Jonathan Kay

Toronto

Editor, writer & podcaster at @Quillette. Book author. Substacker. @fairforall_org advisor. ex-lawyer -engineer -coder. Lapsed Jew. Gamer. Problematic Canadian

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Articles

Canada’s Newest Identity, Made in the USA

1 week ago | quillette.com | Jonathan Kay

Australia and Canada share many similarities, both being large, resource-rich, politically progressive members of the Anglosphere. But they differ in at least one critical respect: In Canada, unlike Australia, our economic livelihood is critically dependent on a much larger neighbour.
DEI’s Beleaguered True Believers, in Their Own Words

2 weeks ago | quillette.com | Jonathan Kay

On 19 March, it was announced that the ten-campus University of California (UC) system would no longer require academic job applicants to supply so-called “diversity statements”—documents testifying to one’s embrace of diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) as guiding professional values.
Podcast #282: Canada’s Strange Election Season

2 weeks ago | quillette.com | Jonathan Kay

Welcome to the Quillette Podcast, which is usually hosted on alternate weeks by me, Jonathan Kay, and by Iona Italia. Quillette is where free thought lives. We are an independent, grassroots platform for heterodox ideas and fearless commentary. And this week, I’m going to be talking about the Canadian federal election, which will take place just days from now—on Monday April 28.
When Good Academics Do Bad Things

3 weeks ago | quillette.com | Jonathan Kay

What follows are notes from an 18 March 2025 speech delivered to the University of Western Ontario law-school chapter of the Runnymede Society, a membership-based organisation that promotes the rule of law, constitutionalism, and individual liberty. Since this is a law school and many of you are aspiring lawyers, I’d like to start by telling you a little bit about my brief and extremely unsuccessful legal career—which I think explains why I got into journalism.
Podcast #281: Making the Case for ‘Free-Range Parenting’

3 weeks ago | quillette.com | Jonathan Kay

Welcome to the Quillette Podcast, which is usually hosted on alternate weeks by me, Jonathan Kay, and by Iona Italia. Quillette is where free thought lives. We are an independent, grassroots platform for heterodox ideas and fearless commentary. What you just listened to is an old clip from the popular CBS television show Entertainment Tonight, detailing the national controversy surrounding Lenore Skenazy’s 2008 decision to let her then-nine-year-old son ride the New York City subway by himself.
Does TED Still Make Sense?

4 weeks ago | quillette.com | Jonathan Kay

A few days before last week’s TED2025 event at the Vancouver Convention Centre, a fellow attendee—let’s call him Dave—sent me a message through TED’s dedicated app. Dave told me that he’s put together an international network of corporate leaders who meet regularly at “bespoke” retreats in “epic” locations such as Bali and Botswana. He was looking forward to telling me—and the many other TED attendees who presumably received the same message—more about it over lunch in Vancouver.
The Future of Canadian Conservatism

1 month ago | quillette.com | Jonathan Kay

What follows are notes from a 4 April 2025 presentation in Kelowna, British Columbia, at The Future of Canadian Conservatism, a conference hosted by the Philosophy, Politics, and Economics Student Association of the University of British Columbia. There are several famous people around the world who share my name. These include Jonathan Kay, a doctor at the University of Massachusetts who ranks as a renowned expert in rheumatology.
Too Many Moons

1 month ago | quillette.com | Lawrence Krauss |Andrew Fox |Ira Wells |Jonathan Kay

When my daughter was in grade four, she was instructed to write about a planet of her choice. She chose Pluto. Alas, about fifteen years later, the International Astronomical Union (IAU) decided Pluto was no longer a full-fledged planet—partly because it’s just one of a number of similarly sized objects in an area of our solar system called the Kuiper Belt.
Lessons for Western Militaries from the Gaza War

1 month ago | quillette.com | Andrew Fox |Ira Wells |Jonathan Kay |Stewart Slater

As the world transitions from a values-based international order to a transactional, multipolar framework, Western militaries outside the US are going to have to rearm rapidly following the withdrawal of US security guarantees. While the military lessons from Ukraine have been widely discussed, those from Israel’s 7 October war have largely been overlooked.
Podcast #276: On Book Banning

2 months ago | quillette.com | Ira Wells |Jonathan Kay |Stewart Slater |Cathy Young

HOST: Welcome to the Quillette Podcast, which is usually hosted on alternate weeks by me, Jonathan Kay, and by Iona Italia. Quillette is where free thought lives. We are an independent, grassroots platform for heterodox ideas and fearless commentary. On Book Banning: Or, How the New Censorship Consensus Trivializes Art and Undermines Democracy - BiblioasisThe freedom to read is under attack.