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CONTENT FOR ISSUE

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  In the News... Erasing the Past to Create that Perfect Future / Madeline Weld

  Taliban-ruled Afghanistan has been elected to the UN’s Economic and Social Council (ECOSOC) for the 2022-2024 term and is also a member of UNESCO. This seems incompatible with the Taliban’s adherence to the destructive concept of jahiliyya but maybe it’s par for the course in our modern world.
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  Humanist Perspectives Short Submission Contest 219 / HP

  We invite you to share your humanist views with us in a paragraph or two (MAX 1000 chars) on one of the following subjects reflected by these 3 images.
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  In the News... Who Am I? Who are You? Mysteries of Identity / Gary Bauslaugh

  Identity both enriches human experience and diminishes it through prejudice, intolerance and violence. As we see every day, in the news, civilization is constantly under threat by the bad sort of identity
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  EDITORIAL: A Prescription for Dealing with the Pandemic: Less Fear, More Reason / Madeline Weld

  The lockdowns and vaccine mandates imposed in response to the pandemic are ineffective and an infringement of our Charter rights, Madeline Weld argues. Instead of censorship of opinions contrary to the official narrative, there should be a public debate about public health policies
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  In the News... What's the Big Secret? / Madeline Weld

  On July 5, 2019, Dr. Xiangguo Qiu, her husband Dr. Keding Cheng, and Qiu’s international Chinese students were escorted from the Winnipeg-based National Microbiology Lab (NML), Canada’s only Level 4 biosafety lab, and stripped of their security clearance.
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  Editorial: Why I Am a Humanist / Gary Bauslaugh

  What do we mean when we identify ourselves as humanists? HP Editor Gary Bauslaugh writes his answer to this question, as does Elka Enola of the Humanist Association of Toronto. We invite other Canadian humanists to give us their own thoughts on this matter.
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  Inside Front Cover: Humanist Canada calls for release of Nigerian Humanist President / Madeline Weld

  …Mubarak Bala…was arrested by Nigerian police on April 28, 2020, following a complaint he had insulted the prophet Mohammad in a social media post. Bala, a former Muslim, has been arrested without formal charges. Bala’s lawyer has not been allowed access to his client.
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  Editorial: Black Lives Madness / Madeline Weld

  Mobs toppling statues, attacking police, looting and burning buildings, terrorizing citizens in their homes and violently occupying a section of Seattle all suggest something more significant than the “mostly peaceful protests” reported by the mainstream media.
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  Why I Am a Humanist / Elka Enola

  Why do our readers (some of them at least) identify themselves as humanists? In what we hope will be the first in a series, Elka Enola tells her story. We invite other humanists to do the same.
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  Mass Migration - a Formula for Failure / Dale Branscombe

  Mass immigration is hyped to Canadians as essential for the economy, but there are downsides that the growth promoters and anti-hate groups don’t want us to discuss. Dale Branscombe thinks it’s time to talk about these downsides and let Canadians have a say in shaping immigration policies
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  EDITORIAL: Contrition and Cancel Culture / Madeline Weld

  Late in May, an estimated 215 unmarked graves were reported to have been found through ground-penetrating radar on the premises of a former residential school in Kamloops, BC.
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  Who Am I? / James E. Alcock

  The challenge for us and for all humanity is to work towards a time when society becomes a big tent that does not leave anyone out, where the benefits of positive social identities do not depend on the denigration of others...
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  This Planet Ain’t Big Enough for All of Us / David M Reid

  Two hundred years ago this small planet was inhabited by one billion humans. Now Earth has 7.8 billion and possibly 10 billion by 2060. Some argue that population growth will soon slow when rural people move to cities, but given the rapid population increases in cities in Africa, Central and...
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  IPCC Climate Report Ignores the Elephant in the Living Room / Alan Danesh

  There is much to-do about anthropogenic climate change, but little attention is given to the ever-rising number of climate changers. Humanity does not seem willing to curb its size or its appetite. Are we heading for those positive checks that Malthus listed?
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  The Origins of Timekeeping / Sheila Ayala

  Our pre-historic ancestors needed a way to predict the arrival of recurring natural phenomena. Hunters and gatherers needed to track the behaviour of animals that could be hunted, such as the timing of the annual migration of caribou and the emergence of bears from hibernation…
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  The Islamic Slave Trade – and Some of Its Prominent Victims / Sophie Dulesh

  We hear a lot about the trans-Atlantic slave trade, but very little about the Islamic one, which enslaved 20 million black Africans, with another 80 million dying en route. And how many people know that over one million Europeans were also enslaved, including Miguel de Cervantes?
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  Identity Anthems – their comforts, uses and pitfalls / Janet Keeping

  Violations of anyone’s human rights should be the concern of all, no matter one’s identity. Our shared humanity requires it.
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  Left Populism: A review of an organized mobbing / HP

  I stopped watching Don Cherry’s “Coaches’ Corner” more than two decades ago. If I was watching a hockey game and his program came on, I would turn the television off. Mute was not good enough. I did not even want to see his image on my screen.
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  Diversity: Our Greatest Conundrum / Dale Branscombe

  Is the promotion of diversity really Canada’s greatest strength, as our prime minister doesn’t tire of telling us? Or should we strive to create a society in which the rights of all citizens as individuals are recognized and we don’t strive to promote with government money all the cultural traditions...
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  Identity as Choice / Christine St. Peter

  But this devotion to a Party that has become so mean-spirited and violent does not fit the profile of those Republicans I know and love. These were — still are — generous, law-abiding, community-minded citizens.
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  Just a Little More Time / Glen Harper

  Workers’ rights have come a long way since the industrial revolution began, but there still is far to go. More time for breaks would boost productivity and reduce injuries, leading to fewer claims for workers’ compensation. But will management listen?
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  The Paper Pogrom: Henry Ford, the Dearborn Independent and the Protocols of the Elders of Zion / Marc Luc Carrier

  “Henry Ford: an iconic self-made man, a self-taught mechanical genius, a man of vision, a fearless innovator. And a virulent anti-Semite.” The man whose use of the assembly line made the car affordable for the average American, endorsed equal pay for equal work for women, and promoted many blacks to...
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  Why Western Elites Can’t Keep Ignoring Africa’s Overpopulation Problem / Bradley Betters

  In America today, talking about the problems of overpopulation is pretty much like placing oneself in the middle of two armies fighting. From the Left, you’re attacked as a Malthusian or, of course, a fascist. From the establishment Right, you’re accused of supporting Chinese totalitarianism or...
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  Identity and Identity Politics / Trudy Govier

  While at present there may seem to be a strong analogy between transsexualism and transracialism, these phenomena are treated very differently in contemporary culture. Self-identification is allowed to define one’s sex and gender, but not one’s race.
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  To Kill a Mockingbird of Merit / HP

  “Meritocracy has flourished in the West since the advent of capitalism and particularly since the 1960s in the form of ‘equality of opportunity and before the law’… Recent books, such as those mentioned above, voice concerns about the ethical failures and corrosive individualism of meritocracy…. But certainly, the abolition of...