What is with all the Ontario left ranting about road tolls and Toronto 'elites'?

While this trope has been around for a while, with the rather facile lines of debate that have arisen of late given Toronto Mayor John Tory's road toll plan, the bizarre and reactionary notion that Toronto is somehow a city comprised of latte drinking academics, intellectuals, and pompous elitists sneering at the rest of the province has reared its head again among lefties in Ontario.

Personally, as I have written about before, I think that John Tory's toll plan, whatever its alleged theoretical merits, is a distraction that will neither raise anywhere near the revenue required to help finance desperately needed transit expansion in the city nor will it raise any revenue of any kind for anything for many years anyway due to the length of time it will take to actually create the legal framework and infrastructure for the tolls.

Having said that, much of the recent left opposition to road tolls generally that is centered around a narrative that they are, in all cases and circumstances, regressive or an attack on 'poor' car drivers and on non-Torontonian Ontarians is simplistic and deeply problematic.

First, Torontonians generally and Toronto transit users specifically have been subsidizing the infrastructure and fuel usage of car drivers across the province for a very long time. The vast majority of people have no real understanding to what extent the government subsidizes the private use of cars. I wrote about it at some length in the piece "It is time for a war on the car". The notion that it is somehow 'regressive' to take steps to right this imbalance is bizarre.

Further, something has to be done to start to get people out of their cars. The present situation environmentally is simply not sustainable, no matter what people want to believe. There is no progressive, left, environmental or moral case for continuing this subsiding of car use as a society that makes any sense at all. It is literally helping to kill us all, and that can be said without hyperbole unless you are a climate change denier.

But it is surprising the number of people on the left who accept the grim reality of climate change but are unwilling to accept even the most minor consequences of what we need to do to stop it.

Trust me, as climate change gets worse and worse it will not be supposed elitists in Toronto alone who will pay the price.

Also, transit users -- who are statistically more likely to be from lower income groups and marginalized communities and who are doing the environmentally right thing -- are all made to pay 'tolls' and 'user fees' every time they ride in the form of transit fares. So unless you have a plan or are committed to eliminating those, opposing road tolls as a leftist strikes me as rather rank hypocrisy.

As a friend of mine put it on Facebook "Transit users pay $3.25 per ride or $140 a month for a Metropass - yet it's only when road tolls of $2 are proposed do we hear "TO THE BARRICADES!" from Ontario's social democrats." Indeed.

There is little that seems more 'elitist' than watching an endless stream of cars with a single person in them speed by long lines of people waiting to get on overcrowded transit with no understanding of just how much money the public spends to allow these car drivers to do this. As just one example, the many billions of dollars of public money that go into building and maintaining the very roads they drive on, all overwhelmingly used by private cars or commercial vehicles. Our cities are literally centered around them. To imply that asking them to pay a greater share for the privilege is somehow regressive is rather like rolling down your car window and screaming 'I'm all right Jack' on the way by that streetcar or bus stop.

Frankly, for the ONDP to join hands with Brown's Conservatives in some broad attack on tolls and to embrace a paint-by-numbers right wing anti-tax stance is typical of the party now and is grotesque.

While road tolls are certainly not even close to the only tool in these fights, and are not always the best one, sweeping reactionary generalizations about them are not helpful and feed broader anti-tax narratives.

Much of this anti-road toll, anti-tax pseudo-populism is served up with a generous side helping of hating Toronto. Especially all those 'elitists' who apparently live in it.

One would have thought that this inane rhetoric -- embraced by leading lights like Warren Thomas in the last provincial election -- that had such disastrous consequences for the ONDP in 2014 would have been put to bed already.

Apparently not.

It is, simply put, idiotic for leftists in Ontario to mimic the anti-Toronto rhetoric of the right. No left wing or progressive government, even a milquetoast NDP one, will ever be elected in Ontario without carrying Toronto, a fact that the Liberals seem to grasp far better than the ONDP and some others.

Despite all of the silliness, Toronto has a long tack record of supporting the left. In 1990 when the ONDP was actually elected under Rae they won 18 of their 74 seats in Toronto, which represented 24.3% of the total. They could not have achieved a majority without them.

In subsequent years Toronto (by which I mean the 'old' city and all its boroughs, but not Mississauga, Brampton, etc.) came through for the NDP again. When it lost in 1995, 5 of the 17 seats it won were in Toronto, or 29.4%. In 1999 3 of the 9 seats or 33%. In 2003 it was 3 of 7, an even higher percentage. In 2007 4 of 10 and in 2011 5 of 17 again.

A notable exception was the last election when Horwath's ONDP thumbed its nose at the issues that were of greatest concern to Torontonians and they responded by punishing the ONDP in the city where they won only 2 of their 21 seats.

The huge wave of red that swept across Toronto played a key role in giving Wynne her majority government. The lesson of this should have been clear to New Democrats and leftists more broadly.

But they have not learned it.

Toronto is home to many of the most progressive voters in the province. The left is not going to come to power here without them. Period. To think otherwise is not just fantasy but foolhardy.

Beyond that though, to talk of Toronto elites simply ignores what is actually going on in Toronto, which sees some of the most desperate poverty and marginalization in the province. This is a city of terrible income disparities in the midst of a severe housing crisis. For decades now transit infrastructure -- and infrastructure and social policy more broadly -- that would greatly help some of its most marginalized and racialized communities has been forsaken as successive governments prioritized other agendas that left these communities behind.

Toronto is the base as well to a wide array of activist groups and grassroots community organizations that fight day in and day out for social justice. That many both inside and outside the city do not acknowledge or respect this does not change this fact.

Given the reality of life and the struggle faced by so many of its residents the portrayal of Toronto as a bedrock of elitism is offensive.

As for sneering talk of 'academics' are we really going to embrace the anti-intellectualism of the right? The notion that academics and intellectuals all inhabit some 'ivory tower' and are out-of-touch with 'reality' is an essential component of the right wing ideological assault on evidence and fact based policy. Scratch the surface of most people out there ranting about academics and you find someone who denies climate change, thinks "cultural Marxism" is destroying society and who believes that "social justice warriors" are reverse racists and sexists that have made it so it is now men and white people who are really discriminated against and oppressed.

If this is the rhetorical road some folks on the left want to start down, count me out.

It is claptrap that emboldens and aids right wingers and it really has to stop along with the rubbish about feminist or anti-racist 'elites' and 'political correctness'.

The actual, honest-to-god reality is that Toronto is a huge, diverse city with millions of people in it many of whom are a paycheque away from destitution or, sadly, already there. It needs government investment in transit, housing, social programs and infrastructure desperately and, yes, this is important to the province as a whole just as it is that we ensure that these needs are met in every community and that rural roads and infrastructure are maintained as well.

We are, after all, living in a society.

If people see calls to invest government funds in ways that directly improve the lives of millions of people, calls to find ways to combat the deadly scourge of car driving and its environmental impact, and calls to use a variety of means at our disposal to pay for this 'elitist', then they really need to seriously reflect on why they do.

Because they are not.

See also: The myth of the leftist, feminist, anti-racist, elitist

See also: The myth of political correctness -- That last redoubt of the bigot, racist and misogynist

The myth of political correctness -- That last redoubt of the bigot, racist and misogynist

It's back!

That specter that has haunted the imaginations of the right, and much of the left, for a generation now apparently has risen to new heights as commentators, politicians and angry people on the internet rant and rave about the supposed tyranny that is "political correctness".

By this, of course, they mean the actions of "progressives" or left-wing activists or any statement by anyone from any group that has suffered under the yoke of historic systemic oppression that challenges in anyway, at all, their bigoted, racist, misogynist or homophobic views on something, somewhere.

And so we find that a "majority of Canadians believe that political correctness infringes too much on their freedom of expression, a new poll suggests".

Really? And how exactly does it do this?

"Two-thirds of respondents told the firm "too many people are easily offended these days over the language others use.""

Two-thirds. A depressing comment.

So what is "political correctness"?

Back in the days before the internet and Gamergate brought us the so-called men's rights movement, lies about "social justice warriors" and the racist and misogynist trolls who think freedom of speech is actually about allowing them to stalk, harass and intimidate people, right-wingers across North America were all huddled together in their "think-tanks" and "war rooms" and editorial meetings freaked out by the rise of all those "others" seeking equal rights.

Women, people-of-colour, the racialized and marginalized, indigenous and aboriginal communities, were demanding to be heard, forming movements and coalitions, changing unjust laws, and forcing whites and men to think about our collective, awful history of racist, colonialist, patriarchal capitalism.

People living in poverty were fighting for economic justice. Unions and social policies were making inroads against inequality during the period we now know as the post-war "social compromise".

A President of the United States even went so far as to declare a "War on Poverty".

What was to be done? How were these obviously just and fair struggles to be undermined? How were those whose agenda it was to actually not just prevent but to reverse any gains made to make it seem as if those seeking basic justice were the "bad guys", but those who were racist, sexist bigots were the "good guys" -- or, at the very least, were just "telling it like it is" or "saying just what daddy and granddaddy did?"

Well, as Keyser Soze said about Keyser Soze, "The greatest trick the devil ever pulled was convincing the world he did not exist."

Now, in their hearts, even total idiots know that these historic injustices and terrible crimes have been committed and that they continue to this day. So how do you convince everyone that they really do not exist and that talking or doing anything about them is what is the actual "injustice"?

The "devil", so-to-speak, had this great plan. You simply turn reality on its head and make it out that those who are fighting injustice are actually the elitists who are trying to take away people's "rights" and that those who benefit from, or are at least down with, oppression are, in fact, the oppressed whose rights are being taken away!

And you call any attempt to change the existing, hegemonic political order "political correctness".

Sounds ominous.

Very clever that. Suddenly it was rich people, white people and men who were somehow "under attack" and being "oppressed" as the dastardly hoards tried to even the playing field, fight for equality and respect and stop the almost endlessly ingrained daily rituals of racism, homophobia, bigotry and misogyny that literally permeate every aspect of our society down to its very patterns of speech.

But the myth of the new "political correctness" went much further than that as it also turned people against their own interests. Even if you are making just a few bucks an hour at some dead end job how dare those "elitists" challenge your god-given right to claim to be better than entire swaths of humanity and to spew whatever vile vomit you want to with the buddies over Bud on Saturday night as the bosses are closing the factories down all around you and as the corporations and politicians you voted for are directly working to impoverish you and your family.

The myth, of course, lingers around to this day to the immense benefit of the capitalist classes, white people, the police, men, and millionaire and billionaire politicians like Rob Ford or Donald Trump who get to recast themselves as fighting against "elites" or for the "little guy" when they are doing anything but.

A woman says she does not like being demeaned by loud, ignorant comments or unwelcome approaches in public spaces by men? Political Correctness!

Native American groups demand that the grotesque and obviously ignorant racist names and caricatures of their peoples used by sport's teams like the Washington Redskins or the Cleveland Indians be ended? Political Correctness!

Black Americans rise up and write articles or refuse to stand for the national anthem in protest against police violence, murder and discrimination against them and against the sickening and deeply embedded bias in the so-called "justice system"? Political Correctness!

It is an all purpose smear. Works in so many cases.

And, ironically, its aim is to actually not just inhibit free speech, but to also serve as camouflage for the real political correctness that grips our politics and discourse which bears absolutely no resemblance to the mythological one created by right-wing white men and their useful idiots out there.

So it is that a Colin Kaepernick can actually exercise his democratic and constitutional right to make a controversial and unpopular statement and be denounced and threatened by the very groups and people who rant on-and-on about "free speech" and their supposed right to act like pigs or make ignorant comments in any time, space or place.

So it is that the true political correctness sits right there in front of our eyes but is ignored.

The political correctness of right wing nationalism, obliviousness and racism that exists when white American idiot John Tortorella, head coach of Team USA at the upcoming World Cup of Hockey, can threaten to bench any player on "his" team who tries to exercise their democratic rights.

The political correctness we see when "Brian Burke, Calgary Flames president of hockey operations as well as a senior adviser to Team USA, said the playing field is not the place to make political statements" in a sport whose major league, the NHL, has "support the troops days" that involve disgusting on-ice displays of military might that are overtly and entirely, 100% political.



This is the revolting irony of the old reliable right wing term. The police, enabled by the formidable political power of law and the state, could and do literally kill people every single day but it is the protesting and calling out of the racism of many of these actions by those who lack real political power and who do not have the backing of the state that is what is termed "politically correct".

So it is that Hollywood fossil Clint Eastwood can say of Donald Trump:

"He's onto something because secretly everybody's getting tired of political correctness, kissing up," the acclaimed actor and director said of Trump. "That's the kiss-ass generation we're in right now. We're really in a pussy generation. Everybody's walking on eggshells."
"We see people accusing people of being racist and all kinds of stuff. When I grew up, those things weren't called racist," Eastwood added.

Without noting in any way at all that when he grew up "those things" weren't  called racism because he grew up in Jim Crow America where segregationism was still law! He literally grew up in a country with open and institutionalized legal racism but bemoans not the oppression that, obviously, never had anything to do with him, but the fact people are now willing to call it what it was and is.

How sick is that? How ass-kissing of racist American state power is that? How stunningly, ignorantly elitist from a very rich, old white man in America is that?

It is all of those things and more

It is also a reflection of the ongoing and actual political consensus and "correctness" in North America and it is a racist, colonialist, homophobic, bigoted and sexist one!

And so it is that in our daily lives we are forced to endure that ironically deeply sanctimonious ass that we all know at least one of (usually male) who will blather rubbish like "I don't care what anyone thinks about what I am saying or being PC..." when, of course, these entitled twits deeply care or they would not have made such a pathetic self-justifying statement to begin with.

More importantly, though, it also means they are going to start into (one or more of) some age old racist, misogynist, homophobic, anti-union, anti-working class line of whatever shit they woke up feeling they wanted to puke all over the internet, or at the bar, or at work, or wherever, while getting all primed and ready to defend their total moral emptiness and privilege by saying that any attempt to call them out on it is "just political correctness anyway".

This is the white male echo chamber of one's own bullshit where the only opinion that matters is the one all of the sexist or reactionary hacks hold in common with each other. Opinions that do not stand up to power at all -- that are not rebellious or individualistic -- but that make those who spout them just like every other asshole who says exactly the same thing to justify their willful and wanton ignorance and who always has and who always will.

The myth of "Political Correctness" is just another way to allow those with power to keep it. Ranting on about it is the last battle line of the troglodyte who cannot find any other final defense for the hatred or contempt of whatever group of people it is that they hate or hold in contempt and whose struggles and realities they seek to demean and diminish. 

Just remember that behind every usage of the term itself lies a history that encompasses the very worst and most backward notions that our society has to offer. 

And when you remember that, don't fucking use the term again! 

See also: It was not the American military that fought for democracy and justice. The people -- and people like Kaepernick -- did that

See also: The myth of the leftist, feminist, anti-racist, elitist

See also: In praise of the "social justice warrior"

Bernie Sanders, the Ghomeshi Verdict, the Calgary Police & more - February and March on The Left Chapter in review

The months of February and March saw 40 total posts of various kinds on The Left Chapter and very strong numbers from our readership!

The posts were very diverse, ranging from Toronto writer A.M.'s  powerful "Open Letter" to American Democrats to 14 year old Nathaniel Laxer's revisiting of the Communist flags of the game Victoria 2, from a trip back to the Mimico of the turn of the last century to a look at some stunningly evocative photos of Soviet era Moscow in the 1950s.

Without any further ado, here are the top six posts, in terms of hits, for the months of February and March.

1) It's Not Over -- Bernie Sanders releases campaign ad unlike any you have ever seen

Yesterday, the Bernie Sanders campaign for the Democratic Presidential nomination released a campaign ad unlike any you have ever seen.

There has never been a political ad for the candidate of a mainstream party like this in either the United States or Canada ever. Period.

Read More!

2) Jian Ghomeshi's acquittal and the systemic misogyny of the justice system

As many have suspected would happen, Jian Ghomeshi was acquitted today.

The verdict, sadly, is not much of a surprise and is grotesquely indicative of how in sexual assault trials it is still really the victims who are on trial. In this case, the treatment of the three complainants shows this very clearly.

Read More!

3) Introducing the Calgary Police Service's "Diversity Unit" -- led by four middle-aged white guys!

Fun fact everyone -- The Calgary Police Service has a diversity unit!

Read More!

4) Toronto budget prioritizes policing -- Yet again

When it comes to the passage of John Tory's second "austerity-without-the Ford spectacle" budget of his term, there is a least the small silver lining that -- unlike in the farce of last year's near budget unanimity -- this time 9 Councillors voted against it.

33, however, voted for it.

Read More! 

5) Soviet Storm -- An epic Russian TV documentary account of WWII in the East

In 2011, Russian television produced an epic documentary look at World War II in the East -- known to the Russians as the Great Patriotic War -- called Soviet Storm.

Consisting of 18 parts, Soviet Storm follows the titanic and brutal struggle between Hitler's genocidal Nazi invaders and the Red Army and people of the USSR. It details the disastrous start to the war, through to the siege of Leningrad and battle for Moscow, to the turning of the tide at Stalingrad and Kursk, to the drive to victory in Berlin. It even has episodes dealing specifically with the partisan struggle, the air war, naval war (yes, there was one), espionage and battles and fronts you have likely not heard of.

Read More!

6) In praise of the "social justice warrior"

Have you heard lately about some "social justice warrior" hysterically standing up against sexism, racism or some other oppression that a wide variety of people seem to think we should all be more polite and demure about opposing if we can be bothered to at all?

Well, of course you have. The term social justice warrior is the new version of the old "politically correct" canard. It has become pervasive.

Read More!

The top food post for the period was "12-Hour Slow Cooked Caribbean-Style Oxtail"

Do you have a left point-of-view or opinion, a recipe or a story you want to share?

Send them to The Left Chapter via theleftchapter@outlook.com!

See also: Racist refugee myths, NDP delusions, Tom Mulcair & more -- December and January on The Left Chapter in review

See also: Racist Memes, Andrew Coyne, the NDP's Disaster & more! -- The Top Ten Posts and the year on The Left Chapter in review

In praise of the "social justice warrior"

Have you heard lately about some "social justice warrior" hysterically standing up against sexism, racism or some other oppression that a wide variety of people seem to think we should all be more polite and demure about opposing if we can be bothered to at all?


Well, of course you have. The term social justice warrior is the new version of the old "politically correct" canard. It has become pervasive.

Like the term "politically correct" the origins of "social justice warrior" are entirely reactionary.

As the misogynist keyboard militants that were spawned by Gamergate sat in their dad's basements furiously ranting at and threatening women who sought to make gaming more inclusive and who exposed its base, pervasive and juvenile mindless sexism, one of their number or of their allies in the pathetic "Men's Rights Movement" spawned this new phrase as a label to attack them. Apparently they viewed their opponents as some threat to their truncated and ugly, toxic vision of "masculinity",

It was an interesting choice of words.

Social justice, as a general rule, is not seen as a negative thing other than perhaps by unrepentant white supremacists, old line conservatives, Republicans, fascists and other assorted detritus of the decline of the white male political hegemony of the 20th Century. And being a warrior -- well that is generally how these sad types see themselves when they play World of Warcraft 57 or Grand Theft Auto Version Who Gives a Shit or whatever other fantasy of death and destruction floats their boat.

But heading out to get fresh bags of Ketchup flavored potato chips to fuel their harassment campaigns, these experts in masturbation -- in this case mental -- spawned a phrase unmatched in its intellectual laziness and perfect for the era of reaction embodied by politicians like Rob Ford or Donald Trump.

The "social justice warrior" was now a negative. Being a fighter against injustice was now framed as somehow shrill or elitist or privileged.

Reality, as it so often is by the right, was turned on its head. Ours is a society of racism, sexism and inequality as institutions, and yet opposing any of this was really what was the issue.

But something happened on the way to the Comic-Con convention. Suddenly it was not the predictably useful idiot fellow travelers on the right using the term, but lefties were tossing it around in their debates as well.

Shell-shocked from decades of irrelevance and infighting there is little some wings of the left seem to love more than expropriating the language, framing and contempt for other leftists that their alleged opponents on the right hold.

Perhaps they seek approval. Perhaps it is an inferiority complex. Who knows?

Either way use of "social justice warrior" as a pejorative has made its way fully from Men's Rights fringe commentary, to mainstream enough to make it into the Oxford Dictionary lexicon, to being tossed all over the place by people who should know better.

Why should they -- or you if you are using it -- know better?

Well that one is easy. There is absolutely nothing fucking wrong with being a social justice warrior.

Nothing. At all. Period.

In fact, if you have done enough to earn such high praise you should be very proud. You are in truly courageous company. Social justice warriors over the course of history have been just that. The human embodiment of courage, fortitude and strength.

People like Martin Luther King. Rosa Parks. Harvey Milk. Sophie Scholl. Malcolm X. Tommy Douglas. Leonard Peltier. Louis Riel. Angela Davis. Gandhi. Nelson Mandela. Rosa Luxemburg. Cesar Chavez. Joe Hill. Salvador Allende.

There are many others, though also altogether too few. Including many millions whose names will never be known who stood up when it mattered and were counted in the tremendous and broad struggle for human emancipation. often paying with their lives.

They were all social justice warriors.

It is a sad commentary and sad statement when this can, somehow, be seen as an insult.

A testament to our frivolous era of supreme self-indulgence and a pathetic pseudo-hipster pose of studied indifference and scorn for people who care about something more than whatever the new idiot viral video of the day is or worrying about whether condo fees are going to increase.

This rank intellectual emptiness and capitulation to ugly narratives has reached its pinnacle in the turning of a phrase like social justice warrior into an attack. Re-framing a collective history of struggle and sacrifice and those who fight for equality and justice today as somehow doing something odious or wrong, and doing so by using what should be a badge of honour, as a simplistic and bullying derisive instead.

What, exactly, is wrong with being a warrior for social justice? Is it better to be a warrior for social injustice? Or just some indifferent asshole out there in the world who does not give a flying fuck about social justice or anything other than themselves or their own personal sense of entitlement?

That so many people see the idea of being someone fighting for social justice as a bad thing is both deeply depressing and an indication of just how pervasive reactionary thinking still is across society.

Any of us should be proud to know and be associated with activists engaging in the very difficult task of fighting for social justice. I admire them and their efforts.

And if you think this is somehow a bad thing...what the fuck is wrong with you?

See also: The myth of the leftist, feminist, anti-racist, elitist