Tag Archives: politics

A Culture War Report: New Prosperity Mine

For the month of July I was living with my in-laws in Williams Lake. So on Monday, July 22nd, I was able to be present at the “first day of public hearings into Taseko’s proposed $1-billion open pit gold and copper mine near Williams Lake, B.C.”

I was working until about one o’clock that day but my mother-in-law, who is a teacher here in Williams Lake, first went downtown around lunchtime at which point two very separate information centers were happening.

Join us and have hot dogs galore!

At one camp, the Taseko mine representatives were serving burnt hot dogs to visitors. There wasn’t much of a crowd, but the vice president of the mine was offering her students jobs if the mine was allowed to come in.

Meanwhile, at the park nearby the Tsilhqot’in nation had prepared a lunchtime feast. There was music and dancing. Most of her friends were at the park. In fact, most of the crowd seemed to be at the park.

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Why I’m Not Afraid Of Crime

In my attempt to err on the side of caution in regards to confidentiality, I rarely speak about my job, let alone write about it. Such is the nature of social work. Even so, the subject of today’s post has been preying on mind for a while now, and while I’m still going to not disclose the entirety of what I do, I am going to put it out there that I am (essentially) a vocational counselor for individuals who have criminal backgrounds. I just want to show that I do have some basic understand of some of the things I’ll be discussing, and I’m not speaking  simply out of speculation. So what are we talking about today? Crime, criminals, and why you shouldn’t be afraid of either.

Except the Corleones, who are the Lannisters, but without the inbreeding… Oh wait- wasn’t there something up with the cousins in the 3rd movie? I try to suppress it…

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Evan and Gordon Talk: The UK Porn Ban

GORDON: Ladies and gentlemen, things are happening in England.

No, no that.

I’m talking about the recent decision by the Cameron government to make pornography blocked by default on British internet service.

EVAN: To segue into us talking about this in earnest, I thought it’d be good to go into our personal experience with this.

No, not that. Continue reading

Selling Sex: Abolition vs Regulation

Many people were introduced to the concept of Human Trafficking via the movie Taken where Bryan Mills’ (played by Liam Neeson) daughter is kidnapped and groomed for prostitution and he has to save her by killing everyone who has an accent.

Good Luck

Around the same time I watched the movie Taken I read a book called Invisible Chains by Benjamin Perrin. The book is a well documented account of Perrin’s investigation into human trafficking in Canada, an investigation that began internationally but ended up in his own backyard when he was “shocked to learn of a case of human trafficking in his hometown.” The book delves into several specific cases, and by specific, I mean horrific: “a 14-year-old from Ontario sold for sex on Craigslist; young women from the war-torn Congo and Colombia trafficked to brothels and massage parlours in Canada; a 21-year-old from Alberta who went missing in Las Vegas in 2006.”

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Shame Day: Sex, Money and the Canadian Senate

What do the following senators Pamela Wallin and Mike Duffy have in common?

They are both under scrutiny for wasting government money. Wallin, for charging 300,000 dollars of travel expenses to the Canadian Government under what she claims to have been “an accounting error” and Duffy for billing “both the Senate and the Conservative Party on the days that he campaigned for the Tory candidates.

But that’s not all. Continue reading

Fame Day: Us VS The US

A few weeks from now will see the 50th anniversary of the “March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom”- the “March on Washington” as it is abbreviated today. Through the sweltering heart, the Reverend Doctor Martin Luther King Jr. boomed out his famous “I Have A Dream” speech. Most everyone is familiar with the beginning, but lesser known is what King had to say later in the oration.

In a sense we have come to our nation’s capital to cash a check. When the architects of our republic wrote the magnificent words of the Constitution and the Declaration of Independence, they were signing a promissory note to which every American was to fall heir… It is obvious today that America has defaulted on this promissory note insofar as her citizens of color are concerned. Instead of honoring this sacred obligation, America has given the Negro people a bad check, a check which has come back marked “insufficient funds.”

But we refuse to believe that the bank of justice is bankrupt.

Now I have a tendency to rail on America. Having been at the pointed end of US foreign policy, I don’t believe I’m unjustified in doing so. But for everything that this nation let’s slide, for everything wrong, I can always count on some American to live out the example described by King and demand the US hold true to the noble ideals it claims it was founded upon. On this 4th of July, I’d like to showcase some of the men and women who I believe are standing up and speaking out. Continue reading