—their actions could be justified as a form of counter-attack, or even a desperate defense, in the ideological culture wars that increasingly enthrall the academy.

"Empiricism" is currently under assault.  Verifiable sensory observation of phenomena no longer serves as the gold standard of evidence-based reasoning.  I don't mean to sound like an insurgent here, but academics increasingly find themselves in exile for defending what amount to experientially evidenced-based reasoned claims.  People outside of our academic institutions might find these allegations bizarre or even unfathomable, but I assure you, this is happening, and it is getting worse.  Moreover, the consequences could be existential to the future of the knowledge project.

I anticipate that I am too honest and too committed to traditional conceptions of truth to survive in the long-term in these institutions.  Although I would never engage in the shenanigans of Sokal Squared, increasingly, it'll take a lot less than those levels of professional transgression to get "cancelled" from the academy, or at least, that seems to be the general trans-disciplinary trajectory.  Predictably, this pathology terminates in (former) academics finding themselves with no other recourse than to argue that the public should defund universities.

And not to (re)tread that clichéd slippy slide, but academic freedom is probably next.

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As a teacher, I am constantly reflecting on what capacities, attitudes, and predispositions I should be attempting to foster among my students.  Recently, due in part to political shenanigans at the University of Toronto, I stumbled upon an insight regarding an ideal or vital characteristic that could logically supersede the value and function of every other bit of wisdom and virtue as conditions for human flourishing.

In some respects, this characteristic has been in front of me the entire time.  Despite my commitments to consistent self-reflection, I tend to take my own positionality and willingness to confront dishonesty and corruption for granted.  I am and will probably always be a social gadfly.  However, I only recently realized the true significance or condition of that designation.

Thought experiment: What potential human characteristic, when removed, would only compromise and/ or weaken all other human characteristics?

If you've read the title of this post, then I un-surreptitiously spoiled the surprise.  Virtue, wisdom, and and all other knowledges can be rendered inconsequential, incomprehensible, and ultimately immaterial if one lacks the courage to responsibly enact them.  Cowardice presents the ultimate source and consequence of the failure of the intellect; in fact, I would argue given my recent experiences that cowardice can render all intention and value vacuous.

But what is "courage"?  What is its essence?  What denotes it phenomenologically? I struggled with its definition significantly leading up to and while editing this post.  Though, I'm relatively confident in my identification of this last piece of the puzzle of human action or of "why [...] people do what they do."

If ascribed values constitute the sources of intention and action, the final threshold of action can be defined by this additional variable.  Undeniably Nietzschean, this willingness to enact the will presents the last barrier to enacted choice.  Following the aforementioned logic, without this willingness, the Will or volition constituted by an individual's intuitive and experientially situated values can be rendered void of meaning and of consequence.  Therefore, courage could be defined as the most valuable of values (of objects ascribed meaning by people) since it can render all other values valueless, practically.

Construed another way, inductively, what is the only human characteristic that cannot be supported by other human characteristics?  Or that can only support other human virtues?  Courage doesn't have a "source" along the same pathways of virtue, wisdom, and other empirical knowledge.  Courage cannot be traced to Kantian empirics.  Like Kant, we often interpret free will as a freedom of choice.  To enact courage is to choose to enact a choice.  In other words, our "Will"s cannot be free without it.

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I've been inspired by Winston Churchill ever since I first encountered him.  After all, he may have hated democracy almost as much as Socrates did.  But, Churchill knew that we could do worse—that we had done worse.

And I might be witnessing a precursor to one of his worst-case scenarios at the University of Toronto at the time of publication.

I've lost count of the number of people who I respect and trust who have told me that I should just give up on the University of Toronto Graduate Students' Union, including several of its former executives. Undoubtedly, my involvement has stretched my PhD studies by at least a year and a half. But, I stand by the same principle that compelled my involvement in the first place.  If UofT graduate students can't manage Good governance, what hope is there for our municipal, provincial, and federal governments in Canada?  Democracy dies in darkness.

And authoritarianism prevails where courage fails.  I've deliberately avoided drawing any contemporaneous macrocosmic comparisons publicly in my communities given that Twitter is already inundated with presentists grafting the flavour of the month onto their every myopic political concern.  But folks, this is how authoritarianism happens.

Despite my continued commitment to defending the Left as a liberal, and given the increasing authoritarian tendencies of other parties who also assume these labels, I might be destined to join Boghossian's camp.  But if only the spectrumed Right will defend cognitive liberty, where else does an academic courageously committed to truth and to the knowledge project find themselves in modern academia?

Moreover, these failures of courage in academic governance tend to osmose from the academy.  Everything I've ever taught or tried to teach my students could be rendered meaningless if my students lack the courage to stand by their senses of truth and justice.  I reflected recently that I care far less if my students understand how and why to consistently respect pronoun-antecedent agreement than if they would stand up for the people or ideas that they care about when it matters.

Ultimately, I would teach my own kids if I were ever to procreate that they should never compromise their integrity or sense of truth for the sake of preserving or shaping their reputations.  Because honestly, what is the ethical or moral character of increased clout with people who would prefer that we compromise our understanding of truth or integrity in order to achieve such ends?

On Responding to Fan Mail

As alluded to in my most recent blog post, I was publicly defamed during the April 2020 UTGSU Executive Elections.  The defamatory email cited "evidence" from this blog.  It's estimated that this email reached anywhere from 400 to 800 UofT graduate students after its initial publication some time on or before April 21st, 2020.  For a prospective political campaign and for peace of mind, I decided to unpack the potential inaccuracies of some of the authors' claims.  The fan mail is transcribed verbatim in the following red, bolded text.  My commentary and changes are appended in black.

From: [REDACTED for the sake of the individual]

Date: Tuesday, Apr 21, 2020 at 11:55 AM

To: [REDACTED for the sake of the individual]

Subject: GSU election: vote today to defeat racist, sexist candidates!

Hi friends!

Tbh I haven't remotely looked into student politics/elections at UofT but a friend just sent me this below. In the end it is something very important - I didn't know about the two anti-equity, anti-union candidates that currently hold positions at the university. So do please take the 5 minutes today to vote to be sure that you rank them last so they won't be re-elected to their positions at the union.

best,

[REDACTED for the sake of the individual]

P.S. Please fwd on to others as we have until 5pm for folks to vote. I imagine it is because student politics has a very low voting turn out (it is a low priority for most of us) that these candidates were able to get elected in the first place.

Hello fellow graduate students and friends, 

I hope you are all staying healthy and safe. I am reaching out about the Graduate Student Union executive elections to urge you to help elect the first truly diverse, equity-minded leadership at our Union with grassroots experience during these critical times.

Voting is now open until Tuesday 21 April at 5pm and it’s super easy!

Just click here to log in with your utorid and vote.

Please consider voting for Jacqui Spencer (External Commissioner) given her stellar record in social justice and student governance. I also believe it is vital that we elect June Li (Academics & Funding Commission Div3&4) and Lynne Alexandrova (Internal Commissioner) to promote a diverse leadership and defeat men’s rights and anti-equity candidates, Adam Hill and Jesse Velay-Vitow (see below). 

Given the appositional syntax, it's implied that I was a "men's rights and anti-equity candidate."  The first category error is easily dispelled.  I am not, nor have I ever been, a men's rights candidate.  A cursory review of this blog might implicate my critical predisposition toward toxic masculinities and the broader problems of men's violence against women; my four years of experience volunteering as a counselor in the domestic violence clinic, Changing Ways, in London, Ontario led me to fight to write and defend my Master's thesis and, more recently, to pursue my PhD.  I was literally counseling men twice my age who were on and off men's rights activism online fora before and after our group therapy sessions.

As for "anti-equity [candidacy]", at the time this defamatory email circulated, I was to be considered for impeachment due to ongoing equity concerns within the UTGSU Standing Committee that I chaired, the Policy and Operations Committee.  Notwithstanding my ongoing research and publications regarding the importance of empathy and humanization, including multiple posts in this blog, I hear and acknowledge the authors' concerns.  I am a volcel white dude from southwestern Ontario.  Equity, for me, requires a constant interrogation of my privileges and a dedication to affirmative action for others with less or different privileges; as I've argued many times in the past, the game was rigged from the start.  We need to do our part to change or at least subvert the game.

Furthermore, MLK is one of my personal heroes; his warning has comprised the last words of my Facebook profile for almost a decade, not to mention serving as the basis for my justification to continue writing this blog.  My research, and ultimately my life, is dedicated to the human project; fostering empathy and humanization has the potential to contribute toward redressing inequities.  I never put down Freire's Pedagogy of the Oppressed; I physically carried it around with me throughout most of the writing and editing of my Master's thesis and have variously argued that people should read it asap, multiple times if necessary, to understand the meaning and importance of the oppressed's liberation of their oppressors and themselves.

But anyways, let's continue reading.

Dhanela Sivaparan (Academics & Funding Div1&2) and Luwanga Musisi (University Governance) have been acclaimed, which is great news since they have strong equity and social justice credentials! It’s more important than ever for us to have a strong and equitable union leadership as we face the fall out of this pandemic on our studies and lives in the coming months. It is also especially important given that over the last year, there’s been a series of equity-related complaints and resignations at the executive and committee levels of the Union that the predominantly white cis-male leadership has proven incapable of addressing adequately.

More information on the candidates can be found here. To cast your vote, click here.

If you have the time, will you consider also reaching out to your graduate student contacts and help mobilize the vote?

Why is it vital to not elect Adam & Jesse?

Adam is currently UTGSU Internal Commissioner and Jesse is an elected member of the Policy & Operations Committee. In these and other roles, they have demonstrated their anti-union and anti-equity agendas.

So, I've already addressed the anti-equity bit; therefore, I'll problematize the "anti-union" accusation.  The authors and disseminators of this email might have been alluding to my past comments regarding the OSSTF.  As of this writing, I've been teaching high school on and off for six years overseas in China and for a private school in Toronto.  When I completed my practica for my Bachelor of Education, I met and worked with a brilliant and inspiring public school teacher who happened to currently serve as their school's OSSTF representative.  They confirmed that they despised the job since, time and again, they were forced "to defend the indefensible."  I can understand why they argued as such since I had a law teacher in high school who taught the entire course from beginning to end, including the exam, via our reading the textbook and completing fill-in-the-blank handout exercises.  She's still working there as of this writing. 

There's a threshold after which defending unprofessional, weak, and/or abusive teachers becomes dubiously moral or ethical, especially when such defenses come wrapped in a rhetoric of protecting and benefiting students & young children.  However, such is not the case for labour unions like the ETFO.  On multiple occasions, I have articulated to my colleagues and friends the importance of the ETFO since the Ontario public generally underestimates and/or misunderstands the jobs of kindergarten to grade 8 teachers.  These teachers need aggressive representation, especially during a pandemic.

Although I remain critical of the OSSTF, I love the UTGSU.  I have fought up hill to preserve the UTGSU, even since leaving office in May 2020; I have persistently argued, with close colleagues and friends who believe that the UTGSU is beyond saving, that we should still do everything we can to preserve it.  A part of the reason I still haven't sued the Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions Caucus leadership (who probably had a hand in writing and disseminating this email) for defamation is because I still believe that we can resolve this internally like adults.  Maybe I'm wrong.  But I'll keep fighting for the UTGSU, and I'll be there to help rebuild it once the dust settles.

Jesse is a men’s rights activist and libertarian. He has run as a candidate for the Libertarian Party of Canada [yadda yadda yadda defaming Jesse]

NOTE: I'm omitting the next couple of paragraphs since they only concern Jesse, and he doesn't deserve this.

[...]

Adam is currently facing an impeachment motion due to complaints by members and staff that he has violated the Union Equity Statement and abused his power as UTGSU Internal Commissioner. Complaints allege that the Adam has made racist, homophobic, and transphobic comments and microaggressions. They also allege that he has overtly and subtly demeaned, belittled, and undermined the contributions of equity seeking members at the Union while creating an unsafe environment for Union members to participate. Such behaviors, which I have witnessed many times, include consistently misgendering and misnaming queer, gender liminal and racialized members verbally and in print. 

As I've acknowledged in public and in writing multiple times, I misgendered a Member of the UTGSU at least once in person and once in writing.  I formally apologized to this Member and committed to redressing their concerns regarding my behaviors and those identified in the Policy and Operations Committee.  

I haven't written about my positions regarding transgenderism in this blog, but a hand full of people might remember posts that I've written on Facebook in the past.  In short, I've articulated the position that traditional gender theory, particularly Betty Friedan's gender constructivism, can contradict the alleged intuitivity and/or a priori status of gender.  It's difficult to argue that gender can be both innate and constructed, but maybe this is the case.  Regardless, these people, like any people, should be respected and validated.

It has also included interrupting, belittling, and blocking attempts by racialized and other women (trans and non-trans) to speak in Union spaces. He has also organized to block resolutions and motions pertaining to equity agendas through procedural tactics and voting alliances with other ostensibly straight, white cis-men. He is a close ally of Jesse at the Union. 

I cannot stress how strongly I believe in procedural justice as the basis for all other Justice(s).  It's the primary means in deliberative bodies to create equal and even equitable space for all voices.  As Chair of a Bourinot's Rules of Order-governed Union body, I had the responsibility to enforce procedure to the best of my ability.  In a email to all voting and non-voting members of the Policy and Operations Committee, I even offered to suspend procedure, promising to prioritize safety before procedure, something that I myself did not agree with at the time since I believed and still believe that procedure is the primary means of preserving safety.  "Points of personal privilege" are sacred for a reason.

His blog gives a good sense of his politics where he makes baffling and unsettling statements like:

“If you happen to have a phallus, have you endured blue balls deliberately more than once to the degree that you could no longer stand erect?”

This quote is referencing this blog post.  If you read it yourself, you might discern that the question is part of a bad ironic joke since it's part of a "check list" to determine whether one has achieved selflessness.  It's also a subtle reference to my status as a volcel.  I've been voluntarily celibate for quite some time; in that blog post, I discuss how selflessness requires a "denial of sexuality."  Blue balls are a real thing, and they can be pretty painful.

“I've always been fascinated by women, due to both previous sexual attraction as well as my general appreciation of humanity. For a while in high school I was even a bit of a ‘man whore.[...] In fact, I've desired to write this Facebook note for a while, I just lacked the courage and the balls. [...] Much of women's self-worth is based on what they think other people think about how they look. That's why much of society has taken to consistently reassuring women that they are aesthetically pleasing. [...] we never once touched the topic of women's relationship with the visual. I - as the only guy - had a unique sensitivity to this relationship - I think most women take it for granted. For example, my self-proclaimed radical feminist professor wore (extensive?) make-up to every class - and never once talked about it.”

The material referenced in this paragraph can be found here.  In another post that I've reverted to draft for an indefinite period, I explored that second statement: "For a while in high school I was even a bit of a ‘man whore."  I was a bit of a man whore in high school until I began to realize the full impacts of my willful negligence and lies on my partners.  When I voluntarily quit "the game" as we called it during grade 10, my wingmen legitimately contemplated killing me because of the challenge that I presented to their lifestyles and world views.  As quoted, I had wanted to write the Facebook note that preceded the blog post, back in 2012, for years.  However, my position has changed a bit since I wrote that Facebook note.  

The typically feminine has a greater affinity for the visual, the seeing and being seen, than the typically masculine.  I don't know how people could dispute this decisively.  I was referring to a gender studies and history professor who taught my third year North American Women's History course at Western University.  I don't, and never have, worn make-up, unless it was for theatrical shows in high school; (I starred in my high school musical, Tommy).  As an avid proponent of "the unexamined life is not worth living," I still wonder what we could have accomplished in that North American Women's History course had we engaged in academic discourse regarding these latent values.  Interestingly, there's arguably far more damning material that they could have cited from that almost decades-old Facebook-note-republished-as-blog-post.

“Hate-speech is rarely a thing in itself: i.e. people don't just hate on other people for the sake of doing so. They do it because some one or group's behavior or way of life threatens their own. Hatespeech then, is not what most believe it to be: an objective moral judgement, but is simply a situational perspective. Accusations of hate-speech represent one of the ultimate forms of repression, because those who would accuse others of "hate-speech" most often do so self-righteously. In reality, they're doing more harm to progress and the planet than good.”

I imagine the target audience of the defamatory email devoured this particular tidbit from this blog.  I recommend reading the 2012 Facebook note republished as blog post yourself, since it's relatively short, and it's difficult for me to argue that they're decontextualizing this paragraph without your knowledge of its content and position in a dialogue.

Okay, assuming you've read my short blog post, it's vital to understand that it was written as a response to one of my old professor's blog posts.  In some ways, both my old professor and I mischaracterized hate-speech since we neglected some of its vilest forms.  I overgeneralized in 'On Freedom of Speech', partly because I was naïve to all of the forms of hate-speech possible.  Hate-speech can describe some of the most maliciously abusive human communication.

However, the concept of hate-speech can be used repressively.  I'm sure some of the more radical among the people who assisted in writing and disseminating the defamatory email would argue that even my writing this blog post could be construed as hate-speech.

Please help me ensure that our Union leadership is committed and able to uphold the basic principles of equity and safety for our diverse membership. As CUPE 3902 prepares to enter a bargaining year and the student union continues to field off attacks from our right-wing provincial government, it is so important that there be a pro-union UTGSU leadership that fosters an equitable, open space for all to participate and build our Union.

In solidarity,

UofT Divest

To be honest, to this day, I'm not even angry.  As indicated in the graph preceding this post, my blog had another ~500 hits in the month following the dissemination of the defamatory email.  People actually read my nonsense for once.  Make no mistake, I am no less committed to all that I've said and promised in this blog.  Although, as a professional teacher and as an educator of teachers & education graduate students, I think the UTGSU's Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions Caucus leadership might need a time-out.

On the privilege of sacrifice

Earn this...

I suppose that it's inevitable that blogs contain autobiographical elements.
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Unbeknownst to most, I am actually a musician.  And I'm not just a musician but a song writer.  At least, I was.

Music still comprises the greater part of my life.  If I remember correctly, I was taking piano lessons when I was as young as 10 years old.  I didn't love it initially, but it grew on me.  I was extremely fortunate that my family could also put me through voice lessons.  By grade 11, I was writing songs monthly for the coffee houses held by the music program at my high school.  I always had to one-up myself, technically, melodically, rhythmically, and/or by refining my overall performance.  I became absolutely obsessed with writing music.  At one point in my life, I would spend over half of my waking hours trying to find underused chord formulas and rehashing traditional constructs.  I know that many people would kill to have my talent (at least that's what my mother always says).

And then I stopped.

It's a bit like ripping my own heart out, tossing it to the side, and knowing that it's still beating.

There has always been a part of me that just wanted to drop everything, join another band, write music, and perform live shows for the rest of my life.

But to this day, I have never regretted sacrificing that privilege.

The rest of this blog post will attempt to unpack that ^^^ statement.
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How was/is my capacity for music a privilege you might ask?

We usually talk about privilege in terms of skin colour, gender, class, wealth, and/or ability.  I'm referring to privilege in a much more wholistic and abstract sense.  I think that I would describe privilege as a certain kind of un/known capacity.

First, many, if not most, families cannot afford to put their kids through piano and voice lessons.  I am ever indebted to my parents for pushing me to attend lessons with an expert from the Royal Conservatory, let alone fund my classes.

Secondly, I know that I can contribute at least 10 fold more to others through schooling, research, and politics than I could ever contribute through a career in music.

Finally, and most importantly, it's possible that in sacrificing my capacity for music that I can bring myself closer to living a Good life.  Not everyone will have the chance to do that which Socrates and his pupils exalted within the Ancient Greek dialogues.

Although one of my greatest sacrifices, writing and playing music is now just one drop in the sacrificial bucket that has been my life.  And I'm not alone in this regard.  Some of my closest allies have forgone child bearing and even intimate relationships in order to treat others as they would have others treat them.  This lifestyle is not for everyone.  But I believe that for me, it is absolutely necessary.  Because my definition of "others" stretches off into the infinite.  My definition includes all potential sentient, feeling, life: all of those potential lives who might have acted differently if they were in my position with my known capacity.

If this capacity is privy to the agent wielding it,  then there are consequences.  For example, I have empirical evidence that I can work almost non-stop in the service of others; therefore, if I know that, then I have a responsibility to do it.  Put another way, someone in the future experiencing the brink of the total destruction of this planet would admonish me if he/she could.  It's a logical projection of our circumstances given the empirical evidence available.

Moreover, our individual responsibility for the future scales with our known capacity.  In this sense, known capacity refers to our knowledge of the causality that might impact the future combined with our knowledge of our ability to do something about it.

I don't expect everyone to adopt my moral universe and, to be honest, I never did.  I don't want my students to end up like me.  I don't want them to have to let go of parts of themselves in order to make this world decent.

But our context has no precedent in human history.  And if we empathize with potentiality, all of those potential lives, it's not an tremendous leap of faith to conclude that they would want, at least, the same chances that we had.  We have this responsibility as an extension of our awareness.  We have an obligation inherent in the universal values of the human species that have transcended time.

I'm only requesting that we try to be reasonable given the circumstances.  We have enormous power over the future of this planet.  And as the inevitable cliche suggests "With great power comes great responsibility."

Therefore, we can have the choice of whether to sacrifice our privileges for the sake of others.
I would earnestly request from my reader that, at the very least, we do that which we think would be reasonable.
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I didn't watch the entire movie, 'Saving Private Ryan,' until I was in China about a year ago.  The first time I watched the ending, I balled my eyes out.  I don't think I've ever cried that much in my entire life.  I want the people of the future to have Ryan's degree of appreciation for what we did.  (Un)fortunately, that means that we may need to sacrifice some of our privileges so that they might have, at least, the same opportunities that we had.
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My students once asked me "How do you define success?"  After some thought, I responded "If I can achieve a measure of decency, then that's enough.  If I can treat others the same way that I would have them treat me, then I've succeeded."

On standardized testing

I started writing a reflection for one of my classes and it turned into an off-topic gripe-fest about standardized testing only worthy of publishing to blogs dedicated to improving the world such as this.  Enjoy!

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In my graduate studies, my Introduction to Curriculum class once came to the conclusion that standardization in schools is not inherently evil.  The key question to ask when confronted with standardization is “standardization of what?”  Are you standardizing the process of education?  I.e. pedagogies and practices. (the means) Or are you standardizing the outcomes?  I.e. evaluation and the desired understandings and skills of students. (the ends)

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Standardizing evaluations and outcomes can create many problems, as demonstrated by researchers of standardized testing.  Standardized tests like the EQAO and AYP have the potential to create systems of schooling that---instead of improving students' overall understanding, skills, and allowing them to realize their full potential---actually just increase students’ ability to score well on standardized tests.

Standardized evaluations can create systemic problems such as polarizing the efficacy of schools.  For example, magnet schools that do well at reaching standardized outcomes tend to attract the best teachers meanwhile schools that are barely surviving under scrutiny based on standardized test results tend to ward off good teachers.  This relationship creates a positive feedback loop in which the better a school does on the tests the more it attracts good teachers and funding (which allows the school to do even better on the tests); the worse a failing school does on the tests the more it wards off good teachers and suffers reduced budgets (which cripples the school at the expense of the students who end up doing even worse on the tests).  This exponentially increasing gap between the best and worst schools is very real in certain parts of the United States.

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However, standardizing outcomes, but especially standardization the evaluation of outcomes, can help organize and increase the efficiency and effectiveness of educative systems (pending those educative systems actually use the data collected by standardized evaluation).  Ideally, if you have a sufficient effective measure of outcomes, it's possible to compare school environments, demographics, students' socioeconomic statuses, etc. with schools' capacity to achieve learning outcomes.

Standardizing evaluations of outcomes provides benchmarks.  They can act as a ruler to measure the relative efficacy of schools and their educative potential.  Further, standardization of evaluations of outcomes encourages teachers to organize their lessons around learning outcomes.  It forces teachers into backward designing their lessons: identifying outcomes and developing teaching practices and activities which create the educational experiences necessary to achieve those outcomes.

Whereas standardizing outcomes can be justified, standardizing pedagogy and practices almost always creates more problems than it solves.  Every student learns at different times in different ways.  Given the diversity of learners, there’s a strong justification for differentiated instruction. 

There's something enormously dehumanizing about homogenizing teaching practices and pedagogies.  It denies the individuality, diversity, exceptionality, and the potential vitality and vibrancy of the human condition.  This goes for students AND teachers.  Teachers are just as diverse as students, and to constrict teaching practice and philosophy is to try to take the human beings out of teaching and learning.  You kill style, attitude, and enthusiasm.  Teacher-directed teaching can be just as important as student-directed learning.

All that to say, it's in everyone's interest that we constantly renegotiate the qualities, understandings, and skills that belong to an ideal global citizen.  Therefore, it's also in everyone's interest that we constantly renegotiate the methods and philosophies that should be employed when educating such citizens.

On accountability: The importance of honesty

It's a kind of cosmic irony that one of the greatest systemic problems facing humanity today is our incapacity to take accountability for our own actions.  Many of us go great lengths to salvage and protect our pride, often to self- and community-destructive ends.  Even more ironic is the availability of the solution, the degree of ease in simply enacting accountability; to be honest.

This dishonesty contributes to a range of social problems and inequalities ranging from war to poverty.  It has enormous ramifications for conflict resolution, everywhere from intimate relationship, to international, violence. 

As a co-facilitator at Changing Ways, I've witnessed how a lack of accountability can destroy relationships.  As a student of history, I've witnessed how dishonesty has tarnished, and even lead to the conquering of, nations.

Accountability affects every context of our lives, and yet it's barely discussed in common conversation.  In fact, discussions of accountability are most often prompted by some sort of accusation of dishonesty; rarely is it discussed as a virtue, ideal, or something intrinsically worth enacting.

So just what is accountability?

Well, Wikipedia currently provides several context specific definitions supplying little assistance in this instance.  But the webpage demonstrates that definitions of concepts can have as many nuances as there are contexts in which these concepts can be identified.

I've been confronted with defining accountability several times, especially at Changing Ways where men were "coerced" into writing accountability statements: to take accountability for the behavior that landed them at the institution.  As such, I've encountered a plethora of definitions from which to draw my own.

In this instance, I'm referring to accountability in its primary essence, its basic values: honesty, integrity (consistency), and reason.  I developed my definition logically, as it consists of honesty, integrity, and reason, because if just one of those values is absent, one cannot be genuinely accountable.  

Without a complete commitment to honesty, dishonest behavior could be justified by reason and enacted with integrity.  I.e. left to reason and integrity, one could justify disingenuity.  I've encountered many situations where people rationalize disingenuous actions in which one behaves as though they know less than they actually do.  To spare you the list of reasons as to why such justifications can fail, I'll leave you with this: how would you feel if you were the one who suffered as a result of that disingenuous behavior?  And what's the point if you'd find out eventually, regardless?

Along with honesty, without a complete commitment to integrity, one can fail to be genuinely accountable.  I placed "consistency" in parentheses to highlight this element of integrity, but I didn't just write 'consistency' because that term alone fails to capture the range of areas within which one must be consistent to maintain their integrity.  Integrity is more than just consistent action; it's an consistent orientation to life: consistent values, beliefs, reasoning, honesty, self-criticism, etc.  Without integrity, one could pick and choose rationally and honestly where and when to be consistent instrumentally.  Integrity's not as vital as honesty and reason, but it's an essential element of persistent, life-long, genuine accountability.

Along with honesty and integrity, without a complete commitment to reason, one cannot achieve the ideal accountability so described.  I know it may sound abstract or obtuse to include reason in my definition and criteria, but bear with me.  Imagine an irrational individual claiming to be accountable based on their honesty and integrity.  In my own mind I'd picture a domestic abuser who consistently and honestly denies their culpability in an instance of domestic abuse.  By the exclusive standards of honesty and integrity, this man or woman could be described as accountable.  However, if that same situation is subjected to rational criticism and reason, that individual may be found to be otherwise.  For example, in the case suggested, the indicted might have done something they don't believe, or understand, to have affected something else.  Reason is the acknowledgement and understanding of relationships like cause and effect, consequences for behaviors, and emotional literacy.  Even if one maintains the greatest honesty and integrity, if they do not acknowledge or even deny rational deductive and inductive logic, the feelings of other individuals, or the full consequences of their actions, they cannot be genuinely accountable.

In sum, my perspective of accountability consists of honesty, integrity, and reason.

That said, why do we struggle to take accountability?

No one likes to be wrong.  In fact, as I've cited previously, in Eckhart Tolle's words, "to be wrong is to die."  Following suite, everyone likes to be right.  No one ever has trouble taking accountability for good, right, actions, unless they're prepared to confront their own pride.

As such, to take accountability is to confront our own hedonist consciousnesses: to confront our desires for pleasure and abhorrence of pain.  It's hard: very hard.  Almost, and arguably actually currently, impossible for some, depending on the context.  As it was at Changing Ways in the men's groups I helped facilitate and participated with, accountability is a process: a gradual process. And the pivotal vehicle of this process is honesty.

I'm awed and inspired by the solution.  The simple, yet revolutionary, power of honesty.  Honesty, in the sense that I use it, is simply an absolute openness, to yourself, everyone, and everything.

Meanwhile, dishonesty is dissonance.  It's a closing or alienation of ideas and people. Dishonesty is a form of conservatism; it's an act of conserving one's pride, feelings, beliefs, understandings, or principles.

As such, honesty is absolutely liberal, it's a kind of liberation: an exercise of personal liberty.  To be honest is to liberate oneself from pride, doctrines, and prejudices.

Many of us are slaves to our selves: to our own pride and hedonist values.  We exercise dishonesty, and fear accountability, because we fear the wrath of our masters: the realization and acknowledgment of who we truly are, and what we've actually done. 

Allow me to consolidate this argument with an example.  Why do we desire "privacy"?

Why?

What's the reasoning?  What's at the root of that desire?

It's because we have something worth hiding.  Whether it be worth hiding because of the consequences of its discovery, or to preserve its worth: this is the nature of any secret.  Simply put, we desire privacy because we feel we can't or shouldn't be honest; there's forces and structures preventing us from being ourselves, honestly and accountably.  We seek out and go great lengths to maintain privacy, because our society has become such that to be completely and absolutely honest about ourselves: our wants, needs, beliefs, and values, often has negative consequences.

My perspective?  Be honest anyway.  Be accountable, even if it hurts. 
Because most often the consequences of dishonesty and running from the truth far outweigh the costs of being honest and accountable.

"Be the change you wish to see in the world."  You want honesty?  Accountability?  Transparency? Be honest, accountable, and transparent.

EDIT: I ironically had to delete a link linked to the words "be accountable, even if it hurts."  That link connected to a post that I had to pull from this blog given my new status as a public servant.  That post may be reposted again, but given its controversy and probable incomprehensibility to most people, it will require reworking, or at least a lot more explanation on my part.  So in eating my own words, be accountable, even if it hurts, only when such accountability will allow you to continue to realize your self and your world.

"Unity is the Way" Part 1

So I'm in the process of writing a post by the name of the title quotation.  However, I had to write a reflection for a class on the educator's role in accommodating for, and preventing, domestic violence in their students' families.  I felt this was a perfect introduction to the things I will discuss in the forthcoming post.  [As always, names, course codes, and locations stripped for confidentiality]

Adam Hill – [course code] – Reflection #9

            I think the key question regarding educators’ role in accommodating for, and preventing, violence in the home, is one of degree.  I.e. to what degree is the individual educator, within a specific context, responsible for accommodating for, and preventing, such violence?  Further, to what degree can, and should, they do anything about it?  After all, those children only spend a small portion of their time in your class, and in your school; likely even less time in the former if it’s a public high school in Ontario.  Further, the educator, in almost every instance, isn’t the child’s legal guardian, so there are many expectations and assumptions baring or inhibiting any action on the educator’s part, other than reporting abuses when legislated to do so.

I’ve been confronted with these issues myself already, even in my short two months of volunteer educational assisting at [an elementary school].  After the principal decided to employ me upon a co-worker’s recommendation and my word, I was given the responsibility of three “developmentally delayed” 6 year olds from, a recently zoned into the school, low-income housing complex.  
Although the one never confided in me directly, many of their behaviours and attitudes suggested issues outside the school.  However, even though there were rumours constantly circulating about the three, and especially about the parents of the one with serious behavioural and attitudinal issues, I never reported anything, because that student never gave me anything substantial to report.

Regardless, I still thought daily about ways I could further help those kids, even lost a little sleep over it.  As of then, and still now, I know if I had stayed with that school, I would have made deliberate efforts to integrate the families, and their members, of that school community together: to engage them by encouraging their communication with the school, and with each other.

Getting back to that vital question, I still ask myself where professional responsibility ends and altruism begins when you’re an educator.  Would I expect an educator to do the same thing, to make deliberate efforts to build a school community?  And where does that responsibility begin and end?  I honestly don’t know.  But I feel that if the educator is aware of an issue, and more importantly, aware of an honest, respectful, and meaningful, method to ameliorate it, I feel it’s their responsibility to do so.  I know I’m still rather alone when arguing as such, but I believe this will change with time.  At least I hope so.