The humourless scolds of the modern left have almost exterminated political satire. If Molière or Twain were writing today, they’d be fighting off human rights complaints and protestors would disrupt their public readings. Here at C2C Journal, we’re trying to keep some fun alive – a Samizdat of satire, if you will. One such effort sprang from Joshua Lieblein’s musings about what might happen if he went looking for a publisher for his conservative-themed Great Canadian Novel. His satirical memo from a traumatized manuscript reader to her editor boss will brighten your day.
The recent dust-up between Stephen Harper and Justin Trudeau over whether the niqab is a reasonable expression of religious belief or symbol of an “anti-women culture” looked at first like a hands-down political win for Harper. Then the Twitterverse got hold of it and recast Harper from feminist champion to sexist bigot. The incident shows how hard it is for governments to exert message control in the age of social media. In theory this is good for democracy, writes Joshua Lieblein, but why does it feel so much like anarchy?