The conference markets itself as "an exploration of a particular topic from multiple perspectives." In my experience, however, it generally takes the form of examining a left-wing issue from a left-wing perspective. Somehow, no matter what the topic of the conference, the themes of climate change, poverty, homelessness and war always come to dominate the discussion. In the words of a former fellow student, one particular conference resembled "a left-wing political rally from the '60's". Well said.
The particular conference this student referred to was the first one I attended, in the Fall of 2008. It was called Invisible Dignity; the premise being that discrimination, poverty, etc. cause a person's inherent human dignity to become invisible to others. One speaker at this conference, Dennis Edney, introduced the University-College to the issues surrounding Omar Khadr. The university almost immediately leapt on the Khadr bandwagon, campaigning for his repatriation to Canada. Now, Mr. Edney is one of Khadr's lawyer - a fact which often seems to be forgotten in all this fuss. Was the picture of Khadr painted for me and my fellow students the whole picture? Hard to say, because no one bothered to check up on the facts. Instead, they accepted this lawyer's statements as the whole truth.
Next came the Truth and Reconciliation conference, concerning the Indian Residential School system in Canada. Now, in this case the topic of the conference was verifiable historical fact - there were residential schools, and the students did endure the abuse of being forcibly taken from their families in order to become Anglicized. I learned a lot of vital history concerning Aboriginal relations. But, the conference seemed to be trying to hard to pander to Aboriginal people - and the Aboriginal story never stayed the same. On the one hand, some said that financial compensation from the government was necessary so the government could demonstrate that it took the victims seriously; on the other hand, others said that the government was trying to buy it's way out of responsibility by simply "throwing money" at the victims in the hope they'd go away. On the one hand, some thought the Prime Minister should offer an official apology for the schools; when such an apology came forth, some condemned it as mere words. There was, of course, no hint that Aboriginals could also be responsible for the strained relations with the government today - it was all the white man's fault.
The next conference was on technology. That's all that I know. I was on the worship team that played during the conference, and thus I did not have to complete the assignment (and therefore I didn't have to attend the conference the parts I was playing for). That was by far my favourite conference thus far.
Finally, the most recent conference this past January concerned homelessness. A worthy topic, to be sure. But the definition of "homeless" was greatly stretched to accommodate refugees from war, climate change, and various other points on the liberal agenda. Of course, homeless people were, one and all, helpless victims of "the system"; and of course, the government was responsible to step in to rectify the situation.
BUT I think that the conference which starts tomorrow might actually be worthwhile. Not because there will be a lack of leftist propaganda. It will be good simply because the topic which cannot possibly be completely messed up, however bell-bottomed the politics may be.
The subject is fear. As I perused the schedule of lectures, I noticed that, true to form, there is a very leftist spin being put on fear: xenophobia, homophobia, Islamophobia... but it looks as if there will be enough food for thought to stimulate even the interest of a hard-nosed Conservative such as myself.
Even better - I've learned two things about the 3-page paper that is required to get the credit for the conference (it's a course, and you need six terms worth of it for any degree program at King's. I find that absolutely ridiculous, but I also digress):
- You need only prove you attended enough of the conference to grasp one key concept and blither semi-intelligently about it for 3 pages, and
- You can vehemently disagree with that same key concept (thereby calling the whole conference into question) and still pass the assignment.
So, I don't need to be at the whole conference. Almost half of the student body sleeps in on the second day of the conference anyway. I suspect that I could write my paper right now without attending the conference, by disagreeing with a position that I can reasonably assume the keynote speaker is going to take on an issue. For example, it will probably be a pro-gay conference; I could write about a biblical stance on homosexuality for 3 pages and take the next two days off. But, since that's slightly dishonest, I'm instead going to sleep in both days and attend the conference in the afternoons - this will yield ample material to write the assignment with.
In fact, since Mr. Dennis Edney is back to rally the troops for Omar Khadr, who is currently on trial for his alleged war crimes, a friend and I have jokingly agreed to write anti-Khadr sentiments whatever form the conference takes. So, in a sense, my paper is already written. Maybe I could charge a fee to write I.S. papers for other people - carve out a little business niche for myself, as it were.
Oh wait - that's dishonest too...
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