You are currently browsing the tag archive for the ‘Canada’ tag.
quag·mire
1.
an area of miry or boggy ground whose surface yields under the tread; a bog.
2.
a situation from which extrication is very difficult: a quagmire of financial indebtedness.
3.
anything soft or flabby.
Sometimes it is good to get back to basics when dealing with complex issues like our ongoing colonial occupation war in Afghanistan. The CBC reports:
“A dramatic increase in the number of homemade bomb attacks is part of an “alarming trend” in Afghanistan, a UN report released Saturday said.
The report to the UN Security Council said bombings and assassinations have soared in the past four months amid ramped-up military operations in the Taliban-dominated south.
The number of attacks involving improvised explosive devices increased by 94 per cent over the same period in 2009, while assassinations of Afghan officials rose by 45 per cent.
“The rise in incidents involving improvised-explosive devices constitutes an alarming trend,” the report said.
Suicide attacks occurred at a rate of about three a week, half in the restive south. Such bombings have tripled this year compared with 2009.”
Is any of this really surprising? I mean, Afghanistan is the anvil on which Imperial armies go to be smashed. It has happened before, and will happen again. So why is Canada still there? Are we really preserving freedom and democracy? Fighting terror? It is all rather nebulous.
“Nevertheless, the UN found the number of security incidents had “increased significantly compared to previous years,” in large part because of more military operations in the south early this year. NATO spokesman Brig. Gen. Josef Blotz told reporters in the capital on Saturday that despite negative assessments, the international force was making steady strides.
“Tough fighting is expected to continue, but the situation is trending in our favour as more forces flow into the area,” Blotz said.
“It has to be tougher perhaps before it goes easier,” Blotz said.”
I think the only statement that contains a grain of truth is Blotz’s final one. It will get tougher and I highly doubt it will get easier as time passes.
Canada’s military commitment in Afghanistan ends in 2011. Not a moment too soon.
Canada's own high representative of batshite-crazy misogyny.
The catholic church really needs to go. They are doing a fairly good job at self immolation as is, but the process itself is taking too long. The cloistered catholic church wankers, from their deslutory anti-rational palace of fuckwittery, make another bold statement:
“Ouellet apparently had no intention of wading into a public policy debate when called abortion a “moral crime” as serious as murder and said it is never justified — even in cases of rape.”
Not surprisingly, given Canada’s proclivity toward rationality, this little gem of religiously approved anti-woman twaddle did not go over well. Now Ouellet is doing PR backflips in order to correct the ‘spin’ he claims the media has put on his words.
“He’s not calling for re-criminalization. He was talking [about] a moral thing. This is a moral issue. He was not bringing this to the judicial level.”
Ah, right. The RCC is certainly not about limiting women’s access to reproductive services. They are not about buggering alter boys either.
At least the politicians in the Quebec know how to deal with the bullshite that oozes from the church’s direction.
“Parti Québécois Leader Pauline Marois, speaking at a weekend party policy conference, said she was “absolutely outraged” by the remarks and that Ouellet was trying to undo rights won decades ago.
“These remarks … take us back to [the] Middle Ages,” said Alexa Conradi, president of the Quebec Women’s Federation.
“At the same time, my concern really is at the federal level. There is movement of right wing Catholic groups to find different ways to re-criminalize abortion.”
Conradi said that since the Conservatives came to power, there have been a number of — failed — attempts to get private member’s bills passed that threaten Canadian women’s legal rights to an abortion”
This Ouelleut is a real peach. He concurs with the Steven Harper’s G8 initiative that gives a hearty thumbs up to sentencing women to die because it dovetails nicely with his sickeningly inane religious beliefs:
“Ouellet applauded the Harper government for its stance against funding abortions in the developing world.”
Your church sponsored douchery has a place. Firmly in the past. Condemning women to die and denying them their autonomy is reprehensible and has no place in the 21st century.
Personal Expression or repression?
Al Jazeera reports: “In the Canadian province of Quebec a furious public debate has erupted over Muslim women who wear the niqab – face veil.
Out of over 200,000 Muslims in Montreal in Quebec, only a few dozen women wear the niqab, but under a proposed new legislation they could be barred from receiving public services.”
When I think about this issue I get a headache. The complexity and intersectionality of issues regarding women’s rights, religious freedom and society is staggering. Watch the video for a little background.
Canada is a secular democracy. I hesitate to fully endorse a law that prohibits anyone from wearing what they deem to be culturally important to them. Conversely, the Niqab and the Burka are both symbols of the oppression of women by the patriarchal rules of a delusional following known as Islam.
Modesty? Can men be immodest? Why is there not a male version of the Burka?
“No no no” you see the Burka protects women from men and their uncontrollable rape-happy urges. So says the Mullah, so says the Patriarchy. ‘Bullshit’ I say. Stripping women of their identities does not make them safer, nor does it prevent rape as the commodification and objectification happens by default in any patriarchal society.
The rub comes when people bring their cultural traditions to a secular society and then expect them to be accepted without a hitch. Whoa! Cultural relativism warning! Where do we draw the line when people bring potentially repressive traditions to our society? How much respect should we accord them? *gnash teeth*
The thing is that women choose to do repressive objectifying things to themselves all the time. Is it enough to leave the argument at if women ‘choose’ (aka obeying repressive cultural dictates) to wear the Niqab, so be it despite all the negative baggage associated with it?
To be honest, I really cannot say for sure one way or the other. What do you think?
Canada, despite being currently ‘governed’ by a conservative minority government is still a pretty good place to be. The important date that I refer to in is January 28th, 1988. It was when the Supreme Court of Canada made this landmark ruling on abortion in Canada.
Jan. 28, 1988: The Supreme Court of Canada strikes down Canada’s abortion law as unconstitutional. The law is found to violate Section 7 of the Charter of Rights and Freedoms because it infringes upon a woman’s right to “life, liberty and security of person.” Chief Justice Brian Dickson writes: “Forcing a woman, by threat of criminal sanction, to carry a fetus to term unless she meets certain criteria unrelated to her own priorities and aspirations, is a profound interference with a woman’s body and thus a violation of her security of the person.” Canada becomes one of a small number of countries without a law restricting abortion. Abortion is now treated like any other medical procedure and is governed by provincial and medical regulations.
One of the few times that I’ve actually felt some national pride for Canada. Canada in this one instance lives up to it ‘reputation’ for being a caring progressive nation.
I shudder at the kludge of access and availability of reproductive services in the United States. It is certainly not perfect in Canada, as access is not %100 in all provinces, but at least we have the notion that women are autonomous beings codified in law and can use the law to further access to reproductive services across all of Canada.
This is a meme that deserves to be propagated.
I’ve been keeping an eye on what has been happening recently with the Canadian Armed Forces and their handling of the detainee situation. The prognosis has been rather bleak. We are most likely responsible for people being abused and tortured while under our aegis. The Harper government has been doing backflips as of late to keep a lid on the story. Intransigentia has forwarded this article to my attention.
“The Harper government has effectively suspended parliamentary hearings on allegations that Afghan detainees were transferred to torture – boycotting attempts by opposition MPs to continue a Commons probe of the matter.”
Why are the Conservatives engaged in what seems to be a full on exercise in damage control if in fact, there is no substance to the allegations raised by Richard Colvin?
The Conservatives are blocking parliamentary inquiries saying insipid tidbits like this:
“It’s not the time to be having meetings that are implying, intentioned or not, that Canadians are somehow guilty of war crimes,” Laurie Hawn, the parliamentary secretary for the Defence Minister, said on CTV’s Power Play after the aborted meeting.
Well Mr.Hawn when exactly is the time to investigate possible war crimes perpetrated by our forces? The optics do not improve by stalling and delaying the House of Commons about the issue.
What is happening is that the Conservatives know they have a situation that will bring down their government. Delaying parliament is only the first step in the three ring circus that is forming around this issue. I guarantee this is only going to get worse.
I’m not sure if this is a nation wide project, or even if its province wide, but the MP’s from Edmonton and the surrounding area have been periodically sending out mail to all of their constituents. This piece of mail consists of a single sheet of paper with some Conservative Party message on it as well as a piece you can rip off and mail back to the MP with your response to the aforementioned message. I despise them.
I am actually in favor of governments letting the people know what its doing and why, but this is not what we’re talking about here. These “political messages” are merely propaganda tools. Further (and I find this insulting) they aren’t very good ones. The message I get from the Conservatives is “We don’t have to try that hard to brainwash such a simple minded public, this should suffice.”
Attacks on other parties either focus on especially weak straw men versions of the target party’s policy or they resort to slander and ad hominem attacks, which never present a political reason why they might be a poor choice for voters. Most of these messages could be replaced by the words “People who are not us are bad,” without losing an ounce of actual content.
The letters used to promote themselves are no better. Most are void of any actual policy and only vaguely refer to some ideal that Conservatives like to attach their policies to. No understanding of Conservative policy would be lost if, instead, they just sent out letters that said, “We are good, believe it!” repeatedly.
These propaganda leaflets have bothered me for some time (especially the “free” return postage, as if it is to be paid out of Conservative pockets instead of by our tax dollars, yeah right) but something odd happened that finally convinced me to write on one of these letters. I received one that actually had a piece of specific information regarding the Conservative plan for Canada: they want to repeal the faint hope clause so those who have received a life sentence will not be eligible for parole for at least 25 years. This, they say, will make Canada safer.
bleatmop
Mystro
Dead Wild Roses 
Your opinions…