The daily outrage: Local edition

[sabotabby]

The RCMP have invaded Mohawk territory, arresting 38 people. The reason for the incursion? Pot dealing. Just as a reality check, 13.3% of Ontarians smoke weed regularly. 36% of adults between 18-29 smoke weed. Generally, police here don't care if you smoke or deal weed as long as you're white.

So maybe, maybe, there is something going on at the Rez besides a case of reefer madness. I didn't actually have to do any research. That's not the pot that's making you paranoid: Harper's actually targeting indigenous Canadians.

Information obtained by the First Nations Strategic Bulletin through Access to Information requests reveals that almost immediately upon Harper’s taking power in 2006, the Department of Indian and Northern Affairs Canada (INAC) was given the lead role to spy on First Nations. The goal was to identify the First Nation leaders, participants and outside supporters of First Nation occupations and protests, and to closely monitor their actions.

Expect more of this now that spiteful, racist Canadian voters have given Harper a mandate to trample on the self-determination and human rights of the First Nations.

Meanwhile, closer to home, our Honourable Drunken Wife-Beating Mayor is tossing the idea of branding public parks with corporate names. Now the TTC may also be following suit. In a way, you know, I look forward to this. It's very cyberpunk. I can't wait until Toronto is turned into a neon-noir dystopia, like the Manhattan of my imagination, with giant billboards awash in acid rain. Oh wait.

If you';re wondering what Canadians can do to help dissident movements in the Middle East, the answer is: Not this. Yeah, a Guelph company called Netsweeper makes sure that when the citizens of Yemen get too uppity, their internet gets turned off. Best quote:

“It’s no doubt a great market opportunity for them,” said Ronald Deibert, who heads the Citizen Lab, which examines human rights in the digital era, at the Munk School of Global Affairs.

Yes, that Munk.

I hate this country.

Comments

[lienne.livejournal.com]

augh

[pofflewomp.livejournal.com]

Your Tories sound worse than ours! Or maybe just less subtle. Or more like Sarkozy and his anti-Romany stance, ugh.

I didn't know there were Mohawks in Canada, but I am very ignorant generally of the world outside my head. Oh dear.

[flintultrasparc.livejournal.com]

Most Mohawks migrated to Canada during and part of the aftermath of the U.S. revolutionary war. Kanesatake was established before that though by Mohawk converts to French Catholicism in 1717. Kanesatake is probably better known for the "Oka Crisis" being the time that the Canadian Military intervened on behalf of establishing golf courses and luxury homes.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oka_crisis

Some stuff I wrote about Mohawks (and other Iroquois) once:
http://nefac.net/anarchiststudyofiroquois#women

[lokilokust.livejournal.com]

this will cheer you up- http://24.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_llmvdc7Hz51qd1wsjo1_500.jpg

[sabotabby]

That is pretty great.

[icedrake.livejournal.com]

Your closing comment brings to mind an old Russian joke, which goes as follows.

An old Jew has been trying to emigrate from the USSR for years and years, and getting refused permission every single time. (back then, they didn't ever let you leave) Finally everyone's so fed up with him that they decide to make him someone else's problem. He gets called down to the KGB headquarters, where a young KGB lieutenant sits him down in front of a globe and says "here, old man. Just choose a country and *go*."

The lieutenant then leaves the office and goes to do other, more useful work. The old man is in that office for an hour. He's in there for two. He's in there for three and a half hours, and finally he comes out, finds the lieutenant, and says "excuse me, young man... You don't happen to have a different globe?"

The point being, Canada's not great, but I really have to say it's the best of a bad bunch.

[sabotabby]

Oh, I don't actually hate living here. I hate what we do to other countries and our own internally displaced people. In that respect we're worse than many, if not most countries. I'm comfortably First World and not going anywhere.

[icedrake.livejournal.com]

OK, I'll bite. Which countries can you name that treat their internally displaced people significantly better?

As far as how we treat other countries, that's gonna be a tougher one, as many other countries aren't in a position to have significant influence on their neighbours, much less countries halfway across the planet.

[sabotabby]

Well, that's the thing. As soon as you start internally displacing your population, you are what I would consider a net evil.

As far as how we treat other countries, that's gonna be a tougher one, as many other countries aren't in a position to have significant influence on their neighbours, much less countries halfway across the planet.

We cause a disproportionate amount of damage, both directly (Haïti, Afghanistan, Tanzania, Papua New Guinea, Palestine, etc.), and indirectly (blocking international agreements on environmental protection because we profit off the tar sands, ensuring that future generations will be irreparably fucked because of Canada). I resent it all the more because of our squeaky clean national image. At least the Americans have the balls to admit that they want to control and shit on the rest of the world, and are justifiably hated for it.

[icedrake.livejournal.com]

"We cause a disproportionate amount of damage" -- do you mean we as in the country of Canada? (I'll stretch the truth a bit and count myself in that grouping, despite not currently living in Canada) I'm not sure what specific issues you are referring to in all these examples, but I'm fairly certain you're referring to mining activity by Canadian companies in Tanzania, for example. Is this correct?

I've been poking at this idea in my head for a number of days now, and it comes down to a major question: What is the purpose of a country?

My current working definition is still not fully baked, so I'm hoping you can offer one in the meantime, as a jumping-off point for continuing the conversation.

[sabotabby]

We as in the country of Canada. Haïti: We played a huge role in the overthrow of a democratically elected government and sent the country spiralling into further chaos. Tanzania and Papua New Guinea: theft of rich natural resources and rape and murder of the civilian population. Afghanistan: brutal invasion and occupation, torture and murder of the civilian population, conspiring with warlords, economic devastation. Palestine: We were the first country, even beating the U.S., in imposing sanctions against Gaza after the democratic, though unwise, election of Hamas, effectively starving the population to death and causing further economic devastation; the unemployment rate there is now 45%. None of these things are secrets, and we, as citizens of a country in which we at least in theory have the right to choose our government, are complicit. (I count myself among this number; my pension plan invests in Barrick Gold.)

My current working definition is still not fully baked, so I'm hoping you can offer one in the meantime, as a jumping-off point for continuing the conversation.

Are you asking what the purpose of a country is, or what it should be? In terms of the latter, to organize that which can't be organized at a larger or smaller level: transit, health care, major infrastructure, social services. In terms of what it is; the purpose of a country is to protect the interests of its ruling class.

[pofflewomp.livejournal.com]

I'd say Britain was better to live in as it sounds like we have a better welfare system. Only it is being completely fucked to bits and everything is getting worse, so Canada sounds much nicer. I don't know if we have internally displaced peoples as such, although there are Irish people wandering around looking lost and drunk a lot and the Tories are telling everyone to "get on yer bike" and keep moving around the country to look for non existent jobs, so maybe that counts.

[poetic-pixie-13.livejournal.com]

I, too, hate this country. -_-

[sabotabby]

We are icon-matching non-patriots.

Wait, you're not actually a straight white guy living in the U.S. too, are you?