Sheena Iyengar On the Art of Choosing: TED Video
Have you ever had trouble make a choice? Would you ever let someone choose for you? Should you? Sheena Iyengar has studied how we make choices and and how we feel about the choices we make. In this TED video, she provides fascinating insight into how we make the choices that build our lives. [Read more]
No, Your Mean Girls Probably Didn’t Peak in High School
Is it is myth that Mean Girls left their best days behind them in high school? We might wish they all turned into has-been uglies but wishing doesn't always make it so. [Read more]
Do “Looney” Cartoon Characters Show Signs of Mental Illness?
It’s a hotbed of psychopathology rivaling that of any daytime soap opera. These individuals cover the entire spectrum of mental illness as outlined by the psychiatrist’s bible, the so called DSM-IV (revised). I am referring, of course, to the stable of unstable “Retro” cartoon characters to which Warner Brothers subjects our children on a regular basis. [Read more]
Che Guevara Conference Takes Place in East Van as G8/G20 Leaders Meet Behind Barricades in Toronto
As G8/G20 world leaders met behind barricades and riot police lines in Toronto, Canada, I was in a run-down community hall in East Vancouver listening to people from one of the world’s poorest countries talk with pride about their gains in healthcare and literacy and refer to their leaders by their first names: Fidel, Che, Camilo, Raul. [Read more]
Buddy, Can You Spare A Job?
It seems employers of today are refusing to interview applicants who are “presently unemployed.” Let me repeat, employers with viable positions that need to be filled in order to move their companies forward are refusing to interview candidates who are “presently unemployed.” [Read more]
We Get the Communities We Deserve
An encouraging trend is ‘new urbanism,’ which values high density city environments with connected, interdependent citizens. New urbanism realizes that if we all just retreat into suburban garages with automatic doors and our private residence cocoons, then no one is left caring for our streets, parks, community centres — or one another. [Read more]
Labels are for Cans
The truly oppressed are those who relentlessly chase the dollar dream. To be able to subsist on only the absolute necessities is indeed a strength, not a weakness. Ask anyone who does it. [Read more]
Who Wears Short-Shorts?
Do you dare wear short-shorts? If you’re my age and can pull off short-shorts, all the power to you. If you’re a young woman with long tanned legs you want to show off, all the power to you. But please — let’s not dress our young girls in short-shorts. [Read more]
Hippie Lessons #1
I grew up in the 60s and 70s. My parents were pretty much hippies, flower power, tie-dyed, peace loving boaters. We lived mostly on a series of boats in the heart of Vancouver in Coal Harbour, nestled into a corner of Stanley Park. As I look back, it seems my childhood was always summer. Guess that's a variation on rose tinted glasses. [Read more]
Can Lifestyles that are Unsustainable be Moral?
In light of our troubled environment, crippled economy and diminishing resources, Nathan Thompson says it's really time to question the morality of our economic systems as a whole because they have gone global, for better or worse. [Read more]
