The Astral Log

Sunday morning began without a breakfast buffet at the hotel, but otherwise everything in Winnipeg was right on track. Dr. Arthur Schafer of the University of Manitoba gave a slow and nuanced talk about the recent Carter ruling that struck down bans on assisted suicide in Canada. Suicide itself ceased to be criminalized in 1972, but prohibitions on aiding or abetting it remained in the Criminal Code afterward...ostensibly in the guise of protecting vulnerable people. These "protections" were in fact discrimination, however...which is why they were challenged by several British Columbia plaintiffs who suffered from debilitating illnesses and disabilities and weren't capable of taking their own lives without an assistant.

Perhaps the most remarkable part of the Carter ruling was that it was unanimous. Seven out of nine justices of the Supreme Court of Canada were appointed under Stephen Harper...but even though he's enthusiastically emulated the worst aspects of American reactionary politics in other fronts of his government, the judicial system still has a kilogram of integrity. Schafer cautioned, however, that the court's ruling would not take effect until 2016 and effective implementation of "death with dignity" was not assured until the Conservatives were defeated.

The next part of the day continued with a familiar face: P.Z. Myers of Pharyngula and the University of Minnesota-Morris, who I had last seen at Freethought Festival in Madison two years earlier. P.Z. talked sarcastically about the topic of biology he knew best, with a new twist: "Evolution is more complicated than you think!"

How so? Well, it's more than natural selection, for one: Evolution can occur by other processes as well, such as genetic drift. It also has little to do with "evolutionary psychology;" an uncredible, racist, and sexist ploy to link natural selection to human behavior and say "people are adaptive; therefore they should be kept down."

The dialogue built and gained momentum in unpredictable ways. Eventually we were treated to a picture of a barnacle penis (which was adapted to its conditions) and an observation of how worms millions of years ago changed their environment by burrowing into the ground. Do climate denialists think they're less powerful than worms?

Lloyd Hawkeye Robertson followed, and gave a few lessons on marriage demographic trends, humanist marriages, and northern Saskatchewan history. He discussed the horrible legacy of Canada's Residential Schools...an attempt by churches to "re-engineer" aboriginal children by removing them from their families and instilling assimilationism and Christianity in them by force. The government had a recommendation to close the schools as early as 1912. Churches lobbied to keep them open as an avenue for them to "save souls" by, however, and the last one in Saskatchewan didn't close until 1998. Chilling.

And after a few closing remarks, the conference was over.

Hector Avalos was a former fundie preacher and faith healer who eventually became both an atheist and a Professor of Religious Studies at Iowa State University...quite a massive change! Religious violence was the focus of a book Avalos had authored, and it was the focus of his dialogue at the conference.

What exactly constitutes religious violence is the subject of debate: Seemingly everyone from Sam Harris to Barack Obama has made statements claiming that this or that atrocity isn't "truly" religious. Hector's take was somewhat different: Monotheism was inherently violent since it created "insiders" and "outsiders" intrinsically, and it created scarce resources. Water and food are scarce resources; so are political power, information, and gender equality; and so is access to divine communication. As disputes break out over that and the "insiders" and "outsiders" war, religious violence is the result.

Next to appear was Scott Carnegie, who provided an insightful and entertaining presentation on Mormonism and his conversion both to and away from that particular sect.

Nothing is all good or all bad, and Scott gave a fair overview of some of the characteristics that drew him from a Catholic upbringing to the LDS in a positive way: The church felt inclusive and supportive. There was no hell; just three heavens and "outer darkness." Baptism was at age 8 instead of birth, which seemed fairer and more consensual. Through proxy baptism, people could be moved from spiritual prison to paradise. And it was a modern-day revelation...something that seemed "real" and exciting!

Of course, this was followed by the flip side of the coin. Alcohol was banned in the Word of Wisdom. Non-members were banned from temple weddings. Black people were denied the priesthood until 1978. Joseph Smith was reprehensible at coercing people, and he sent men away so that he could marry their wives. The Pearl of Great Price contained the "Book of Abraham;" an Egyptian papyrus that Smith was able to divinely "translate" by himself in an era when hieroglyphs were an unknown language. The papyrus was lost in 1871; then found again in 1966...and if the translations matched, it would have been proof that the LDS Church was prophetic and correct! But needless to say, they didn't and it wasn't.

As a liberal Mormon, Scott didn't care for short hair, white shirts, and ties; he didn't believe the prophet was infallible, and his relationship with the church became increasingly strained. If Joseph Smith made up the Book of Abraham (and made up the "connection" between American Indians and Jerusalem that he espoused; easily disproved by DNA), it logically followed that he made up the Book of Mormon too...and he made up everything. Proposition 8...the Mormon-backed ploy that caused 52% of California voters to revoke their gay and lesbian neighbors of equal civil rights...was the straw that prompted him to burn bridges and officially resign from the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints. Scott Carnegie is an atheist activist today.

The last highlight was Stephanie Zvan, a Minnesotan who blogs at Almost Diamonds. Her spiel was a rich and layered lesson on community-building.

Stephanie began by pointing out parallels between atheist communities and fandom communities: Different people get together because of shared interests in a common topic; whether it's dressing up as comic and movie characters or changing the world through changing minds. But, there are challenges. It's a tough balancing act to tear down barriers of language or tradition and welcome new members without also alienating old ones. Specialization is what gives groups reasons for existence, but over-specialization will kill a group.

What will help a group grow and thrive? Family matters, for one: Have split conferences and things for kids to do beyond being babysat. Give people more roles. Design events around marginalized groups: The more folks you have from an underrepresented group, the more you will get. Lower the cost of participating, through affiliations or subsidization. Have a vision for the community. And, keep others from tearing the community down through abuse and intimidation: Have a harassment policy. Keep records. When assholes undermine how communities function together by their repeated bad behavior, remove the assholes.

Altogether, it was a productive lesson with food for thought. Many of the tips would have been applicable to any group looking for improvements...including a certain license plate collecting club that I'm a part of.

My second full day in Winnipeg began with the start of my actual, ostensible reason for being there: The first ever River City Reason Fest...a conference arranged by the Humanists, Atheists, & Agnostics of Manitoba (HA²M) and focused on secular issues and current events. I had learned about Reason Fest three months before, and was immediately interested: It featured several guest speakers who I knew from their blogging and advocacy work, and it gave me an excuse to visit a city that I've been interested in for years of my life.

All conference participants received a packet including a tourist book and downtown map...both of which could have been useful when I was getting lost sightseeing around the city the day before! HA²M leader Donna Harris welcomed the crowd, and kicked things off with an irreverent tribute to "International Talk Like a Pirate Day." The ice was broken, and the conference began.

My acquaintance Greta Christina was the first speaker to go on, and did so with a lengthy discussion about the very topic she recently devoted a new book to: "Comfortable thoughts about death that have nothing to do with God."

Death sucks, and nonreligious philosophies about it are hard to find. But are religious philosophies any better? Religious people go through the same bouts of grief that nonbelievers do, and the notions of heaven and hell simply add torment, terror, and guilt to survivors' lives. She also cited that people who actually believe in an afterlife are the very ones more likely to stay it off for as long as possible.

The topic occasionally took a turn into the amusing: "Heaven would be so monotonous that a few minutes of hell would be a relief...and eternity spent with friends and relatives would be hell!" Greta expressed that death was a deadline: An encouragement to go out, do things, and live life to the fullest. Meanwhile, the fundamental meaning of life is to participate in life, experience comfort and joy, make the world a better place, and create a legacy to leave behind. I can't argue with that.

Greta was followed by Eric Adriaans of CFI Canada. After beginning with a recount of his organization's history and objectives, he segued into a discussion of Canada's blasphemy law.

Yes, Canada has a blasphemy law, and it prescribes up to two years' imprisonment as punishment for "blasphemous libel." Few people are aware the law exists...even the head of the "Office of Religious Freedom" in the Canadian government didn't know until CFI prodded him about it. The law has rarely been enforced, most recently in the 1930s. Nevertheless it has a chilling effect as a threat on expression and was used as a charge in more recent years; notably to thwart a showing of Life of Brian in Sault Sainte Marie.

From there, he elaborated on a variety of related points. Blasphemy laws were spawned from heresy laws forged in an era where religion was tied to national identity. Canada's example is doubly hypocritical, as the country vocally supports the repeal of blasphemy laws in other countries on the international stage. The International Coalition Against Blasphemy Laws was formed in the wake of the Charlie Hebdo shootings, and Iceland established precedent by repealing their law months later. With a federal election and the probability of a new government just weeks away, the time to lobby for change in Canada is now.

The third guest speaker of the morning was Tracie Harris of the Atheist Community of Austin, who touched on religious trends and gave a detailed recount of the harm of religious "family values." This conference was her first time in Canada.

Organizations like Focus on the Family and other fronts of the Christian Right commandeer families as a vehicle to promote Jesus worship at the expense of the family itself. Values are redefined as beginning with God (thus implying that atheists can't have them), and people are defined as being born twisted and practicing sin every moment unless they're "saved" from their sin. Religion becomes the sole means of family cohesion, and it repels people who don't conform...and people who deconvert in such situations often find themselves compelled to lie about religion rather than eliminate their place in their family by upsetting the status quo.

Harris' own work in the Atheist Community of Austin puts her into contact with uncountable people wriggling out of religion in toxic religious families, and they get more letters from children than anyone else. Her own pre-deconversion upbringing was in the fundamentalist Church of Christ, but she noted that the same perversion of "family" as a construct occurs in many virulent sects around the world...from Adventist to Islamic to non-denominational.

At this point the stage emptied, people mulled about, and everyone prepared to have a break for lunch. I did likewise, and got some fresh air and exercise by taking a walk down Ellice Avenue and back again. But there was plenty more to come.

My first night in Winnipeg was not especially restful: As luck would have it, I was kept awake late by noisy guests elsewhere on the hotel floor. But I did eventually doze off...into a dream that I was back in high school again, but assertive and out as a gay atheist in a way I was never brave enough to be. Oh well: I may never be able to rewrite the past, but I can control the future.

Before I started my trip, I made a list of tourist attractions and their addresses, hoping to go down the list one by one. None of that mattered yet, though, since for now I was captivated by the siren call of shopping. The Polo Park Mall was huge, with over 200 stores (many of them unique Canadian tenants) packed into two floors of space. There, I kissed the rest of the morning goodbye...though the only misadventure I got to show for it was an incident where a store was running a buy-one get-one sale, yet had only a single T-shirt in my size.

Eventually I escaped...and I spent most of the afternoon driving around the city, doubling back, and driving some more. Winnipeg streets are like an obstacle course with pedestrians, buses, one-way traffic, and stoplights that turn red when you least expect them to. I somehow managed to circumnavigate all the obstructions...and got a healthy dose of exercise for my clutch pedal foot. I applied for a visitor's library card at a local branch (which allowed me to use public computers, though not check out books). And, I started to make my way down the list...checking out tourist attractions as I came to them, one by one.

Unfortunately, most of my plans for a Friday afternoon were thwarted. The Manitoba Museum, Science Gallery, and Planetarium turned out to be closed through the 18th...meaning that I couldn't visit it until a day later. The Manitoba Railway Museum had free admission the coming weekend...meaning that there was little point of going there now. The Mulvey Flea Market was only open on Saturday and Sunday. I couldn't visit the Canadian Museum for Human Rights since I couldn't figure out where it was supposed to be on the map. By the time I got to the Assiniboine Park Zoo, it was after 4 p.m. and the gates had already closed for the day. I took four days off to be in Winnipeg, half of which was stitched up in conference time...and it wasn't enough.

But there were some things that I did get to see, including a wealth of additions to the Cliched Landmark Photo File:

Union Station, completed in 1911 and still in operation for VIA rail service today.

The Winnipeg Canadian Pacific Railway station, bearing a 1904-dated inscription and currently housing the Aboriginal Health & Wellness Centre.

The original flagship store of the Hudson's Bay Company, which opened in 1926 (and nowadays has an uncertain fate).

The Manitoba Legislative Building, completed in 1920.

This? Heh...this one seemed to be in a class of its own. Wild Planet was housed in what near as I could tell was a "deconsecrated" midcentury-mod church, reused and reoriented towards metal gods. I actually went inside, and the place blew my senses away...mainly through the reeking odor of incense, which permeated everything there.

Once I was at a stoplight, and I noticed a driver in the next lane over motion me to roll down my window. I did, and I promptly received an introduction by someone who said that he had been in Wisconsin the last time he lived in the United States...years and years ago. He then made wishes for good weather and good traffic...though for whom the wishes were intended, I was less clear about.

Canadian "friendliness" may be a stereotype in league with hockey and poutine, but it's based in some truth: Everywhere without fail, I was always hearing people saying "Hello." People in Winnipeg also generally seemed to be less suspicious, reserved, and paranoid than their counterparts in much of the States...an aspect that I credit to the fact that they didn't live through 35 years of Reagan and his acolytes chipping away at social safety nets, perpetuating income inequality, vilifying public institutions, and brandishing Christianity as a weapon. But will they fulfill their responsibility to prevent 10 years of Harper from turning into the same thing?

Since I talk a lot about license plates in this space, I'll wrap up with two from Manitoba: The most horrible-looking example I saw (on a city bus, no less); and the lowest number I spotted in the present series, which began in 1997.