The Medieval Moral Bar

I returned from a Ghanaian hospital to my parents' basement in Calgary, Alberta. It was there I spent the better part of the month of October slowly putting my stomach and intestinal linings back together. By the end of October, I was finally back in the world of the living and able to venture back crowded population centres without being a vector for disease. There remained just one big friction point: I was living in my parents' basement. I was effectively reliving my High School social life.

Almost high school me...

Now my mother reads this blog on occasion so I am both unable to either embellish the ridiculousness of the situation nor find any humour at her expense. She birthed me, raised me, and refused what I'm sure was a strong urge to euthanize me during my teenage years (I was a brat), and I am thankful for all 27 years of support she has provided to date.

I have since graduated from high school and am now in Toronto working with Engineers Without Borders. The problem this time: I am now living in what amounts to dorm room.

Toronto-based dorm room

The good news is: I have an eight-bed (4 bunk beds) room to myself and three incredibly intelligent and hilarious roommates. On one particular evening, the four of us were talking about one of the woman's employment as an unpaid intern at two separate organizations. It was brought up that unpaid internships would have been viewed as immoral in Medieval times as apprentices were at the very least provided room and board in exchange for their labours. I believe we now have a new moral bar:

If someone in 1399 would look at what you are doing and think, "how you're treating people is awful," you should rethink what you are doing.

I bring you the first episode of: "What would your Medieval Ancestors think?"

Unpaid Internships

The U.S. Supreme Court recently found that six legal requirements had to be met in order for an unpaid internship to be lawful. These requirements can be summed up as: interns must be a burden to the company. In other words, an unpaid internship must be a training program. However, as many of us have experienced, this can be pretty far from reality. In the past year, hundreds of companies have had cases brought forward against them for illegal unpaid internships (I.E. Over 100 companies in the U.K., and Bell Canada). Proponents of serfdom and 1400s public opinion are very disappointed in us.

When I managed my Lord's Twitter account, I At least got room and board!

Money Lending

Usury is defined as the practice of lending money at unreasonably high interest rates. The moral bar on this practice dates back to at least the Old Testament (1,500 BC). Now John Oliver had a great segment on the awful state of Predatory Lending in the United States back in August, but that's the U.S.  Most of us Canadians look at the U.S. regulatory regime with a sense of smug superiority, because we couldn't possibly be that douch-y. 


It is with a heavy heart that I must report that we are no better than our neighbours to the South. As this report from Stats Canada shows:

- "There are 15 return customers or rollover loans for every new payday loan customer."

- These loans disproportionately target people and families who make less than $30,000 per year.

- Rates vary from province to province, from an annual interest rate of between 60% and 700%.

"I find your lack of respect for your fellow human most disturbing" -Friar Thomas Aquinas, Italy 1265 Photos from: http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/6/61/Reeve_and_Serfs.jpg http://www.biography.com/people/st-thomas-aquinas-9187231