ctv local snooze

Save Our Snooze poster

Have you seen CTV’s latest campaign – the one where they practically beat you over the head with a club to get more money? Here’s a take from one writer in Winnipeg who shares my skepticism.

But let’s get this straight — local news and news coverage is not threatened. In a city as large as Winnipeg, there are many media outlets, and new ones emerging, to report on what is happening locally. There is already a local news provider on TV, radio and the web that we all pay a fee for — the CBC.

CTV’s desire for cable fees is as much about the network wanting to broadcast Desperate Housewives on Sunday night as it is about anything else the company does.But a blockbuster American TV show does not have the emotional appeal of news from your backyard.

 

"endangered" CTV local reporters

I was fence-sitting on the issue – until I spotted these CTV local reporters on their way back to work after a liquid lunch at the ritzy marina club in Lachine. 

Endangered species? Yeah, right!

shameless plug

There were lots of things I didn’t like about Winnipeg when I lived there for a couple of years. They were eclipsed by the things I really loved. One thing above all else was the sense of social activism and involvement. The city was alive with people doing things, not just sitting there waiting or looking the other way.

What brings this my attention? Colleen Simard. She writes from time to time for the Winnipeg papers and is, IMHO, one of the better, more graceful and classy writers and journalists out there. Take her latest guest bit in “View From The West” at the Winnipeg Free Press. She knocks down some ridiculous but hard to kill myths and stereotypes but in a way that makes you wonder afterward what your guts are doing down there on the floor.

Why the U of S turned down half a million is simple enough: the kind-hearted donor stipulated she didn’t want the money going to aboriginal people. Of course, that’s discrimination because you’re excluding a race of people. If you don’t understand that you should be doing some educational reading of your own.

Read up on the Canadian Human Rights Act. And before you start firing off those angry emails, stick with me.

Sure, it’s fine to set up a scholarship for “white people,” but don’t set up a scholarship that expressly excludes a race.

See what I mean? That’s just the tip of her dagger.

But to get the full effect, head on over to read the whole thing.  Then check out her Urban DND(oops!) NDN publication – then ask yourselves why can’t we do something like this Montreal, or Ottawa, or Kingston? Blimey!

Two big thumbs up for Colleen.

canada’s 19th century policies

The United States may be moving toward recognition of the United Nation’s International Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples. Australia has already announced it will do so. New Zealand may be re-considering its opposition the the Declaration as well. If so, this will leave Canada the only member in the UN voting against it, because Canada (as usual) is hoping to legislate Indians out of existence before that’s necessary.

The fact that Canada will be alone in its refusal to recognize Indigenous rights should not surprise Indigenous peoples, nor should it anyone else. Canada has maintained hypocritical, illogical and ridiculous positions on Indigenous rights all along.

• Canada says it respects the right of self-determination while making sure its legislative leghold traps remain firm, keeping Indigenous peoples in a system of internal colonialism.
• Canada says it wants to resolve disputes about Indigenous rights to land and resources by honouring existing treaties and land agreements, but continues to be the main reason for the huge back log at land claims, wasting millions of dollars each year, and provoking legal bar fights over resource issues. 
• Canada says it supports Indigenous rights, but does not seem to have a clue what that means. Or if it does, Canada seems to be stuck in 19th century attitudes and legal opinions about Indigenous peoples and their rights.

So here’s a suggestion. Follow this link and read. Canadians really need to educate themselves about the Indigneous peoples that their governments deny even exist. They may need to drag their country into the 21st. century.

The critical point here is that nation states assume their citizens accept the government and the political and cultural rules of social and political process. This, however, is a main point of contention between nation states and indigenous peoples, who have their own cultures, forms of government, economies and communities. Indigenous peoples live in communities or nations that are organized differently than nation states and many indigenous peoples do not recognize the authority or power of nation states, although they are often compelled to abide by their rules.

Indigenous peoples are often not, if ever, consensual citizens within the nation states that have assumed power and territory surrounding indigenous communities. Immigrants are asked to become naturalized and take an oath of allegiance to the nation state. Indigenous peoples, however, have been legislated into citizenship, and have not voluntarily taken oaths of loyalty or willingness to uphold or recognize the constitutions of nation states. Indigenous peoples generally are not parties to, did not consent to, and often did not participate in the constitution formation of nation states. While many indigenous peoples are loyal to their nation states, they at the same time want recognition of their political, cultural and territorial traditions.

ipperwash

From today’s Sarnia Observer online:

After decades of wait and struggle, Stony Pointer Cathryn Mandoka is back home.

Mandoka is the first member of the Chippewas of Kettle and Stony Point First Nation to move back onto ancestral lands at what was once Ipperwash Provincial Park.

“Ipperwash” dredges up a lot of pain among people who were there at the standoff in 1995, who identified with the Anishnawbe (Ojibway) peoples and what they have gone through – not just since 1993, when the occupation of Ipperwash Provincial Park began, but for more than 80 years before. 

The name “Ipperwash,” however, also brings hope that maybe – just maybe – real change might be possible in this land where things move like molasses in January, and racial attitudes toward Indigenous peoples continue to be as vibrant as ever. 

Lambton Shores councillor Mark Simpson said the province has set a dangerous precedent when it comes to land claims. He worries that awarding land to a “special interest group” could open the government to a series of repercussions.

“To me, this is a dark day in the history of our community,” he said. “This sets a bad precedent.”

Yes, things are changing but the questions are: Will things change before another generation is ruined? More to the point, will they be for better or worse?

Dudley George is another name that brings mixed emotions. He was the first Indigenous person killed in Canada in the last century during a peaceful occupation to recover land that had been stolen from his peoples. For some, he is a hero. To others, he’s just another one of those individuals who knew when something was wrong, and who stood up because it needed to be made right.

Dudley’s brother, Sam George, is a soft-spoken man of great dignity and quiet determination. The occupation, the shooting of his brother by the Ontario Provincial Police, and Sam’s long fight to get a provincial government in full-blown denial to answer a simple question – What went wrong? – is the stuff of legend. 

Sam’s struggle to get past the slammed doors and official cover-up of a botched police raid eventually (I contend) toppled a provincial premier. It showed how petty those in power could be, and how profound the powerless were. The Ipperwash Inquiry showed how federal and provincial governments took part in legalized land theft, illustrated nearly a century of official denial of fundamental rights and the rule of law to the peoples of Kettle and Stony Point, and how racial attitudes contributed to an abuse of power and coverup at the highest levels of the Ontario Government of former premier, Mike Harris.

There are lessons here, questions too?

 

“To me, this is a dark day in the history of our community,” he said. “This sets a bad precedent.”

What’s to be learned? Who should learn them?

 

As a 10-year-old child in the 1940s, Bud Cloud was part of a forced relocation from the Stony Point reserve to the neighbouring Kettle Point reserve. His family lived in a house with no heat that winter.

The federal government said it would return the land after it was no longer needed as an army camp, but still hasn’t formally done so.

He now lives with other Stony Pointers at the former army camp, which has been occupied by the group since 1993.

all hail the grand pooh-bah

Every now and then, I like to browse the Interwebs. Sometimes, one finds the strangest things out there. Like one particular news release that (thankfully) didn’t appear on the front page of the National Post or some other excuse for Canadian journalism. 

I have to confess that the person behind the news release is one of my faves.  He makes me giggle. He can coax a laugh from me. Okay, I’m man enough to admit that he makes me guffaw until my ribs ache. (stop it, yer killing me)

Yes, it’s him. National Grand Pooh-bah of the Holy Order of the Water Buffalo, Guillaume (aka Billy) Carle. Great Chief of all of North America, Turtle Island, and all Lands Outside of China. You saw him bring peace to Vietnam (don’t believe me? check out his web page) You saw him turn the earth on its axis – not for evil but for… uh, something else. Now he’s ba-a-a-a-ck.

Or at least he was, a year ago when he single-handedly took control of the occupation at Tyendinaga Mohawk Territory from those pesky Mohawks. I mean, c’mon, you can’t have Mohawks running a national protest of their own… on their own Territory? Can ya? 

Details, details, details… Take it away, Billy.

April 26, 2008 – Canada Newswire

Explosive situation at Tyendinaga – The National Grand Chief Guillaume Carle and the Confederation of Aboriginal People of Canada where mandated and assigned by the Tyendinaga Mohawk warrior chief like mediator in the conflict against the provincial police of Ontario and also the political government of Canada and Ontario

OTTAWA, April 26 /CNW Telbec/ – Broadcast on the Radio-Canada, National Grand Chief Guillaume Carle of the Confederation of Aboriginal People of Canada accepted is nomination as mediator for the Mohawk warrior chief of Tyendinaga, when interviewed by the journalist Sébastien Saint-François.

The Mohawk warrior chief would like to advise the population of the decision to integrate National Grand Chief Guillaume Carle as their mediator / negotiator.

For further information: Alain Prénoveau, Confederation of Aboriginal People of Canada, (514) 605-8652

Time for a reality check. Billy Carle claimed to be Mohawk from Kanehsatake, near Oka, Quebec, in the years after the so-called Oka Crisis. Where many saw devastation and ruined lives, Carle saw opportunity.  Sadly, for him, not a single person at Kanehsatake remembered him or supported his claim to Mohawkness. In fact, a bunch of Mohawk women would chase him out of the neighbouring town of Oka when he tried to hold a meeting there. Why there? Because no one would let him onto the Kanehsatake Territory.

Carle decided that if the Mohawk wouldn’t let him lead them to glory, he would change his creation story. Suddenly, he was Anishnabe from Kitigan Zibi near the town of Maniwaki on the Gatineau River north of Ottawa. Except (sigh, not again) no one remembered him or supported his claim to that Territory either.

It’s got to be tough to be a world leader – especially when people refuse to be led.

Carle then called for all native peoples of North America to convene in Hull to support his take over of the Indian Affairs building. I showed up on my bicycle, as I just happened to be passing by that day. I hoped to catch at least a whiff of Carle’s greatness. But, alas, Carle’s Chief of Security gave me the bum’s rush. I didn’t have a membership in Carle’s exclusive national organization (membership in the low teens). The Confederation of Aboriginal Peoples (absolutely meant to be confused with the Congress of Aboriginal Peoples) apparently did not want a real Indian to help take over Indian Affairs. Ah, bien. C’est la guerre. 

I do hope that all of those other Indigenous peoples from the West, and the North, and the South of Turtle Island who heard Carle’s clarion call to action weren’t as disappointed as I that day.

Yep, leading a revolution practically all by your lonesome can be pretty tough, especially when your little band of sycophants refuses to share your greatness with the rest of the world.

Carle didn’t let that disaster stop him. He managed to get some ink, thanks to the always gullible Ottawa Citizen and a profile that compared him to that other National Grand Pooh-bah, Patrick Brazeau, who in a strange twist that could only happen in the Wide Wide World of Weird also claims to be Algonquin (again with much head-scratching by the Anishnabe of Kitigan Zibi). The rationale for the story? Read on…

Carle inserted himself into a blockade in Parc La Verendrye set up by a group from Barriere Lake. Minor problem: they didn’t ask for, want, or suffer Carle’s interference or lust for fame and glory. In a rare display of gonads, Phil Fontaine, head of the Assembly of First Nations in Ottawa, told government authorities that Carle was (in so many words… how to put this gently…) a charleton, a shameless self-promoter, a fake.

Undaunted, Carle then set about to proclaim himself the National Grand Pooh-bah of all Aboriginal thingys in Canada. Yo!  Phil, Chairman Clem, step back. 

CTV took the bait and Carle wound up on Question Period, providing yet another notch in the journalistic belts of hosts Jane Taber and CTV News Parliament Hill Star Trek villian lookalike, Craig Oliver. Billy was on a roll.

This led to Steve Paikin convincing TVO in Toronto to charter a seat (yes, only a seat) on a plane for Carle to appear on his evening interview extravanganza, and its hundreds of viewers.

This string of successes no doubt had the Dalai Lama absolutely green with envy. (oh dahling, it clashes so with your saffron robes)

Shortly after conquering Turtle Island, Carle invited himself to Vietnam where he would liberate the poor and down-trodden. He took his entire organization (all ten of them) over there in an impressive show of solidarity forever. Of course, no one noticed – over there or upon his return to Canada. No huzzahs. No ticker tape parades down la rue de L’Annonciation in beautiful downtown Maniwaki.

Carle’s star fell from the heavens during that international mission to save all of the world’s Aboriginal types. It has remained sewer-bound ever since. 

The last gasp may have been that news release from April of 2008. Perhaps the Mohawk at Tyendinaga knew not what they had forsaken. Then again, maybe they did. 

It must be tough when you’re a jackass and nobody takes time to notice.

As for me, I miss the big lug. (snurfle)

p.s.: for a truly hilarious account of the battle for the hearts and minds of the good people of Kanehsatake, read this. (WARNING: shmohawk provides the link for edification and entertainment purposes only)

enuff alreddy

Done. Dat’s it. Dat’s all. Enough fooling around with graphics, themes, colours, formats, layouts. I’m done – until something else works better.

another confession

I did it. There’s no hiding anymore. I’m guilty as sin. More guilty than the Governor-General of Canada. I admit it. I have been to the Arctic, have hunted seal, have tasted warm seal meat… and I loved it. Every damn second, every single bite.

 

I have also brought arctic char south, have eaten it raw in my Toronto apartment. I did so at the same time that I shared my stash of whale blubber (muktuk) with a few friends, along with a tasty white wine. There!  I said it!  Guilty as charged – and damn proud of it too.

 

I don’t know too many people in Canada who have had the pleasure, the honour, of going onto the land or the water with an Inuk (singlular of Inuit) to hunt for food. I can say that I’m the only Mohawk I know who has ever done so. There may be others but I’ve never met them. 

 

I’ve been to the Arctic a few times. I’ve hitchhiked down the Mackenzie River from Wrigley to Norman Wells on my way to Inuvik. I’d been trapped by weather for days in Cape Dorset; happily trapped too. I’ve flown into and out of northern communities from northern Quebec to the the Delta. But I had never been on a hunt until I went to Taloyoak and later to Igloolik. 

 

Igloolik is on a small, windy, bit of rock between the western end of Baffin Island and the mainland. It took me an hour to walk around most of it one day, followed by a angry female falcon. I had been warned to watch out for escaped sled dogs that had gone wild, as well as wolves and polar bears. Maybe the falcon was keeping watch over me because nothing else came near.

 

It was a warm mid-summer and on some days it really seemed like summer. People shed their heavy coats and a few even strutted around in t-shirts. I stuck to my fleece pullover and a windbreaker because the wind could shift. Heavy ice might flow into and clog the harbour within hours. The sun could be reduced to a lighter spot in the dark sky by the fog.

 

One weekend, when the wind had shifted, clearing the harbour of ice, one of the trainees asked if I’d like to go seal hunting. He asked if I had ever done so before. It brought to mind an old saying by Hollywood stuntmen who, when asked if they could ride a horse, always answered: “Like the wind.”  He didn’t even raise his eyebrows when I used that one.  

 

The next morning at his house, he pointed his chin to a heavy sweater, pair of quilted overalls, and a outer coat, boots and leggings. It’s summer, I thought, confused. I thought I had already dressed for the weather.  It didn’t take long for me to know how wrong I was.

 

It was cold. I never got warm the entire five hours we were out on water. My feet were cold. My hands were cold. My eyeballs felt cold. It was damp and the cold seeped through all of those layers. The hunter, if he felt the cold, never showed it. All I saw was an intent look in his eyes as he scanned the waters ahead.

 

We headed out from Igloolik, into the Hudson Strait. We chugged along, making good speed. The water was calm. The skies clear. But, the hunter said, this could change with a snap of his fingers. He stopped the boat suddenly. Without a word, he picked up his rifle, put it to his shoulder, took aim in the gently rolling boat, and fired. I saw the bullet smack something that looked like a boxing glove about 200 feet away. The hunter nodded in satisfaction and moved the boat over to a seal which he hauled over the side. 

 

“They sink fast. You have to get them quick.”

 

Then we sat with the boat going up and down with the waves. We sat for about ten minutes or so, then he began to rub his hand back and forth along the side of the boat. Again, he pointed with his chin, this time out to what turned out to be another little boxing glove popping above the water, disappearing, and popping up again only closer.

 

“He’s curious,” the hunter said still rubbing the side of the boat.

 

The hunter kept this up until the seal entered his kill zone. Then he lifted his rifle, a small .22-calibre, not the large calibre weapon I expected. He fired one more shot. This is how the morning went. By the end of four hours, he had more than ten seals in the boat. He missed only one shot.

 

We headed toward a nearby island. I confess, again, that I was freezing despite the warm sun. It’s cold in a small boat in Arctic waters. That’s all I can say in explanation. It’s cold out there, and I was freezing.

 

We pulled into a long fjord and tied the boat to a rock. We climbed the steep hillside and sat ourselves in the warm sun. We drank hot, strong tea and chewed on hard biscuits. He showed me some small dark berries and picked some along with the leaves that he said his wife would use for teas.

 

I sat there, warm finally, enveloped in the quiet. Gentle breezes ruffled the hillsides. The hunter poked me in the shoulder, looking down toward the boat. “Leopard seal,” he said. There was a huge shadow that slowly rose near the boat and became a long grey thing sliding through the water. It was nearly as long as the 18-foot boat down there. The seal surfaced, breathed, and slipped back into the deep water and out of sight. Like that, he was gone. 

 

We spent another hour or so on the water. He bagged a few more seal. A storm came up suddenly. The wind tossed our boat around, and grabbed the hunter’s compass, flipping it end over end and over the side. He must have read my face because, man of few words, he said: “It’s okay. I know where we are.” 

 

All I could see through the wind and driving snow were white tops on the water. Then, he did a typical Inuk thing. He turned off the motor, leaned into the storage compartment in the bow, and began to make tea. What else does one do at a time like that?

 

Strange, I thought, but he was right. We sat there in the tossing boat and waited until the storm blew over and the wind calmed. Then he started up the boat again and we headed home. I saw nothing out there but he seemed certain about our direction. 

 

I almost didn’t notice when we pulled into Igloolik. He beached the boat, and we hauled the seal onto shore. Kids gathered like gulls, almost as noisy too. Other people showed up and nodded to me with a slightly confused look, then ignored me completely.

 

Knives came out. Seals were skinned, and dressed. The meat divided among families. The skins to be traded for fuel, ammunition, clothing and whatever else they needed. People picked up bits of heart or liver sliced with an ulu (woman’s knife), and slipped the still warm meat into their own or other people’s mouths. 

 

I joined the impromptu feast there on the beach. I loved every minute. I have no regrets. That’s my confession. I stand by it.

they’re just jealous

Gov-Gen and Official Hubby at Rankin INLET

(sigh) So Canada’s Governor-General, Michaëlle Jean, Her Royal Majesty’s stand-in, had a little raw seal during a visit to Rankin Inlet, Nunavut. (i heard one cbc news reader called it “Rankin Outlet,” but I digress).

Big deal. Previous Gov-Gen’s on northern trips – and even the Queen herself- have partaken of northern cuisine, including muktuk (whale blubber), musk ox and even raw caribou and raw arctic char – the original sushi. So what?

If Ms. Jean  had gone to China, she would have had genuine Chinese cuisine. If the visit took her to Saamiland in northern Scandinavia, she would have dined on reindeer. If her official visit had taken her to England… well, let’s not go there. And no jokes about so-called English cuisine or why the Queen really makes all of these trips abroad!

The point is: Stop being ridiculous! Seal is home food in the North. It’s healthier, tastier, more nutritious for Inuit than processed food from the south. Ms. Jean and her hubby were invited to a community feast. It would have been rude and disrespectful to turn down the offer.

Not good enough, according to some snooty Euro eco-freako-commie-pinkos, like this one:

“The fact that the Governor General in public is slashing and eating a seal, I don’t think that really helps the cause, and I’m convinced that this will not change the mind of European citizens and politicians,” Slee told The Associated Press.

IMHO, all those who tut-tut and wag their finger (and we know which one) are just being major jerk-balls coz they are stuck eating tofu!. Nuff sed.

ach, shame – again

Zap! Zuma.

First, they pulled it in April, just before South Africa’s elections because… someone complained it wasn’t balanced. Now, they’ve pulled it again, because “due process with regards to consultation has not been concluded,” according to an incomprehensible spokesperson at the South African Broadcasting Corporation.

“It” is a documentary on political satire that was produced by the SABC current affairs program, Special Assignment. The real beef, it seems, is with Zapiro.

“Zapiro” is the nom-de-lume of editorial cartoonist, Jonathan Shapiro. Yes, he’s the one who attached a shower head on Jacob Zuma’s bald pate. He installed that bathroom ornament in honour of El Presidente’s bizarre precautions after having sex with a woman who was HIV-positive. The former head of SA’s AIDS awareness effort didn’t slip a rubber on his ducky – he took a shower instead. Oy!

Enough about Zuma and the shower head though. It’s been retired, for the time being. No, Zapiro is on someone’s sh*tlist. The SABC apparently deems Zapiro not-ready-for-prime-time. Perhaps because Zap’s also he’s being sued by The Zoom ™ for another cartoon.

In the cartoon, Zapiro portrayed Zuma unbuckling his belt, while “Lady Justice” is held down by Zuma allies Julius Malema, Gwede Mantashe, Blade Nzimande and Zwelinzima Vavi.

Mantashe eggs Zuma on: “Go for it, boss!”

While Zuma’s allies claimed the cartoon was intended to project the ANC president as a rapist — even though Zuma was acquitted of rape in 2006 — Shapiro said the central meaning of the cartoon was “incredibly clear”.

“It showed Jacob Zuma, with the help of his political allies, threatening and intimidating the judiciary to try to manipulate the courts for him to be exonerated and escape going on trial [for corruption], thus paving the way for Zuma to become president,” said Zapiro.

He said he used Lady Justice to represent the South African judicial system, adding that the figure is recognised as a symbol of justice the world over.

The documentary also features material from the Z-News satire, which was produced by Zapiro and shows Zuma trying to flee from the National Prosecuting Authority and axed president Thabo Mbeki in drag, singing I Will Survive.

I hope this isn’t a sign that South African’s are prepared to let humourless idiots ruin things for them. They let that happen once before. Remember?

Please, please, please don’t let them dull your tongues because it’s one of the things I love most about your country.

Ummm… Let me rephrase that….

invasion – day 4

UPDATE:  No raid. Bad information. 

Every now and then, I’ll try to post information that’s come this way as updates to the raid that took place 4 days ago. There’s still a heavy police presence with about 20 vehicles at the SQ compound on the outskirts of Oka, one boat, one helicopter, and one armoured wagon (see pictures below). It seems the SQ are may be moving in again.

The helicopter’s been buzzing homes near the Pines again today. I saw them loading up at the SQ compound on my way into Kanehsatake about an hour ago. I suppose they need may want to provoke a reaction to justify use of all of the armour they brought for some pretty measely pickings. 1000 pot plants, 20 tomato plants, and… that’s about it.

I’ll head and and see about pictures. In the meantime, here are those pix at the SQ compound.

SQ armoured vehicle

SQ boat and helicopter