Reflecting on milestones and cool people

Happy Thanksgiving to all Woke Watch Canada readers

Photo by Pro Church Media on Unsplash

By

James Pew

It’s Thanksgiving weekend and I am feeling reflective and full of gratitude. Especially towards Woke Watch Canada supporters. So I thought I would write about where Woke Watch Canada is at in the big scheme of things, pay tribute to some of the brave Canadians leading the parents rights movement, and provide somewhat of an informal orientation to the many hundreds of new subscribers who have joined us since the beginning of the school year.

Recently, Woke Watch Canada has blown past a number of milestones so rapidly I haven’t had a chance to recognize any of it. In October of 2021, the first month of the newsletter, I was elated when 35 people subscribed in the first week. We’ve now passed the 3000 subscriber mark and are racing towards 4000 (the next milestone). We continue to smash single-day subscriber records, which some days exceed one hundred. We have published over 330 articles on the incursion of Critical Social Justice (wokeism) into Canadian institutions. And our most popular article has been read over 48,000 times!!

But most importantly, we have become a hub of the new counterculture, an important partner engaged in a consequential struggle, where parents rights protesters, and other defenders of Western Liberalism can unite around shared values, like protecting the innocence of children.

Back in the fall of 2021, there seemed to be few people aware of the ideological indoctrination of children in Canadian schools. There was very little sign, at least to me, of the burgeoning national parents rights uprising soon to make its presence known as a force to be reckoned with. However, a number of concerned parents and citizens found each other, in no small part due to the organizing efforts of Catherine Kronas. 

It is those parents and concerned citizens whom I lean on most to guide my writing and publishing decisions related to Woke Watch Canada. And it is that same group that I will continue to draw on when covering topics related to ideological indoctrination in Canadian schools. For the benefit of new subscribers, and readers who may wish to know more about these star players, I will mention some of them by name and provide a link where more information can be found.

Catherine Kronas, is the founder of Lighthouse, where many of the following people connected with one another. Chanel Pfahl is a warrior who exposes the ideological indoctrination of Canadian students. Shannon Douglas, is a heroic father deeply engaged in the Canadian Gender Wars. Pierre Barns is a research maverick who built a database with details concerning age-inappropriate sexualized content in Canadian schools, and who has called out the school his son attends. Carolyn Burjoski is a teacher who was silenced for speaking out against the same perverted books Pierre covers.

Jim McMurtry was cancelled from a celebrated teaching career for telling his students, who were upset by false allegations in the media of mass murdered Indian Residential School children, that many former students of this unfortunate period died from disease. Lynn Petruskavich, is a parent in the Halton region who organized with others to push for a professionalism policy in schools meant to address a male shop teacher who was wearing a fetishized woman costume with enormous prosthetic breasts while teaching.

Cristina Fernandes is a parent from Waterloo who doubles as a force of nature. In fact there are a bunch of amazing parents in Waterloo (desperately needed as the WRDSB is off the charts woke) including David Todor and Julia Malott.

Last year I met Elton Robinson, a parent in Windsor who, like some of the others, is relentless and unstoppable. Elton started a parents rights group and wrote a number of articles covering the highly dysfunctional and authoritarian Greater Essex County District School Board. There will be more coverage from Elton on the situation in Windsor soon.

Igor Stravinsky is the pseudonym of a teacher in the Peel District School Board (PDSB) who consistently offers sharp critical analysis of the PDSB. Another pseudonymous teacher, N. Invictus, offers her own brand of biting critique concerning the ideological capture of Canadian education.

Mr. M is historian who researches the history of ideas. From feminism to black radicalism, Mr. M traces the roots of these destructive ideologies. Mr. M and I have also been collaborating on a writing project we call The Great Illiberal Subversion.

Also worth mentioning are parent-run groups like Blue Print for Canada , Our Duty Canada (who works with Shannon Douglas on the weekly Canadian Gender Wars Report), Action4Canada, and Parents as Fist Educators. There are many more groups than these, and there are many more brave individuals than the ones listed above, please leave links to the remarkable people and parents rights/children advocacy groups who are struggling to restore decency, reason, and the prioritization of academics (not Social Justice), in Canadian education.

Parents Rights Coalition of Canada is another group worth highlighting. They have recently published a National Statement on Gender Ideology in Education in the form of nine principles called The September Declaration. Things like “No secrets, parental consent is mandatory,” and “Public schools must be ideologically neutral,” and “Sex-based rights must be respected,” are included in the group's statement of principles. Read through the nine principles yourself and add your voice to the discourse. What do you agree or disagree with? What are these principles missing? Where have they gone too far?

It should be explained to new subscribers that Woke Watch Canada also publishes an abundance of commentary on Truth & Reconciliation, stories involving so-called unmarked graves at former Indian Residential Schools, the history of the Indian Residential School Period, and Canadian aboriginal issues in general. The following will attempt to explain why.

Schools across Canada recognize what is called Orange Shirt Day. However, as reported in these pages by independent researcher Nina Green in her essay “The Truth About Orange Shirt Day,”, the story of Phyllis Webstad, the lady with the orange shirt, has been greatly misrepresented. In my view, Phyllis Webstad’s story has been twisted into an effective piece of anti-Catholic propaganda.

Further, Schools and many other public institutions across the country are constantly performing land acknowledgments as part of the greater Critical Social Justice/woke agenda. Aboriginal issues, and the ideological language used to frame them, words like “settlers” to describe non-aboriginal people, and “Indigenous” (spelled with a capital “I”) or “First Nation,” to describe aboriginal people are part of a decades long descent into postmodern conceptions of indigeneity that inform virtually all levels of aboriginal public policy. In other words, aboriginal issues are ground zero for wokeism in Canada. For that reason, we will continue to provide this important commentary.

Woke Watch Canada’s publishing philosophy regarding aboriginal issues reflects the same commitment to evidence-based research as expressed by the board of directors of The Indian Residential School Research Group. 

The truth about Canada’s past is not being taught to Canadian students from K-12 and beyond. Politicians and the media have thrown our ancestors under the bus. The Indian Residential School period is being misrepresented horribly. Canada has no genocide in its history. For these reasons and more, I feel our coverage of these issues is related and relevant to our coverage of the ideological indoctrination of Canadian schools. Indeed, as our friend Jim McMurtry found out, these issues overlap considerably (to the tragic detriment of students).

To bring today’s message to a close, allow me to state what I’m sure is obvious to our astute readership: this stuff is a lot of work. But, it is really important that this work continues. It absolutely MUST GET DONE! And, crucially, without the generous financial contributions of paid subscribers and donor box contributors it could not be done. I thank everyone who has supported Woke Watch Canada. 

I can’t help but think that Woke Watch Canada can be even bigger and better, that we can offer greater levels of research oriented analysis and opinion. That we can be even more useful and informative to parents trying to navigate the madness of Canadian schools. Or do more to protect and honour our national heritage. I humbly request that readers please consider upgrading to paid memberships, where each reader's small contribution can add up substantially. And necessarily, fuel the next phase of Woke Watch Canada’s contribution to this modern countercultural movement. Woke Watch Canada has made an important contribution, I’ve been told this by many. I wouldn’t do this otherwise. And I wouldn’t ask for your help, if I didn’t believe we could make a difference.

Thank you and Happy Thanksgiving!

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Thanks for reading. For more from this author, read School board shows true colours

Also, for more evidence of the ideological indoctrination in Canadian education, read Yes, schools are indoctrinating kids! And also, What age should kids learn about "felching?"

There are now two ways to support Woke Watch Canada through donations:

1) By subscribing to the paid version of the Woke Watch Canada Newsletter for - $7 Cdn/month or $50 Cdn/year

2) By making a contribution to the Investigating Wokeism In Canada Initiative, which raises the funds necessary to maintain and expand Woke Watch Canada’s research and investigation into Dysfunctional Canadian School Boards, Education, Indigenous Issues, Free Speech, and other areas of Illiberal Subversion and the Canadian Culture Wars.