So, there's an election coming up in October in Ontario. (Be sure to
vote, eh?)
And, John Tory — the accidentally-eponymous leader of the Ontario PC party — has decided to make education the leading issue so far. Namely, he wants to "bring faith-based schools into the public system." (He went on The Agenda on TVO tonight, going toe-to-toe with Steve Paikin.)
Riiiiiiiiiight.Tory makes the argument that, since we've had Catholic schools for 150 years in Ontario, why shouldn't we fund students in schools based on other faiths... with public money?
He says, "We're trying to bring more students into the public system. We're trying to expand the system."
Does he think we don't have memories of the early 2000s? Lest we forget his predecessors, Mike Harris and Ernie Eves, who started writing cheques to parents whose kids went to private schools? Public funds, private schools.
You can dress it up any way you like, John. You can try to make the excuse of, "Well, since there are Catholic schools which are funded, we should fund, for example, Jewish schools."
*Paikin: "Do you believe a public education should be a secular education?"
Tory: "Well, we've gone 150 years down the road... the Catholic system is a success story, so that's a viable option. ... I'm going to build on that success."
I've read multiple times that the UN has publicly scolded Ontario for selectively funding Catholic schools, and not any other faith-based system. Now, there are two possible roads you can go down, if you want to rectify this situation:
- Fold the Catholic system into the public system.
This seems like a pretty simple thing to do. My students learn that F=ma... it doesn't matter if they're Catholic, Zoroastrian or Ra-worshippers. You want to add a Jewish slant to it? Do it on Saturday.
- Fund every religion that comes down the pipe.
Scientologists? Tory didn't dismiss the idea... which is just fuckin' crazy. Just like the Scientologists.
I was typing as Paikin and Tory were talking, but this captures an exchange they had pretty accurately:
Paikin: "If we want to teach that the ultimate authority is God, should we do that in the public schools?"
Tory: "I'm not troubled by that. We should spend more time in public education talking about what unites us. Including the Muslim faith. These are good people who are contributing to Ontario's society. There are maybe people in the Muslim faith that say things that they shouldn't say, that we don't like them to say. But we should be careful not to stereotype them, and we're saying, 'Be Canadians, live your life'..." I'm paraphrasing here, because I can't type as fast as someone talks. Also, John Tory likes to pander to Muslims.
Maybe he should just to back to being the commissioner of the CFL.
Hell, when you have a writer from the
National Post, Robert Fulford, saying things like, "It's unfortunate that the Conservative Party has brought this into their platform," you
know you've taken a wrong turn, policywise.
* There just happen to be a lot of Jewish voters in the so-called "905 area," ringing Toronto. There are lot of seats in the Ontario Legislature that are really close, vote-wise, between the Conservatives and the Liberals. I'm just sayin', is all.* * * * *
Incidentally, I teach in an exceptionally ethnically-, culturally- and religiously-diverse public school in Toronto. Seriously, the thing looks like a Benetton ad. This morning, I had a classroom in which there were three Afghans and a kid born in Armenia, shooting the bull together. So, let's just create a Muslim school, and an Armenian Christian school instead, so they never have to interact with each other in an educationally-meaningful setting. Uh-huh.
Besides, isn't the cleaving of society into different sects based on where they get bored every week, like,
soooooo 16-th Century?