Why did he move to Canada? Because of The Rapist?
Continuing on a theme of members of the intellectual class exiting the United States, I’m well aware of Timothy Snyder, but not his wife, now Chair of European Intellectual History at the University of Toronto. I was not familiar with this scholar either, but it’s not a surprise under authoritarian regimes.
Philosophy professor Jason Stanley is leaving the US for Canada, “the Ukraine of North America,” because he believes Trump’s America is “pretty far along” in the grips of fascism.
www.vanityfair.com
Jason Stanley has spent the last two decades writing about power, language, and the ways both are corruptible. He is an
expert on authoritarian regimes and the author of seven books, including 2018’s
How Fascism Works: The Politics of Us and Them and last year’s
Erasing History: How Fascists Rewrite the Past to Control the Future, and has been a member of the Yale University faculty since 2013.
Last week, in what he calls an “impulsive” decision prompted by
Columbia’s capitulation to Trumpadministration demands, he decided to leave—not just Yale, but the country altogether. This fall he’ll decamp to the University of Toronto’s Munk School of Global Affairs and Public Policy, where he was offered the position of Bissell Hyatt Chair in American Studies.
“Educational authoritarianism is frequently accompanied by more general restrictions on knowledge,” he writes in
Erasing History, “and by attempts to push mythic representations in place of that knowledge.” In the book he likens conservative activist groups
seeking book bans to Nazi propaganda minister Joseph Goebbels keeping lists of books to be censored, and outlines
attacks on the rights of LGBTQ+ people by various fascist regimes throughout history (among which he counts the Trump administration). When I ask whether he sees warning signs in sectors outside of education, he responds, “Are you f****** with me?”
The philosophy professor says he is emigrating to Canada because no one is defending democratic institutions in the United States.
aldianews.com
Jason Stanley, professor of Philosophy at Yale University and a renowned expert on fascism, has decided to leave the United States. His decision, he says, stems from what he describes as the consolidation of a "fascist regime" under President Donald Trump. Stanley’s departure is far from quiet: he has been publicly denouncing the atmosphere of fear that, in his view, has taken hold in American universities and other academic institutions.
In an interview with Amanpour and Company, broadcast on YouTube on March 26, 2025, Stanley warned that "authoritarianism requires a culture of fear," and that, in his view, the United States is already heading down that path. "They're creating a culture of fear in K-12 and universities," he stated, pointing to new Department of Education guidelines aimed at imposing a state-driven patriotic ideology, while censoring teachings that acknowledge systemic racism in the country.
Stanley's concerns are not limited to academia. Speaking to BBC Mundo, he explained that his decision to move to Canada is also motivated by personal reasons. "The main reason is the political climate, both for my profession as an academic and for my children, who are Black and Jewish," he said. He added that he is deeply alarmed by how American Jews are being placed at the center of political debate and used, in his words, by the Trump administration as "a kind of sledgehammer for fascism."
Here is the Amanpour interview:
From a different perspective, some think fleeing prior to being persecuted is the same as obeying in advance:
Fleeing America before you are threatened is a lot like obeying in advance.
www.theatlantic.com
www.newsweek.com
www.motherjones.com
