The US is a rising fascist regime. Migrant workers are being sent to international concentration camps. Trump is threatening to send addicts and Mad People to modern-day “lunatic asylums.” RFK Jr. wants to send “troubled teens” to “wellness farms,” resonant of the Willowbrooks of the past. Brian Kllmeade from Fox News advocated for the mass extermination of long-term unhoused people by lethal injection. Racialized, poor, young, trans, disabled, Mad, and addict Americans are at risk of being mass institutionalized in conditions worse than prisons. The state schools, asylums, and poorhouses of the 20^th Century are roaring back. 

Canada has its own version of eugenic segregation in the nursing-home industrial complex, but so far Canadian politicians have not adopted the same enthusiasm for reviving Dickensian social policies. Yet they may not be far behind. Canada is practically a subsidiary of the US economy, with 2/3 of its exports going south. Many Canadians consume more American media than their own. American think-tanks, advocacy groups, and lobbyists operate across the border, shaping Canadian laws and policies in significant and catastrophic ways. And if Canada doesn’t let Corporate America consume it, Trump is threatening to invade.  

To be clear, authoritarianism is not new, but it is being ramped up by the Trump regime. When I was still in the US, during the ICE raids, the attacks on journalism, the anti-trans bathroom bills, the DOGE cuts to healthcare, and the other preludes to the current authoritarian police state, I felt sick every day – the nausea of being unsafe. On my immigration lawyer’s advisement, I privated my social media accounts and kept a low profile. Now, the Trump administration is trying to silence academics, journalists, comedians, and public figures. In a presentation on Crip Pessimism in January – just days after Trump’s inauguration – I predicted that things would get worse, potentially much worse, especially for members of oppressed groups. And I was right. Fortunately, I was able to move back to Canada.

This is a chance for Canadian philosophy departments to provide refuge to philosophers who are at risk of forced institutionalization in concentration camps, asylums, and prisons. Vulnerablized philosophers in the US – some of whom have Canadian citizenship – are making exit plans. Canadian departments can offer them a safe place to land. Vulnerablized philosophers already living in Canada, who are susceptible to Canada’s own eugenic institutions and MAiD, could also be offered a lifeline, especially as Trump’s tariffs, combined with decades of neoliberal fiscal policy, increase the risk of homelessness and incarceration.

Despite a recent uptick in the percentage of women earning Philosophy Bachelor degrees, the demographic makeup of the profession – especially at the highest ranks – has not changed significantly in my lifetime. Although everyone is allegedly doing their best, philosophy is still one of the whitest, malest, most able-bodied and cisgender disciplines in academia. What better time to change that than during a fascist uprising? Philosophy’s overwhelmingly white, cisgender, able-bodied securitariate, with the least to fear from a fascist police state, have a chance to offer a safe haven to the most imperiled philosophers, both in the US and at home. Canada might not have ICE raids (yet), but we have a growing for-profit “carceral archipelago” that feeds on bodies marked as “other” and “deviant” to sustain the GDP. Philosophy faculty should keep this in mind when making hiring decisions.  

Now, some may view this suggestion as a secretive and perhaps illegal form of employment equity. But in Canada, this would only be the case if it resulted in the hiring of a less qualified candidate. And why would it? Given the massive overrepresentation of racialized, disabled, Mad, and trans philosophers in the underclass and unemployment pool, there’s no shortage of over-qualified candidates who could benefit from sanctuary-through-work. In fact, I know some people who could be spared harassment, homelessness, and potentially far worse if given a job here, and their CVs are unparalleled for their areas of specialization. Some of the most vulnerablized philosophers would already have jobs if they were given equal consideration. Offering them refuge would simply correct an epistemic injustice in the field.  

Canadian departments that have the means to welcome a vulnerablized philosopher into their ranks should not miss this opportunity to fight fascism through employment equity.