The Implosion of CFI Canada

[rug]

Saturday, November 26, 2011

The Centre for Inquiry - Canada "... promotes and advances reason, science, secularism and freedom of inquiry in all areas of human endeavour." It is affiliated with the Center for Inquiry in the United States, headquartered in Amherst, New York (near Buffalo).

The Canadian Centre for Inquiry was founded in 2007 and the inaugural meeting was held in their rented facilities just south of the University of Toronto and a short walk from my office . Justin Trottier was the new director.

CFI - Canada has now grown from the original Toronto (Ontario) branch to include branches in Vancouver, Okanagan, Calgary, Saskatchewan, Ottawa, Montreal, and Nova Scotia. There's paid staff in Toronto and there are now paid employees (usually part time) in several other centres.

Justin Trottier has played a huge role in developing CFI into a national organization. In addition to the formal centres, CFI is affiliated with dozens of other organizations across Canada. I admire Justin for the tremendous efforts he has put into building CFI Canada and, especially, for recruiting students. Unfortunately, the qualities I admire in Justin are exactly the same qualities that turn some people off. The squabbles at CFI are part of a larger disagreement between accommodationists and confrontationists. I agree with The Good Atheist, Jacob Fortin, when he says ...

As the former National Director of the Center for Inquiry Canada, Justin Trottier clearly fell into the Confrontationalist camp. From his early days as a student activist at the University of Toronto, Justin was instrumental in breathing life into CFI. In it’s early days, his personality and vision allowed the organization to grow. His management style, unfortunately, tended to make him few friends. Still, one of the main reason why the organization has been so successful as of late is because of his relentless activism and his ability to “get the job done”. The whole reason CFI even exists in Canada is largely his doing. Say what you will about him: Justin has drive, and the growth of the organization would have been impossible without his passion.

http://sandwalk.blogspot.com/2011/11/implosion-of-cfi-canada.html