Society
Ten values we can all live by
How insights from different moral philosophies can help us find common ground
No rent for Gypsies, Arabs or blacks in Bucharest
They are dirty and violent and the landlord doesn’t want any trouble
Can minorities be racist?
On one end of the spectrum, PC leftists say there’s no such thing as reverse racism because minorities can’t be racist. At all. Ever. On the other extreme, alt-righters say racism against oppressed minorities is as bad as racism against privileged majorities and therefore the very categorization of racism into “reverse racism” and “regular racism” is inherently racist because it suggests one may be worse than the other. I’m usually skeptical about such black-and-white statements, so I would like to propose the truth lies somewhere in between.Read More »Can minorities be racist?
The burkini ban and the dangers of political polarization
As everybody knows, last month France started enforcing an extremely controversial ban against the so called “burkini”. The ban was eventually overturned, but the debate is still very much alive. In the age of social media, when we all live in echo chambers ¹, I still haven’t had a chance to talk to a person who is actually in favor of the burkini ban. But the mere mention that “it’s hypocritical to display so much outrage towards this and then turn a blind eye to the culture of forced modesty in Muslim communities around the world” or that “I can understand why this ban appeals to the masses” is already enough to trigger some progressive liberals and turn them into paranoid anti-Islamophobia police (or, as Maajid Nawaz would call them, regressive leftists).Read More »The burkini ban and the dangers of political polarization