Saturday, April 22, 2006
Another broken CPC promise: Funding for the arts.
Briefly, based on a partial clip from CBC Radio One a few minutes ago, Minister of Canadian Heritage and Status of Women Bev Oda now says that, when she originally promised that the arts would be funded, she was speaking only "for herself." Links, anyone?
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12 comments:
Yessiree! I heard it too. It was on CBC "The House" and her words, after being confronted about establishing long-term funding for the arts were... "I was speaking for myself."
This audio link is available but it takes a while to get to the correct part. (Real Player)
So she was going to provide long-term funding term for the arts ... out of her own pocket? Damn, that's generous. :-)
Why should the government fund the arts? Do what other people do. Get a job, do your art after. If no one will pay for it, or pay to see it, then do something else.
Wayne:
Why should the government subsidize the churches or the Catholic school system?
Maybe they will get real artists jobs like air brushing helmets or harleys.
And an election gig on the broadcast network they want to shut down.
hi wayne. i'm an artist. i have never asked for, nor have i received government funding. i work a crappy day job. i pay my way. i've managed to make a living by my craft for a few years at a time. between rounds, i work. i work to purchase, upgrade and repair equipment. i work to pay for the hours and hours of time in the studio. i work to pay for a place to work in and from.
i'm lucky. i'm in the performing arts and i can suppliment my art by gigging. a lot of artists toil in obscurity for years to produce their singular creations. you can't trot a forge down to the local pub and put on a casting. artists are fundamental to our economy. every place you look, you're life is informed and surrounded by art. the support of an artistic community is essential to the growth not only of our identity, in this disparate and cherished nation, but also the economy.
art is big money and canada is a land of incredible talent. that talent pool is a vital natural resource, we would be fools not to exploit it. that exploitation requires nurturance. if we are to evolve into a significant culture, it is through our art that we will be remembered. take a trip to florence and look at the surviving wonders that the patronage of the arts provide.
by your logic, why should we give money to athletes. all they do is run around looking smug and healthy. national sports programs? get a job leeches.
as for ms. oda, watch out for the coming of the flashlights, clenched between the teeth of the copyright squads. she has threatened to unleash her new copyright act soon. fair well, fair use.
I agree with you cc 100%.
I can admire pretty shaved ape. A person that works a crap job to follow his or her passions. Excellent. That is what produces great art. Real art cannot be created with funding. I agree why give money to athletes, they do run around looking healthy, when their bodies are falling apart from injuries (sometimes drug use). I also agree that Oda should not get rid of fair use.
noel m. Farmers do have jobs, so do their wives. If they did not have jobs they could not farm. The problem right now is, huge corporations are making record profits, while farmers are going broke. By not funding farmers, the farms get bigger and bigger. They then get so big that they use herbicides, pesticides and fertilizers just because. When you have a smaller farm you walk the fields and only use what is necessary. Not funding farmers destroys the enviroment. Not funding arts, sports or religous schools does not hurt the enviroment.
Wayne: You know how conservatives are always calling lefties "commies"? Well, one of the whole communism thingies is to take away all forms of creativity, so that the population becomes one homogeneous mass, concenrating on nothing but work. Well, taking away art funding is a little like that. It takes some of the colour out of Canadian culture. Speaking as an artist working in science, there is NO time to dabble after work. There is no creativity left, just tired. Creativity needs to be cultivated.
I am beginning to wonder more and more why I keep getting "shut up you commie" whenever I post on a Conservative blog when the conservative government is pulling these oppressive stunts over and over. MAybe art is a liberal thing?
Well, it doesn't surprise me, only saddens me. In the CPC platform they barely made mention of the arts. Culture is simply not on their radar - they don't care.
CC: They never promised anything for the arts to begin with, so how can it be a broken promise?
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