"Representatives of eight First Nations groups asked a judge yesterday to declare Ontario's workfare legislation unconstitutional. The James Bay-area groups say the province has forced workfare on aboriginal Canadians under the 1997 Ontario Works Act -- a move they claim is an unprecedented interference with their right to self-government. ... They are seeking punitive damages of $1-million." (National Post, May 19, 1999)
"A Burnaby, B.C., man who worked at a Nazi-controlled prison camp during the Second World War will be allowed to remain in Canada because the federal government cannot prove he lied about his wartime past. Eduards Podins, now 81, was charged two years ago under the Citizenship Act for entering the country illegally by withholding the fact that he collaborated with the Nazis in his home country of Latvia. The case against him turned not on his war record but on the claim that he must have lied about his past." (National Post, July 13, 1999).
So now it sits: Losses - Bogutin, Katriuk, Kisliuk: Wins - Vitols, Dueck, Podins: Waiting for verdict - Oberlander: In litigation - Odynsky, Baumgartner. Notice: Only Ukrainians, Germans and Balts. (Well, Bogutin is half-Jewish, he says-- but only on his father's side.) Funny, not a single former Soviet in Canada has been charged nor is there even a "border watch" for those who ran the gulags in the Evil Empire. MacMulticulturalism Is Our Business
In an article entitled: The effects of multiculturalism on scholarship, Daniel Bonevac, professor and chairman of the philosophy department at the University of Texas tracks the triumph of correctness publishing over that of more traditional academic pursuits. "In 1996, there were 34 percent more publications on non-Western philosophy than there were in 1987. Compare the following more political topics: Racism: up 587 percent from the 1987-1990 average; Diversity: up 1000 percent from 1987. Feminism: up 341 percent from 1987. ... As I have argued elsewhere, multiculturalism is best seen as a form of mercantilism. As always, in protected industries, quality declines from a lack of competition. ... Researchers display a bipolar view, with dichotomies between oppressor and oppressed, 'targets' and 'mascots.' There is no sense of tradeoffs and complexities. Social problems are attributed to the heteropatriarchy without any felt need for detailed argument or analysis." (Academic Questions, Winter 98/99, Vol. 12, Issue 1)
The massive 1996 report of the Royal Commission on Aboriginal Peoples recommends such diverse remedies as an aboriginal university, a separate aboriginal parliament functioning essentially as a third tier of government, and (surprise!) more money. This is necessary, confides the section titled: "Looking Forward, Looking Back," because "continued failure may well lead to violence". May? According to Manitoba native leader, Terry Nelson, "'We make up a minimum of 61 percent of the inmates in prison and one out of three native children that are born today will spend some lengthy time in jail,' says Nelson. 'A native woman here in Manitoba is 131 times more likely to go to jail than a white woman.'" (ESPN Online, July 23, 1999) "Natives may suffer a higher rate of incarceration, but they also commit disproportionately more crime than all other ethnic groups. ... [It's insensitive to notice the behaviour. Let's 'correct' the sentencing] In April, the Supreme Court of Canada handed down a landmark decision, R. v. Gladue, which admonished the trial judge for not giving due attention to the 'Indianness' of Jamie Gladue, an aboriginal offender who had fatally stabbed her husband. She served six months. ... When Leonard Carratt, an aboriginal, bit off the thumb of 63-year-old Francesco Iulo, he was behaving like a demented criminal -- and a terrifying one at that. Now, in a Saskatchewan courtroom, Don Worme, Carratt's lawyer, hopes to portray his client as an innocent victim of society's 'systemic discrimination' against aboriginals." (National Post, June 28, 1999)
You're not the only one confused about what country this is: "The federal government will spend $1.7-million over the next year to double the number of brightly lit 'Canada' signs on top of federal buildings. ... Ottawa has already put up more than 60 of the Canada 'wordmarks' on top of highrises nationwide. Now, it plans to hoist another 57 of the illuminated logos. ... Over all, the government will spend $3.3-million on signs in all provinces and territories [what about ceded territories like the costly Arctic playpen called Nunavut?] ... 'It's deformed thinking to say that it will bring Canadians closer together if they drive by illuminated signs with the word Canada on them,' said Reform MP Jay Hill. ... 'Why not give overtaxed Canadians the tax relief they deserve?' ... Deputy Prime Minister Herb Gray answered that the government was 'responding to the desire of Canadians to have the name of their country proudly displayed.' ... Paul Rutherford, a cultural historian at the University of Toronto who studies advertising and propaganda ... [says] In the 19th century ... Canada had to be marketed abroad, to get outsiders to come to the country. During the past 25 years, the government has been making its pitch to Canadians." (Globe and Mail, July 12, 1999) Why? What's happened to Canadian identity over the last 25 years?
Perhaps American conservative Paul Weyrich can shed some light on the communist rhetoric that is such a prominent feature of the liberal-left. "Some radicals had a plan to weld traditional Marxism with Freud and to initiate a long march through the institutions, tearing down whatever they could and building nothing in its place except political correctness, which forbids a discussion of what took place." Appropriately enough, the very term politically correct comes from the communist theorists. According to the long march theory, key people sympathetic to the communist cause would gradually occupy as many influential positions in mainstream (particularly educational) institutions as possible. In case of a communist uprising, they would be ideally placed to lend a hand. In the event that a violent revolution did not occur, they were still ideally placed by virtue of their moral authority to pursue an alternate road to power. Even as the Italian Marxist theorist Antonio Gramsci, was honing nascent ideas about the long march, a thoughtful anti-Communist named George Orwell was developing his own ideas about the varieties of tyranny inherent to political correctness. Not so very long ago, robust peoples reserved a special contempt for the machinations of legislated behaviours, speech codes and citizens called to answer for thought crimes before a People's Tribunal. Writing in the June 1998 Transcultural Psychiatry Newsletter (Vol XVI No. 2) D. Kensin and Prof C.P. Korolenko (head of the Dept. of Psychiatry at Novosibirsk Medical Institute, Russia) reflect on the politically correct language of Soviet Russia. "The creation of the new mythology by the Soviet system required the invention of a new language. ... This Soviet Russian Language (SRL) was gradually developed [so that] many Russian words used before 1917 were omitted and gradually disappeared from common usage. ... In official speeches, at social meetings and celebrations, the restriction on the use of words and expressions was even more severe.
Utilization of SRL expressions was mandatory. Digression from this schema was dangerous and happened only on very rare occasions. The poverty of the SRL was, of course, not accidental. The Soviet system was organized down to the smallest detail and made enormous effort to control the 'purity' of Communist doctrines. In this context, digression from the prescribed standards in vocabulary and expression, especially in terms of the SRL, was treated as a serious offence or in some cases even as a crime. ... People conditioned by an instrument such as the SRL lost their resistance to political indoctrination. ... The SRL frequently used insults, condemnations, and incantations ... It cultivated a dogmatic agitator's style designed for the suppression of conscious rational analysis. ... The constant utilization of a special sort of sarcastic intonation in spoken language and of quotation marks in written texts, with the same mocking intention when referring to the ideas and points of view of those who did not quite agree with Communist doctrines or with the current party line. This applied also to terms such as 'humanism', 'democracy', 'justice', 'freedom', 'equality'. ... Although the original goal of creating the SRL was the formation of a new Soviet mythology ... a stable and lasting Soviet mentality was not formed as it could exist only under special conditions: the main factor determining its relative stability was the constantly present fear of persecution and punishment for any deviation from the officially declared but often purposefully hidden party line. ... [As with the infamous Chinese Red Guards,] the SRL had a strong effect especially on the mentality of the newer generations that were reared and educated in the era of the fully developed Soviet system. ... Today the SRL is still used in leaflets, speeches and proclamations at meetings and demonstrations of the extreme Left." (The Transformation of Religious Feeling and of Language and its Influence on the Mentality in Russia)
The rancorous campaign against Mike Harris's Ontario Conservatives did not prevent the Tories from securing 59 of 103 seats. Much-maligned education minister Dave Johnson lost his seat, amid anti-democratic innovations like bomb scares, and threatening telephone calls to polling station personnel in his riding (Six stations had to extend polling hours to accommodate those who merely wished to vote). As usual, the disgruntled didn't seem to want anything in particular -- just to be rid of Mike Harris. The NDP's 9 seats left them three short of Official Party Status, while the Liberals finished with 35. Some thoughts from Canada's weekly African Canadian and Caribbean news magazine: "The very basic observation that one can make about the Progressive Conservatives is that they espouse a philosophy which says there is no racism in Canada, and in this case, Ontario. The people who tend to support the Tories believe that if you are experiencing difficulties, they are difficulties of your own choosing. One way to resolve the issue is to go back where you came from. It doesn't matter that generationally you may very well have been here longer than they have. ... You may argue that this does not necessarily follow since the issues above were never raised nor debated. But that is precisely the point. ... Now there is an old belief that, when an animal is cornered, it will take all necessary action to save itself. The question is: now that the Mike Harris Tories have been returned to power, is the African-Canadian community starting to feel cornered? Is the African Canadian community likely to act to defend itself?" (Patrick Hunter, Pride, June 10-16, 1999)
Here's an item for all those old '60s leftists, now gone paunchy, bald,
or grey. These were the chicks and dudes of yesteryear 
who
hollered, "Ho, ho, Ho Chi Minh, The Vietcong are gonna win!"
They clogged the streets of Canada and U.S with their anti-American pro-communist
demonstrations. Some probably really believed that communist cadre Ho Chi
Minh was creating a just "workers' paradise."
Consider: "Vietnam's leadership has urged the community to take responsibility for the elimination of 'social evils' -- reinforcing an earlier commitment to purge the country of corrupt officials. Prime Minister Phan Van Khai called in a radio broadcast for people to unite to 'build up democracy and drive away social evils from your residential [districts]'. There is growing acknowledgement that 'social evils' such as drug abuse and prostitution are flourishing with the complicity of the elite. Nguyen Thi Hue, the director of Hanoi's anti-social vices department, surprised observers last month when she publicly denounced state employees for patronising bia om (beer cuddle) and karaoke bars which are often used as fronts for brothels. 'Our inquiries show that 70 to 80 per cent of their customers are state employees,' she said. 'I can say that those [people] . . . are corrupt because they have to steal state money to pay for their dirty and expensive activities.' Mr Khai's call coincided with the arrests this week of 34 members of an alleged drug-smuggling ring headed by Customs officers, and followed Thursday's sentencing of a Hanoi lawyer to 19 years in prison for orchestrating the country's biggest prostitution racket. Nguyen Van Tha received the harshest sentence handed down to a brothel owner, with the court also ordering that he surrender the US $3 million it calculated he had earned in the 12 months before his arrest in August last year. Prostitution has boomed in Vietnam with increasing social freedom and wealth. Communist Party chief Le Kha Phieu earlier this year attacked the bureaucracy for persecuting anyone who challenged its power. 'When people speak out they are immediately persecuted,' Mr Phieu said. (South China Morning Post, July 3, 1999)
The Indian and Northern Affairs website devoted to the celebration suggests - "Celebration of the Summer Solstice ... Pow-wow ... Prayers ... Cultural awareness workshops ... A panel discussion on Aboriginal issues. ... [What fun! In 1996] the Government of Canada chose June 21 for National Aboriginal Day because it is also the summer solstice, the longest day of the year. For generations, many Aboriginal people have celebrated their culture and heritage on or near this day. [Certainly, Aboriginal Europeans have] ... It also supports the United Nations International Decade of the World's Indigenous People (1994-2004)." Well, there goes the second of four immensely important dates in our great European sun wheel tradition: the other, Spring Equinox, has been appropriated as the International Day for the Struggle of the Masses Against Racism and Differentism, or something like that.
We're accustomed to the anomaly whereby parents who cannot legally swat a diapered bottom may be legally responsible for what the monster does 15 years later. With the move afoot to include criminal history in the tedious list of special protected types (and the latest restriction on merely inquiring about criminality of those entering Canada), what should charitable agencies make of the latest justice to slop over from the Supreme Court? "The Children's Foundation operated two residential care centres in British Columbia. ... Thirty years ago the foundation hired a man named Leslie Curry. Before hiring him, they ran background checks. ... But Curry turned out to be a paedophile. ... When the foundation received a complaint, Curry was fired and he was eventually convicted on 19 counts of sexual assualt. ... The issue before the Supreme Court was this: Is the Children's Foundation vicariously liable for Curry's conduct? In a rare display of unanimity, the Supreme Court held that it is. ... Under common law, the foundation would have been exonerated. So the Supreme Court changed the law. ... The Children's Foundation decision has profound implications for the 6,000 claims pending against churches that formerely operated residential schools. In a case involving a former Brantford, Ont., school, the Anglican Church is being sued for more than $2-billion. In all probability Canadian churches have already apologized themselves into liability; if not, this Supreme Court decision id likely to finish them off." (National Post, August 5, 1999)
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