Matthew McManus

"So far there has yet to be a systematic argument presented against Peterson by the political left, which takes seriously and critiques many of the different dimensions of his work. Our book Myth and Mayhem: A Leftist Critique of Jordan…
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We Canadians frequently pride ourselves on our multicultural society.  Unlike assimilationist cultures, such as France and (at points) the United States, we are regarded as adopting a mosaic approach that accepts and celebrates the…
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We the Left and Them-the Ruling Class There has been a growing call for the Left to become more adversarial in its approach to politics. A number of authors claim that the Left has been overly beholden to its liberal elements,…
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Introduction In Citizens United, the US Supreme Court made a drastic decision that pushed the United States ever closer to becoming a liberal oligarchy nominally legitimated by quasi-democratic procedures.  More notably, it marks yet…
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This essay deals with several related issues in the theory of punishment and dessert, human agency, and the self. In it, I argue that there are two types of theories which justify the state’s right to punish criminals. The first is the…
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In the post-Charter era, there has been a significant academic, and increasingly public, debate surrounding the role the Supreme Court should play in Canadian society.  Since 1982, the Court has found itself at the epicentre of numerous…
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       The argument that states have obligations to non-citizens is hardly novel. This has long been recognized by international refugee law, the laws of war, and other standard features of the international legal regime. Unfortunately,…
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Introduction             In his seminal Amusing Ourselves to Death the sociologist Neil Postman observed that there were two seminal dystopian novels released in the early 20th century. The first was George Orwell’s 1984. Humankind would…
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In a recent Macleans piece Scott Gilmore writes passionately and rigorously about “why Canada is not a country.” His concerns are echoed by many in the public sphere: that there is increasingly little culturally and institutionally that…
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Conservative commentators have spent a lot of time recently commenting on threats to freedom of speech, especially on university campuses across the country.  They see university campuses, and the “left wing” activists and intellectuals who…
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Introduction Secretary of Defence John Bolton has long had a bad impression of international law. He has that argued that allowing international legal institutions a substantial degree of control over the policy of a sovereign state…
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            In his 2003 speech to Civitas, an up and comer named Stephen Harper made the following comments about the Left’s belief systems:             “Conservatives need to reassess our understanding of the modern Left. It has…
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Introduction Few policies have been as controversial as Donald Trump’s executive order to ban immigrants and refugees from Muslim dominated countries.  While he has backed off from the more extremist rhetoric of banning Muslims from…
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Editor's Note: This article is a follow-up to the author's previous piece on Jordan Peterson and his misrepresentation of post-modernism as an "attack" on truth and objectivity. Introduction Many conservatives today decry post-modernism…
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There has recently been a furious debate in the public sphere about post-modernism, or post-modern neo-Marxism as it is sometimes called.  Recently, Canada’s Jordan Peterson has made headlines for attacking it, blaming post-modernism for…
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Introduction In a February 20th article of the National Review, noted conservative Ben Shapiro argued that the victims in the recent Parkland School shooting were too immature to think through the issue of gun control rationally.…
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