Kate McToxic

The Fabulous JJ went skimming over at the net's most influential septic tank. In a turn of prissy comedy, our lady of teh hate tries on some pearls for clutching. Seems we horrible awfuls use the swears and well, being a proper lady, KKKate just can't abide the thought of linking to us. I mean what would the good people at the bottom of the bell curve think? Far be it from us to distress the cult of the lowest common denominatrix, why, it would be just terrible to sully their daily dose of bigotry, spite and dishonesty with a naughty word. It must burn like the yeast in her leather riding gitch that a pol can admit to reading us while she proves toxic. After all, a riding association president reads our blog... gasp. Well, that's probably better than having a Provincial Premier disavow your "controversial" hate site. But don't worry Kate, while you're squatting at the tail pipe, sucking fumes, there's other politicians reading our site too, we get daily hits from the Privy Council, various ministerial offices and often the Conservative Party of Canada drops in to see what we think of them, site meter is lots of fun.

Getting Things Done Up Canadians

Who doesn't love that undersea rascal Spongebob Squarepants? Now you can welcome Spongebob into your home as a part of your personal health care equipment. Introducing the Spongebob rectal thermometer! When the little ones aren't feeling well, it can be very difficult to get them to cooperate with necessary treatment measures. Their innocent trust of a beloved cartoon friend can help ease the situation, they've opened their little hearts to Spongebob and now you can use him to open their, um...

Guaranteed to probably not turn your little fella ghey. Even takes accurate temperature measures of conservative kiddies!



Is there a Falwell in your life? Does the paranoid fear of an innocent cartoon cripple your already challenged neuronal pathways? Fear not conservative consumers, the free market is looking out for you too! Now, for the very first time anywhere, the fabulous Stevemometer! What could be more comforting than the very not gay face of Canada's new Prime Minister peering out of your arse whilst accurately and calmly assessing the truth of your rectal warming? He's had his head up his own ass for ages, now it's time he stuck his head up yours!

An O'Reilly Factor Christmas

Once again, the tides of laziness lap at my toes, so here for your delectation I submit another delightful Xmas memory. From December, 2005, a classic retold...

'twas the night before holiday
and there at fox news
not a sentient was stirring
neither brain cells, nor clues

gibson was nestled
all snug in the back
with his toilet brush head
wedged up his proverbial crack

but then from the studio
there arose such a clatter
that i sprang from my chair
spilling fish sticks (beer battered!)

i ran to production
and threw open the blinds
and there to my eyes
was a sight (the worst kind)

bill o'reilly in chaps
and his eyes were so wide
his talking points dangled
little lies and false chides

he brandished a loufa
his four cheeks were red
it was clear, holiday fever
had gone to his head

he cursed and he bellowed
damning heathens and you
for killing babies and christmas
with your secular views

so sudden he turned
and then with a roar
like bush, he went pulling
on the push exit door

he pummeled an intern
for their holiday wish
and took down a moderate
with a knee to the knish

he visited horror
upon all with his power
to lie and defame
on his spin and spun hour

he called out the media
he called out the stores
he throttled the truth
like his personal whore

soon he had spent
the last of his issue
the carpet was ruined
he called for a tissue

greasing the runners
of his dismal black sled
with the tallow he rendered
from the christmas war dead

he shot us the finger
then climbed o'er the side
he took up his whips
to sting the sweet hide

for there at the front
was a four pair, strong team
of flying butt monkeys
with a lash, he then screamed

on venom, on avarice
on vitriol and greed
on bully, on bastard
on liar and screed

we waited until we saw
the very last of the shape
of that cruel lying prick
and his aviating apes

our stomachs resettled
no more gorge on the rise
as the echoes soon faded
from his last venal cries

we take things for granted
in our holiday stride
like blowhards and bullshit
from those drunk on pride

but never a holiday
was so betrayed, 'til we heard
"i will get them"
in bill's very own christmas words

- for bill o'reilly,
professional asshole

A Republican Senator...

...having misplaced his fiddle, hurries back to the Senate for an important values vote.

The War On Christmas

Having just visited the eminent Mr. Driftglass, I see he has solved the laziness issue by recycling posts from Wars on Christmas past. Smart him! Since I happen to have a bit or two stashed away for such occasions, I steal his idea. Now then, not much of anything brightens the War On Christmas season quite like kicking the crap out of the ever obnoxious John Gibson from Faux News Nutwerks. So here then, a blast from the past, this hails from my old and abandoned blog, The Terminal Velocity of Sausage, Dec. 2005 edition.

christmas. the holidays. a season of giving. celebrating the birth of the christ child. a time of peace, joy and good will to all men (and women too, right? they're sort of like men, but they smell better). every year the sacred advertisers remind us of bargains and the must-have items, for which the son of god sacrificed his life. this is the season most cherished by believers around the world. why, right now, the christian citizens of the holy lands are scouring the arid hills, looking for pine trees. its a tradition! and just like in the bible, news of the son of god, born to a virgin, is heralded throughout the world, by a fat nordic elf. for in olden times, the elven folk were revered as tinkers, toymakers and sys-admins.

but some bad people want to take all of that joy away. imagine, the long, dark nights of december stripped of popcorn strings, non-biodegradable, mylar tinsel and twinkle lights. no more sad anthropomorphic snowmen. no more flying arctic ruminants. rudolph, we hardly knew ya. but fear not, citizen, all the news that's fit to scribble has your back. (cue thin lizzy's classic: the boys are back) oh yea, fox's dyspeptic duo are on the case. answering the cries of the woefully oppressed and vast majority of americans, watch as john gibson plays cockrobin, to big bill o'reilly's wingbatman. in this episode they set their steely gaze on those insidious fiends, the...

"Anti-Christmas Warriors"

"I was away for a few days and the war on Christmas exploded."

thank gracious that john gibson was protected from the blast by his exoskeletal hair.

"Bill O'Reilly's been leading the charge and uncovering tons of places where someone is trying to change the name of the tree or change the name of the season."

gosh, wingbatman, you sure are swell. is that the sound of bowing and scraping? if o'reilly and gibson lead a charge, it'll be straight to the craft table and god help any interns that get in their way. but what of this tree? it has a name? oh, that's right, the appropriated religious symbol tree. but the season, come on now. don't be messing with the name of the season. i mean, i was like every other kid in school, we counted the days, hours and minutes, from the first whisper of snow to the last second when the buzzer sounded, and we were off. there was nothing like it. we'd laugh and wrestle in the snow, our breath steaming as we dreamed about all the things we'd get, all the things we'd do, the treats to eat and the days off school. man. nothing ever beat the holiday season. a week off school, well more like nine days when you count the weekends, that was awesome. entire days to spend at the rink playing pick up hockey after laying in bed for hours. lots of time to watch tv, except all the good stuff got bumped for crappy specials, with has-been stars singing medleys and trying to look sober. my favourite, getting to stay up until midnight on new years eve, what kid didn't love the holiday season?

"You'd think saying the word Christmas would kill some people."

oh but what if it could? talk about a wet dream for these guys, 'hey sanjay, christmas.' *thud* imagine the cheery jingle of laughter as o'reilly wades through the corpses of the unbelievers.

"On my own network, ultra lefty liberal Neal Gabler called me a demagogue for even bringing the subject up. If Neal were in charge I'd be sent off to a Khmer rouge re-education camp to make sure that there is no war on Christmas was beat into my head."

never one to shy away from wielding an unwieldy sentence, eh john? perhaps using demagogue, is just a polite way to avoid having to call you a whore, what with your new book being called, 'the war on christmas', soon to be discarded in a bus station toilet near you. a round of applause for mr. gibson's delicate rhetorical restraint. as the concise oxford would have it, a factious orator appealing to the prejudices of the masses, demagogue, shoe and fit. mind you, gibson's a simple sort, he probably thinks the word means he's somehow a democrat, on account of it starts with the same letters. but this is a war, damn it...right? and in war, people who disagree with you also want to send you thirty years back in time, to be tortured by a monster who was created by illegal acts of war and depredation, committed by an american republican president. makes sense.

"But par for the course, Neal is almost always wrong. And his co-panelists on Eric Burns' show "FOX News Watch" are so fatigued from trying to counter his out in deep orbit diatribes that they hardly put up a fight anymore."

and by extension, or projection if you prefer, john gibson is almost always right. perhaps that fatigue is just the failure of empty talking points to serve as coherent rebuttal to an argument, but hey, what do i know? maybe fox just needs to hire a better class of commentator.

"Another guy on television somewhere called me the worst person in the world."

oh stop bragging. o'reilly scored a trifecta.

"I tried to imagine how that could be possible, like maybe the guy is seeing my hair on the real worst people. You never know. Maybe this explains why he could say such a thing."

well, the worst people should have the worst hair. or perhaps keith olberman just likes to call an arse an arse. as for explanation, the wounded pretense is more than just a bit coy, coming from a man who, only paragraphs ago, stated that a liberal commentator would ship him off to the khmer rouge, if he could.

"Look, denial is the name of the game with the anti-Christmas warriors. They deny they are changing the name of the Christmas tree. "Everybody knows this country has been calling the thing a holiday tree or a giving tree. Where did we ever get the silly idea it was a Christmas tree?"

oh, oh, made up quotes! that's the best. i love made up quotes! "the christmas insurgents are fighting a rear guard action to rename all conifers, christmas." oh, i love the new kitchen cabinets, is that knotty christmas? imagine how much cheerier funerals will be, when the deceased is laid out in an old christmas box. i don't have a tree, but if i did, i'd call it a brutus tree and i'd hide all of popeye's spinach under it.

"The same thing with the war. They are denying it is happening. Accusing me of making up a phony war. But none will say the incidents in my book didn't happen. Instead they say it's just a few people who've gone over the top, not really a countrywide movement."

at first i goggled. i re-read those first few sentences a couple of times. then i realized, he's still talking about this trivial, made up kerfuffle, he's not talking about the war. what is at issue, is a backlash against what christmas has become, a high pressure sales pitch that starts in autumn and builds relentlessly for weeks and months. its a mall powered juggernaut of commerce, manipulation and excess. the hearth and home, traditional christmas still exists in hundreds of thousands homes. a quiet time for the gathering of friends and families. some religious, some not. and i am quite sure that muslim, hindu, hopi and the other kinds of french-americans, all look at a lit up conifer and see a christmas tree. aren't they pretty. they aren't overtly religious and you're welcome to them. but things like nativity scenes in government buildings are pretty graphic representation of one religion and could be seen as official sanction of that religion. plus, they're usually pretty tacky looking anyway.

"Well, I think not. I hear it all the time from my e-mailers and from callers to the radio shows I do and from people who walk up to me on the street."

ahem, when i meet people who agree with me, they tell me that i'm right and that proves it.

"It's like the secret bombing of Cambodia. It was a secret from everybody except the people getting bombed. Same deal here. People trying to keep Christmas in schools and parks and libraries and city halls know about the war on Christmas."

gibson has a point here. it seems quite obvious that he has indeed been getting bombed. and hitting the pipe as well, i'd guess. i suppose, if you're going to go for a stupid and inappropriate analogy, you should go for the stupidest and least appropriate one available. to even pretend that a parallel can be drawn is a dishonesty that borders on pathological.

"The people waging this war are trying to keep it secret. But it's too late. They have been outed."

outed. outed. does he mean that...no. it can't be. fags hate christmas? because you just know how mr. gibson feels about gay rights and all. well, i for one can't believe it. none of my queer friends would pass up the opportunity to celebrate, dress up, decorate and (worst of all) socialize.

"That's My Word."

you say that as though you're proud john. but your word isn't worth the methane that delivers it.

Blog Awards, No Prize

Well, fuckery is afoot. Seems the best of intentions lead to rectal discomfort. And when describing pains of the ass, the name SUZANNE springs to mind. Over at the Canadian Blog Awards a request was made for a category to recognize the best in feminist blogging. Now that seems fair enough, given the number of potential nominees, but it just won't do. Instant acrimony takes hold with demands for anti-feminism and masculanism categories and things devolve from there. As of the closing of the comments, after much waffling and sock tasting, and pending a decision from the co-Operators of the awards, suzie has her victory as Northern BC Dipper states:

“...Best Feminist Blog” cannot be done, as it is unacceptable to some."

Here's what I think, it doesn't matter one iota whether or not a contentious slag like suzie likes or can accept the category. She wouldn't be in the category and her only purpose in objecting is to be a prick. Hell, that aggregation would make it easier for her to decide who to flick snot at. There are lots of Canadian writers whose identities are strongly tied to their feminist ideals and they deserve to be recognized by their peers. I think Saskboy and BCDipper had the best of intentions and I think they are more surprised than anybody to see their good intentions go up in stink. Sadly, they allowed themselves to be buffaloed by suzie and a couple of bellicose tweezer heads.

I don't consider myself a feminist. I tend to think of myself as an egalitarian (I know, I know) but I would self identify as pro-feminist. There are certain areas of feminist thought that I don't agree with and I am a middle aged white male but for the most part I think that feminism has been a vital aspect of change for the better in our society. And while it ain't my place to make demands, I'd like to stand by my friends. Strike the canadiancynic nomination(s) from the ballot please. If suzie has veto power, then the awards have failed, they mean less than nothing.

Update:

Having followed the various threads concerning this issue and the responses to it, I can't get over how the feminists are being demonized as drama queens and hopped up trouble makers. Yet somehow, lying scum like runner are posting volumes of negative swill over in the awards sham threads and not being called up on the carpet for their spite and spittle. So the awards can get stuffed. I left this in the threads over yonder:

runner opines:

"The request to have a feminist category was not offered in a nice manner. "

here is the very first mention of the issue from berlynn:

"I have a concern. There’s no Best Feminist Blog."

runner, no need to lie.

runner, you aren't a feminist, as you state. but there are a population of feminist bloggers on the canadian scene. it doesn't matter if you read them, like them, agree with them or what not. they exist and they are a unique element of the blogging populace. the invective here started with suzie all-caps. the "drama" that is a result is in response to the vituperative tone of suzie and yourself and a few others. however unfortunate the outcome, the blame lies with suzie all-caps and the waffling ops.

sometimes, for every inaction there is a just and angry reaction. the ops of the awards gave suzie all-caps a tacit veto. there is unlikely to be a compromise solution to a compromised situation. cc has already stated his disinterest in the awards for his own reasons, as a co-blogger at canadiancynic i can't see hanging with this charade. so with apologies to those that nominated us, please pull us off the ballot.

Weepy Pete's Big Day

Defence Minister Peter MacKay is unharmed after being successfully bundled away from a Taliban rocket attack near Kandahar. CTV reports,

"His security detail very quickly jumped into action, grabbed all their gear, rushed to a light-armoured vehicle and basically scuttled Mr. MacKay away to safety," Bill Graveland, a reporter for The Canadian Press, told CTV Newsnet from Kandahar on Tuesday."

The Taliban were apparently fooled into thinking that increased helicopter activity in the area meant the presence of someone important. It was only Peter MacKay. It is unclear if a neighbour's dog will be airlifted into the area for photo opportunistic pictures and solace. Having replaced the tainted and ineffectual Gordon O'Connor as Minister of the Defence Lobby, weepy MacKay was making his first trip to the region. After successfully retreating back to the Kandahar Air Field, MacKay delivered the following analysis of events to the press,

"There was an explosion. It was a loud bang," said MacKay. "When it happened, we heard the explosion, we heard the whistle overhead, we were told to get down and we did."

Clearly, Peter MacKay's expertise is equal to the task. Undaunted by the event, MacKay will stay on in the embattled area to perpetuate the misinformation he was sent to spread. Aiding in that task was Colonel Stephane Lafaut,

"...Lafaut, commander of the Canadian Operational Mentor Liaison Team, said the attack shows how desperate the Taliban have become since coalition forces have limited their movement in the region."

Yes, the Taliban have been reduced to rocket attacks that injured four Canadian soldiers and sent a cabinet minister scuttling for safety. Surely a sign of progress and another corner turned in that troubled land. MacKay will continue his mission, such as it is,

"MacKay is supposed to be using the trip to trumpet successes in Afghanistan, including an economy that has tripled in size and improvements in access to health care and education."

Isn't it amazing what heroin and the arms trade can do for an economy?

Commies and Muslims, oh my.

Alright. CC is going on vacation and a richly deserved one at that. Few bloggers are able to maintain the pace that he has established here. So while CC recharges his batteries I will attempt to keep the posts coming as best I can. In CC's honour it only seems right that we give serial dimwit Joel Johanessen a swift kick.

To be honest I don't read poor Joel's musings for the same reason I don't drink out of the toilet, it's intellectually unsanitary. I'll soil my synapses this once, as tribute or penance, you decide. Today Joel is all atwitter about a meeting of Marxists as reported in the Post. With a title like "Canada’s commies, um, and Muslims, and um others, gather in Toronto" you can be assured of, um, quality analysis.

From the top, "Some people—especially liberals—think I’m Joel the blogger A.K.A: Captain Hyperbole, or Joel McCarthy; but actually, I’m just way ahead of you.  Or on to you.  And I call it the way it is. 
Almost as if to help prove me right, which they do almost every day, the Marxists of Canada—um, and Muslims and Kyoto bible-thumpers—gather in Toronto this weekend for the four-day Marxist “Festival of Resistance”.

Indeed, what all of the literate folk see as Joel's chittering idiocy is just proof that he's, um, on to us. On to us like the politically deceased Rick Santorum on a puppy. I'm not sure quite what Joel believes is being proved by a meeting of politically disenfranchised fringe types. Given Joel's strangled prose, I doubt he's sure either. Whatever, he's quite sure that he's almost sure of something and it involves lefties of some sort and Muslims and it must be bad. Onward...

"The National Post is covering the story, although they serve to mainstream it more than properly marginalizing the radical communists as they should any group of fringe leftist radicals and agitators who call President Bush a “terrorist”, see below, —and like the liberal media so often does to those awful “Christians”, for example, unfortunately: Participants are totally mainstream liberals, seems to me, as judged by this t-shirt ..."


National Post - Colin O’Connor photograph

Well, if a t-shirt is all the evidence one needs to define 'totally mainstream liberals', it explains Joel's execrable language skills. All of that reading is just a waste of time. T-shirt - case closed. Joel follows this, which is the full extent of his analysis with a couple of paragraphs from the Post article with a few highlighted phrases that point out the enemies:

"devoted to a discussion about building unity between Muslims and the left"

"green activists, the anti-war movement, the transgendered, members of First Nations, traditional Islam."

“Out of Afghanistan and into Kyoto.”

"Professor of sociology"

And that's it. That's the sum total of what Joel derived from the article. Followed by a snap of some literature with the following remark,

"Betcha they take VISA and MasterCard and American Express at their li’l book stand featuring communism and socialism books, and global warming books, and of course feminism books! And hey: what self-respecting —or good ‘n self-loathing— liberal or member of Layton’s you’ve got to be kidding party hasn’t read Noam Chomsky’s fabulous writings?"

Cripes why read Chomsky when you can get the crystalline fabulosity of Joel Johanessen for free. Shame that reading thing hasn't infected Joel, he might have made it a little further into the article which is busy almost proving his almost points. Remember how all of us liberals and our dastardly media were always hurting the feelings of the poor benighted Christians? Well one might imagine a bunch of Marxists would be pretty harsh in dealing with the Godly. Or not so much:

"At one point, a self-proclaimed Trotskyite in his 20s stood and for about three minutes declared his "absolute hostility" to all religions. The crowd shouted him down. Several speakers later, Benoit, a 40- year-old from Gatineau who delivered his intervention sitting down, said that when he last read the Communist Manifesto, it did not say, "Atheist Communist workers of the world unite." Minutes later, the Trotskyite slinked out."

And then there was that whole t-shirt as proof of thesis thing, "Not one T-shirt that read "Eat the Rich" could be found anywhere." In all fairness to Joel, reading entire articles is a lot of work. Let's give the last word to Craig Offman, the author of the Post article since Joel doesn't even bother to credit him:

"Inclusiveness is the buzzword here, where the members of this hodge-podge gathering can be overheard calling each other brother and sister. Participants call this membership drive "building unity," a much-repeated mantra throughout the opening night. Self-proclaimed Marxist James Clark, who helped organize the event, said that while there are disparate groups in attendance, they can all still rally around a slogan like "Out of Afghanistan and into Kyoto."
Gatherings like the one this weekend at the University of Toronto are an attempt to get the party restarted. Let's face it: Das Kapital is not selling like hotcakes anymore.
Maps of the world are no longer crowded with country names that begin with expressions such as the People's Republic. Almost all of the movement's Great Leaders are now waxed and tucked away in grand mausoleums. Some socialists are looking at the dissolution of Communism as an opportunity.
"We're looking at a new beginning," said liberal thinker Stanley Aronowitz, Distinguished Professor of sociology at the Graduate Centre of the City University of New York. "We're no longer based on the existence of nation states. We must reinvent ourselves."
None of this sounds very Marxist, does it?"

Nope, doesn't sound very Marxist at all. And here's my bet, Joel, in his highlighting, pointed out the Professor of Sociology. Who'd like to wager that the twit doesn't realize that sociology and socialism aren't the same thing? Joel Johanessen, ladies and gentlemen, still as dumb as a box full of snot.

Missing in Action?

Former Speaker of the House, Dennis Hastert, has been awfully quiet of late. Here he relaxes as he rides out his final term and waits for either his investments, ahem, to mature or his name to surface in any of a number of investigations.



It will be interesting to see whether the ousted silverback manages to escape the building tide of the US Attorney scandal. Hmm, maybe not so much, "On March 14, 2007 Sen. Peter Fitzgerald "believes Rove was trying to influence the selection in reaction to pressure from Rep. Dennis Hastert, then speaker of the House, and allies of then-Gov. George Ryan, who knew Fitzgerald was seeking someone from outside Illinois to attack political corruption."

space porn

Growing up as a little kid in the 60s, the conquest of outer space was the single greatest thing ever. The weeks before and the months after the Apollo missions were filled with wonder. Pop stars were fabulous creatures but astronauts, man, astronauts were elevated beings. Pun fully intended. When Armstrong stepped onto the moon's surface, the whole world seemed to stop. I still get excited by the achievemnets of space exploration. This may be among the coolest things I've ever seen.

A million miles from Earth. Check out this video of the moon's transit across the face of the sun. Awesome would be the right word.

Update:
In my excitement to get back to looking at amazing images and vids, I neglected to say that I found this site via boingboing. Also, upon snooping around the rest of the Nasa Stereo site. They have 3-D animations and imagery of solar phenomena, mission craft and all manner of fabulous goodies. Now then, where can I find me a pair of those 3-D glasses with the red and blue lenses?

cat mimicry

here is iggy doing her best imitation of goombah thinking up a new comment.

i read your mail today, oh boy...

be afraid, be very afraid.

i'm not a lawyer. i've had the blood tests, i can prove it. crooks & liars points at this piece of legislation headed for the floors of congress:

"Internet Stopping Adults Facilitating the Exploitation of Today's Youth Act (SAFETY) of 2007 (Introduced in House) HR 837 IH"

the sexual exploitation of children can be summed up in three words: deeply evil madness. something is very wrong with people who are sexually attracted to children. children are the sacred people. we, individually and as communities, are duty and honour bound to protect children from harm and exploitation.

and while i don't argue the stated ends, i certainly question the proposed means. the bill is entitled:

"H. R. 837
To amend title 18, United States Code, to protect youth from exploitation by adults using the Internet, and for other purposes."

these are the folks introducing the bill:

"Mr. SMITH of Texas (for himself, Mr. FORBES, Mr. GALLEGLY, Mr. CHABOT, Mr. FEENEY, Mr. FRANKS of Arizona, and Mr. PENCE) introduced the following bill; which was referred to the Committee on the Judiciary"

the upshot, via the the agonist, is that the law, "...would require ISPs to record all users' surfing activity, IM conversations and email traffic indefinitely." well isn't that swell. seems to me that this is a shell game. the nsa has been hampered in recording the private communications of the nation. this is the elegant solution, hide an invasive, blanket surveillance act (and the death of privacy rights) in legislation on an emotionally powerful issue.

i'm going to hope that the better instincts of the authors were overcome by zeal and not by malice. yes, the prevention and prosecution of pedophiles is vital, but at what cost? the only letters i've written and snailed in the last few years, have been legal papers and business paperwork. the rest of my correspondence is online. if you're reading this, i doubt your world is shaped much different. think this doesn't affect canada? how much of our web and email traffic gets routed through american servers, nodes and portals? each transient residence in the servers is subject.

but you aren't a diddler and neither am i? nothing to worry about. right? if these rules go into effect. the queue of lawyers will wind over the horizon. what copyright holder wouldn't want unfettered access to the entirety of the web traffic of the land. every "illegal" download subject to prosecution and litigation. i imagine the legal team at universal music group are wearing lobster bibs to catch the drool. what branch of law enforcement wouldn't want to go crime-fighting in your private data? and if all of that information is being phished for one crime, why not a host of crimes?

this is over reach with staggering implications, this sort of draconian measure could stop the web in its tracks and roll digital culture back a generation.

whack-a-troll day

next...

"goombah said...
Comparing a monument sitting in a public space (since removed) to forcing an individual to act against his religious convictions is nonsense. Surely someone of your self-proclaimed wit and intelligence can find better examples to get your panties in a twist over. Give it a try."

look goombah (and thank you for not being annonymous), the marriage commissioner's religious convictions are irrelevent. such convictions are their own business. that commissioner simply does not have the right to inflict those beliefs on other people's lives. full stop. period. you're offering a legal service. you do not get to choose your customers. you are not representing yourself, you are representing the dominion of canada.

the job title is civil marriage commissioner. by definition, one who performs marriage ceremonies with no religious context. the marriage, a contractual agreement between two consenting persons, that are legally free to marry, is notarized by this minor state functionary. since when does some soft assed bureaucrat's supernatural stance trump the legal rights of two citizens?

one of the popular gambits of the trollosphere(tm) is the civility jive. please, someone explain to me just how this commissioner or his supporters canmake any claim to civility. imagine. on your wedding day, you gather those closest to you, family, friends and loved ones. you plan a quiet, private civil ceremony followed by a fabulous meal, drinks and dancing. you anticipate sharing old memories and forging new ones. people have travelled to join your celebrations. it is a big day, even if it doesn't have a religious component.

so there you are, nervous, excited, it all seems to be happening so fast. you take a breath and someone decides to throw a wrench in your works. you're held up at the counter, functionaries huddle and buzz. someone tells you there's been a delay, you ask why. they tell you, the commissioner refuses to perform your ceremony because he disapproves of your lifestyle. he disapprovse of you.

he also disapproves of your intended, the one you love. by extension and through cavalier disregard, he disapproves of and offends your family and friends. the kick off to the biggest day of your life ruined by some sanctimonious twerp. this has less than nothing to do with religious convictions and everything to do with bigotry. will the commissioner join two multiple divorcees? you bet your praying beads he will, despite that being adultery, if you want to get all fundamental on it. he'll do his job in the face of one of god's laws that actually made it into the commandments, with a shalt not and everything. just which biblical admonitions do you get to enforce? how do you know which ones don't apply to you? like, judge not...

speaking of commandments, that "public place" wasn't just a public place. it was the house of justice, the seat of civil arbitration under the laws of the people and the laws of the land. certainly, ancient laws influenced modern jurisprudence but one could argue that any number of documents were more vital to the shape of the law than ten common sense rules for a nascent cult to survive. look up british common law sometime, magna carta and all that.

a massive monument of one religious law tells the public that justice isn't blind. that justice isn't impartial. that your hope for a fair trial might be lessened by dint of faith. it all comes down to the desire to impose one's individual personal law upon others. this is not about following one's religious convictions, this is about establishing primacy of faith. this is inverse to civility. these small incursions and self proclaimed magical rights are no less that small usurpations of state by church.

would it still be a forced act against religious conviction, if a pagan dentist refused to fix your toothache late on a friday afternoon, because of the prominent cross around your neck? you, who's church hunted, killed and tried to eradicate her spiritual forebears. would her right to religious conviction trump your right to impartial care? because after all, there's more than one dentist. her deep faith in her gods and goddesses is no less significant than your belief in your god. and son. and etherial partner. right? after all, if you get a bye for your belief, shouldn't everybody get to play? moslems believe with great conviction. what laws and rules can they ignore out of respect for their faith? too inflammatory? what with the campaign to brand every moslem a heartless killer. let's try a more benign faith. what rules of sexual modesty is a tantric devotee allowed to skip? how many brides will the offshoot mormon elder be allowed before someone tut-tuts.

or is it only your deeply held belief that counts?