Tags: Olympics

SANTA CLAUS OR SANITY CLAUSE?

Last week in England, a vicar told a group of Grade 6 pupils that Santa Claus isn’t real.

He then told them their parents ate the biscuits the kids left out for Father Christmas. Many of them burst into tears and their parents complained that the Reverend Dr Paul Chamberlain had ruined their families’ Christmas.

The Anglican Diocese of Portsmouth then apologized on Chamberlain’s behalf, saying: “Paul has accepted that this was an error of judgement, and he should not have done so. He apologized unreservedly to the school, to the parents and to the children, and the headteacher immediately wrote to all parents to explain this.”

Read on…

“TOO MUCH OF A MUCHNESS.”

My mom used to say that to describe anything that spilled over the guardrails of usualness in 1960s Edmonton – like Pierre Trudeau, or exercise, or drinking gin while playing bridge.

She would die of shock if she were alive today.

Here are three examples. None of them is about the U.S. election, the Israel-Hamas conflict, or Pierre Trudeau’s son. All reveal how extreme life is in the world today, especially when it comes to freedom.

First, two North Korean table-tennis players who won the silver medal at the Paris Olympics, are being investigated by Kim Jong Un’s government  — not for posing for a selfie that went viral with the gold (from China) and bronze (from South Korea) medal winners, but for smiling when they were posing for that selfie. The smiles were deemed unpatriotic.

Read on…

Zero Tolerance for Cancel Culture.

On October 5, 2017, The New York Times published shocking allegations about Harvey Weinstein’s sexual predation. Four months later I hosted a RamsayTalk with the co-author of that piece, Jodi Kantor. She noted that the pendulum had already swung from silence to zero tolerance.

She told a story of a notional office party where the CFO drank too much and made an unwelcome advance to a female colleague. She complained to HR. He was immediately fired, couldn’t get a job, lost his accountant’s license and left his family and life in ruins.

Some would say he deserved all that and more.

Jodi Kantor said, before #MeToo became a movement, and long before she co-wrote She Said, and won a Pulitzer Prize for breaking the Weinstein story: “Likely all the woman really wanted was an apology.”

Read on…

“No country for old men.”

Yeats was referring to Ireland when he began Sailing to Byzantium with that line in 1933, and the Coen Brothers used it as the title for their 2007 Western about an old sheriff trying to make sense of a brutal and ambiguous world.

Last week, of course, its meaning had changed again, to “Joe Biden.”

This week it means something else entirely, “Donald Trump.”

We blame old men with money and power for not handing them back when asked nicely. As a result, many don’t. Most don’t. So when an old man with more power than anyone else on earth decides his time has come, the speed and scope of change can be head-spinning.

In the space of two days, Donald Trump is now the halting old man. A convicted felon also found guilty of sexual assault in a separate case, he will now face an opponent who has put dozens of men like him in jail. A …younger…. Black…woman. Can there be a worse nightmare?

Read on…

The Beautiful Game

“Of course we should form a women’s pro soccer league in Canada.”

Yes, we should. But not like how we did women’s pro hockey.

The Beautiful Game

“Of course we should form a women’s pro soccer league in Canada.” Yes, we should. But not like how we did women’s pro hockey. This

RamsayWrites

Subscribe to my Free Weekly Omnium-Gatherum Blog:

  • Every Saturday the Omnium-Gatherum blog is delivered straight to your InBox
  • Full archive
  • Posting comments and joining the community
  • First to hear about other Ramsay events and activities

Get posts directly to your inbox

Name(Required)
This field is for validation purposes and should be left unchanged.

Sign Up for Updates!

Get news from Ramsay Inc. in your inbox.

Name(Required)
Email Lists
Email Lists(Required)