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Justice will be served?
He’s a Fundie, with a BADGE! That’s right folks, newly appointed Winnipeg police chief Devon Clunis is gonna clean up the streets….with prayer! Hallelujah Sweet Jebus, we gonna fill some murderous hearts with love tonight, just by whispering sweet nothings into the ear of our collective imaginary friend, AMEN!
You know, I spend a good deal of my time reading about how religion poisons and destroys lives all across the globe, all across history, but I admit I’ve always felt a little shielded here in Canada. Sure, Alberta sometimes seems like the ‘Texas of Canada’, but that ‘of Canada’ bit reigns in a substantial amount of theistic lunacy.
Sure, we have some obstacles to overcome to become a truly progressive society, but this is Canada, goddamit! We got that separation of church and state thing going strong! We aren’t like those backward United States! Faith isn’t paraded like a virtue by those in public office! Civil servants keep their faiths hidden where they belong and … and … who the fuck is this guy? A police chief promoting prayer? Really? REALLY? IN MY COUNTRY?
Ok, ok. Calm down. Let’s deal with this like cool collected intellectual people, and tear this guy a new one.
Rationally speaking, of course. Read the rest of this entry »
Hey I need some help eroding the church/state separation. Lets ask the experts!
I’m not really sure what is so shit-hot about the attitudes and conventions of the Dark Ages, but Harper and his government have decided to fecklessly dive into the land of pants-on-head stupid and establish a official government bureau of “Religious Freedom”. Let’s be clear, not something useful like an office sponsoring freedom FROM religion, so sorry Rishma of Pakistan, you still get be sentenced to death for allegedly burning pages from a magic book. Because, obviously we need MORE religion in the world because rational thought is too fucking hard to deal with.
“The federal government’s long-awaited Office of Religious Freedom will be unveiled soon, officials say, after months of delays caused by difficulty in finding the right person to head the office.
The new body, which will be housed within the Department of Foreign Affairs, was expected to be up and running earlier this year.
But a senior government official told CBC News that Foreign Affairs Minister John Baird has had a hard time finding someone to fill the role of ambassador to head up the office. Two people who were approached ultimately turned the post down for logistical and personal reasons.?
Reasons why? Because being head of the Canadian christian god brigade overseas is not appealing. I’m really flabbergasted at my government right now. I’m imaging that in some meeting some wonk pops this ass-blister of a suggestion and throws it out there –
“Hey, you know that separation of church and state thing, its dumb, lets set up an office and get the government officially involved in delusional religious shit”. Ohh the meetings goes quiet. “But where are we going to get the money?” says Economic Wonk, our resident member of brain trust of turdistan says, “oh, well we closed a bunch of science and research down there is plenty of money saved from that…”.
And then there was cabinet/Harper approval. Yes, lets close down scientific research on one hand and fund the promotion of stale religious brain-flatulence from the bronze age. Brilliant! How can we lose? It is astonishing that people voted for people that actually endorse this sort of thinking.
“Some supporters of the idea have grown frustrated with the long wait. The $5-million office was first announced during the May 2011 election campaign as a centrepiece of the government’s foreign policy.”
A vesitgal bone thrown at the dumb-as-dirt religious value voters that worked. Apparently jebus said lower corporate tax rates so we can screw the rest of society over. To my idjit right of centre commentators, did you notice that you only get lip-service paid to your nuttily-regressive ‘social conservative” goals all the while the economic conservatives who hold the real power happily continue to gut the bastions of the social democratic state? You think getting screwed over would become tiresome after the nth time, apparently you thought in 2011, *this* time it would be different.
Bhatti argues the new ambassador must be objective.
“The person shouldn’t be one-sided,” he said. “He doesn’t focus on the one religion, or one persecution. He will treat every religion equally and give his recommendation to the foreign office and government regarding truth and reality.”
I don’t even know what this means. But I think I would be a good candidate for the job. I all religions the same, with contempt, would this make me a good candidate for the job? Probably not since the ability to think clearly is not selected for when trying to get a job within a religion.
“As CBC NEWS reported last year, internal Foreign Affairs documents showed nearly all of the panellists who participated in a closed-door consultation with Foreign Affairs last fall in Ottawa were drawn from Western religions, primarily Christianity. Few Muslims were in attendance and there were no Muslim panellists.
Arvind Sharma, a Canadian scholar of religion, has been carefully monitoring the government’s plans, and says the idea presents a great opportunity for Canada on the world stage.
But the McGill University professor warns that’s only if Canada avoids promoting proselytization.”
Yep, Canadian Christians for Christ, sponsored by the secular government of Canada? *sigh* Canada is a secular democracy and really needs to axe this crumby idea.
Giving government support to mythology is stupid and needs to stop before even more people get that idea that religion is an still acceptable choice in the 21st century.
Maybe we should update our preferred torture methods, hanging perhaps?
Our society is progressing ever so slowly (and will continue to do so if we don’t let the corporations win, restore the 25% tax rate please). I often look to the politics and citizenry of Quebec for cues on progressive society and the model we should be working toward. Progress does come in fits and starts, but the latest PQ notion of a Secular Charter is a retrograde notion at its very best.
The Parti Québécois wants to introduce a secular charter and ban all civil servants from wearing or exposing overt religious symbols.
This isn’t the first time the Parti Québécois has mentioned the introduction of a secular charter aimed at making sure public and parapublic institutions are free of religious bias and symbols.
This part is good. Government needs to be free of the stench of religion and all of the sectarian nonsense that comes with it. The wider the wall between church and state, the better off society will be. Spot the problem with this next bit from Pauline Marois:
“We will fight for what we need because we think this is essential for the public’s well-being by taking its values and writing them in a charter,” Marois said.Under such a charter, civil servants would not be allowed to wear conspicuous religious symbols.
The crucifix at Quebec’s national assembly, however, would remain untouched.
Marois also talked about the fact that many of Quebec’s institutions used to be based on religion.It’s part of our heritage, but taking a step to ensure the state’s secularity is not to deny what we are, but that we are at a new moment in our lives and believe the state’s neutrality and the fundamental values, equality between men and women must guide us toward a life together in Quebec,” Marois said.
*broken record sound* What phoque is going on with that?
We’ll keep our christian torture symbol prominently displayed in the national assembly, but the rest the religious stuff, you know you immigrants and your pagan practices…that shite has to go!
If you are going to adopt a secular charter then all of the religious bullshite has to go, you can’t keep the ones that you like and then say no to others citing “the secular nature of society” that is just discrimination of the racist sort and therefore has no place in progressive secular society.
Fits and starts I tell thee. Come on Quebec, get it right and turf all the religious ooga-booga, it will do Quebec and Canada proud.
Hurrah, Bad Science Watch is here!
It is about time Canada had its own team of people dedicated to showing the absolute nuttery that goes on under the guise of homeopathy, riki, acupuncture and the rest of the quackery that goes on up here. Go to their blog, click on there advertising, heck donate to them and help them in their battle against the dishonest woo-peddlers that are infesting our society.
The first bastion of bullshite they are tackling are the so called “nosodes vaccines” which like the rest of the shit and sugar water homeopathic foolishness are unproven snake-oil remedies that can really hurt the people taking them and the people around them. From the BSW website:
Today, the new Canadian science advocacy group Bad Science Watch announced plans to convince Health Canada to de-register homeopathic health products that are offered as unproven replacements for childhood vaccinations. This project will combat the anti-vaccine camps within homeopathy that offer these so-called “nosodes”; the sale of which directly contradicts Health Canada’s own efforts to promote childhood vaccinations.
Nosodes are ultra-dilute homeopathic remedies prepared using diseased tissue, such as blood, pus, and saliva, that are based on the unsupportable “like-cures-like” hypothesis where you give someone a very low dose of the offending substance to then cure or prevent the disease in question.
Homeopaths in Canada are offering these nosodes for a variety of childhood diseases, like pertussis, or whooping cough, a deadly disease that is currently afflicting more Canadian children, mostly infants, than it has in the past 50 years. The anti-vaccine messages spread by homeopaths have caused parents to needlessly question the usefulness and safety of vaccines and as a result the level of vaccination in Canadian communities has dropped to as low as 62%. A level of 80% or higher is needed to have proper protection from pertussis in the community.
62%? Frak me, people. You need to vaccinate with real vaccines not this froopy-doopy shite that doesn’t work. You are hurting yourself and the people around you. BSW is starting large, I hope they can get the ball rolling on defenstrating this quackery ASAP.
Let us sent out a big thanks to the Ontario Swing Voters that brought us this monstrosity known as the Harper Majority Government. The Omnibus bill is the latest poke at the mouldering corpse that is Canadian Politics.
Debate? Defence of ideas? Compromise? Not happening in our House of Commons. The light at the end of the tunnel is coming though and the French NDP contingent is gnawing at the bit waiting to lead the charge to expel the current plutocrats from power.
“The French chant “2015” started in the upper reaches of the NDP backbench and soon cascaded into a common, desk-thumping chorus just before midnight Thursday in the House of Commons.
The tone from the official Opposition was oddly celebratory, given that they’d just faced 22-plus hours of consecutive spankings by a Conservative majority government voting to protect its omnibus budget bill from hundreds of amendments.
Bill C-38, the sprawling Jobs, Growth and Long-Term Prosperity Act, survived the ordeal untouched and now goes to third and final reading in the Commons on Monday.
The bill — and the literally dozens of significant statutes it comprises on everything from environmental assessments to old age security, employment insurance rules, government contracting and cross-border policing — should clear the Conservative-dominated Senate by the end of next week.”
Of course Bill C-38 was going to pass, like a javelin through the heart of Canadian Democracy. But we can save hope that things will change as the NDP back bench clearly intoned in the House of Commons.
“Finance Minister Jim Flaherty said as he emerged from the chamber with his budget bill intact.
“We have our view and our view is supported by the mandate we got from the people of Canada last year, so we’re carrying out the mandate that we have — which is about jobs and growth and economic prosperity.”
The majority of Canadians did not vote for you or your mandate Mr.Flaherty, it would be good of you to remember that. You can feel the scorn from Conservative benches, actually having to show up and vote on legislation, having to deal with this nasty messy idea that people should have input into how their country is run. The nerve of Canadians who clearly do not know their place.”
“Green party leader Elizabeth May was the author of hundreds of the substantive amendments shot down Thursday and one of about a half dozen MPs who didn’t miss a single vote. She said it was far more than “theatrics or … a waste of time.”
“This was democracy,” said May, still feisty and coherent after 22 hours of voting.
“This was parliamentarians stepping up to our obligation and our duty to Canada, to parliament, to the people who sent us here from our constituencies, to behave like parliamentarians.”
“It was a sign that democracy in Canada has a spark of life,” said May. “We found the pulse.”
This was democracy indeed. The electorate will remember how the Harper Government slapped the democratic process in the face. Prepare for more jaw dropping, commonsense defying attacks on our environment, labour and the social fabric of our society though because Harper needs to get all the damage done quickly so he can begin sucking up to the Canadian public in time for the 2015 election.
The move is over. Let the unpacking begin. Thank you, my committed readership, for staying with us here at DWR during the transition to our new home. It has been a wild and hectic couple of weeks. I should be able to commit a little more time to blogging and finding the information I find interesting and sharing it with you. With that in mind I’d like to share and and comment on the recent furor about Tom Mulcair’s comments about the “Dutch Disease” in Canada.
The noise generated by his comments are out of proportion to what his observation was:
“Mulcair claims that “Dutch disease” has hit the country, blaming energy exports from the Alberta oilsands for artificially raising the Canadian dollar and hollowing out the manufacturing industry.
Coined in an article in The Economist in 1977, the concept refers to the adverse economic effects that the discovery of large natural gas fields off of the coast of the Netherlands in the 1960s had on the country’s manufacturing sector.
The theory goes that a boom in a natural resource sector can lead to an appreciation of a country’s real exchange rate. That increase in the dollar value makes exports more expensive, and has an adverse effect on the manufacturing sector by making it less competitive.”
Okay, so it sounds reasonable so far. Our dollar goes up and makes our manufacturing industry less competitive. But what has got the defenders of corporatism all up in arms? Mulcair takes his statement one step further…
“Mulcair said the problem is the government is not enforcing legislation that would include the environmental costs of exploiting natural resources.
“Those statistics with regard to the overall losses of jobs in Canada are irrefutable,” he said this week. “And they are directly related to the fact that we’re not enforcing federal [environmental] legislation.”
Oh snap. How dare you mention that pillaging the land in the hog-wild foo-fur-ah that is Fort McMurray might be anything less than a calm nuanced approach to 
resource management is beyond the pale. Fainting couches were needed *stat* across much of the Canadian media and parliament.
“I am wondering when the leader of the Opposition will apologize to western Canadians for suggesting the strength of the western Canadian economy is a disease on Canada,” Heritage Minister James Moore said in the House of Commons.
“He attacks western Canada, he attacks our energy industry, he attacks all of the West and the great work that is being done by western Canadians to contribute to Canada’s national unity. He should be ashamed of himself,” he said.
Yes, he should be ashamed for trying to keep the government accountable to for environmental legislation that is currently on the books, oh the villainy. The tar sands have gained a love-halo that is growing in magnitude. Speaking out against them is sacrosanct,with reasonable debate being drummed out by “it’s good for the economy!!!1!” and other nonsense.
Good On Mulcair for pointing out some of the problems with the oil-sands vis-a-vis the rest of Canada, the man is doing his job as leader of the Opposition.
Fantastic. Our cracked conservative government is floating yet another trial balloon on its anti-empirical evidence “tough” on reality crime bill. Listen to all the surreal talking points from the interview on CBC’s The Current Podcast.
Civilized states do not put people to death. We should remain counted as a civilized state.
bleatmop
Mystro
Dead Wild Roses 
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