By Mark McConaghy Last week our nation was shocked by the suicide of Rehtaeh Parsons. The details of the story are so grim they remain difficult to summarize: at the age of 15 Parsons was allegedly sexually assaulted at a house party by 4 teenage boys in the small town of Cole Harbour, Nova Scotia. A […]
Read more "On Rehtaeh Parsons"Mark McConaghy on the Passing of Noted Film Critic Roger Ebert. Film critic and writer Roger Ebert has died. Thousands of people have expressed their sorrow on twitter, facebook, blogs, and in print. The outpouring has come from famous filmmakers and powerful politicians to everyday people, all of whom were touched in some way by […]
Read more "For Roger"Mark McConaghy breaks down the political stakes involved in the University of Toronto’s decision to turf a vital piece of green space in downtown Toronto. Although seemingly a simple issue of field quality, the proposed turfing cuts the very core of questions of democracy, public space, and community life in Canada’s largest urban center. In […]
Read more "The Battle Over Back Campus"Mark McConaghy breaks down what we know about the deal Cyprus struck to avoid fiscal collapse, and why it sets a very dangerous precedent for fiscal policy in the 21st century. Are we going to find ourselves in a world where even our personal bank accounts are not off limits from state power? A deal […]
Read more "The Age of the Bail In: Cyprus in Crisis 2"By Sean Callaghan The Revenge of Marx? On March 25th, Time magazine published an article detailing a resurgent interest in Marxism. The title: “Marx’s Revenge: How Class Struggle is Shaping the World.” The basic argument: that the current widening divide between rich and poor since the financial crisis of 2008 has become so apparent in […]
Read more "The Homer Problem"By Mark McConaghy. The people of Cyprus are facing an egregious betrayal of trust by their own government, who has proposed to steal 10% from their citizens personal bank accounts to pay for an EU sponsored bailout. With yet another European country on the verge of total financial collapse and social upheaval, the question that […]
Read more "Cyprus in Crisis"By Mark McConaghy Jorge Mario Bergoglio has been elected as pope and has taken the name Francis 1. As a follow up to my wishlist for the papal appointment written last week, I have been encouraged by our readers to provide my thoughts on his election. As the first pope from Latin America, Francis 1 will […]
Read more "Francis 1: New Pope, Many Questions"By Mark McConaghy At a time of acute crisis in the life of the Catholic Church, what are five things that it could do to make itself into a revitalized, socially progressive, and powerfully empathetic institution for the 21st century? 1. A Comparative Perspective In the mid 18th century, the power of the Manchu Qing […]
Read more "Five Things I Want From the New Pope"Article by Mark McConaghy I take it as axiomatic that it is impossible, in our current political moment, to think of what a world not defined by capitalism would actually look like. The problem with capitalism is not a moral but a structural one: can we ever get beyond the violence inherent in its continual […]
Read more "The Impossible Starts Now: A Manifesto"by James D. Poborsa Apathy is a ruse… an indignant ruse… Yet apathy has its merits, as it at once maintains and punctures the banality of the everyday with the detached indifference and tepid contemplation necessary for overcoming its seemingly callous grip. To be intellectually apathetic is not to feign indifference or refrain from thetic […]
Read more "On Apathy, or an Anti-Manifesto Adumbrating All Things Contingent and Trite"
The 14th Floor 