Whither Canada?

 

Morgentaler

Bill C-9 has now passed the Canadian House of Commons and is going to the Senate. It removes the religious exemption from the charge of hate. One can now be sent to prison for two years for quoting scripture, if the passage goes against current government views.

At this point, I wonder if Canada is redeemable. I wonder whether I live in Sodom and Gomorrah, or in Canaan. Indeed, I have wondered this since Henry Morgentaler was given the Order of Canada in 2008. How can I feel true patriot love for a country that formally honours someone for killing children? And actually in violation of the law of the day? How can I honour a nation that dishonours itself?

How can I honour a country that now allows unrestricted abortion? How can I tolerate allegiance to a country that will put the poor, the sick or the elderly to death? How can I revere a country that does not recognize private property, a government that freezes people’s bank accounts? This is all National Socialism only barely warmed over. This violates the terms of the social contract under which we can give allegiance to any government, as outlined in the American Declaration of Independence: government exists to protect our rights to life, liberty, and property. If a government, like the current Canadian government, instead violates our right to life, our freedom of speech, or our property rights, our duty is to overturn it.

I don’t even see, at this point, how electing a Conservative government could save Canada. 

Canada cannot become again a free country, firstly, unless all the “hate laws” are repealed, and the right to free expression as guaranteed in the Charter of Rights and Freedoms is at last honoured, as it is in the USA.

This much can be done. Euthanasia can be rescinded. Abortion can be criminalized. But I doubt the CPC or the electorate itself has the will. And the democratic will does not in itself equal freedom: Hitler in Germany was democratically elected.

As with Europe, Canadian culture and society is being flooded with mass immigration. It is madness, at the very time that the futurists and the high-tech mavens are advising that within a few years most human jobs will be obsolete. All new immigrants are potentially public charges.

We ought also, at that, to promote assimilation, not multiculturalism; the Canadian social fabric is fraying, not to mention access to basic services. But here we face a bigger problem: multiculturalism is actually enshrined in the constitution. Worse, the Canadian constitution is almost impossible to amend. 

We must also, urgently, end any fiction of aboriginal land title or special aboriginal rights. It doesn’t just hobble resource development, impoverishing the country: the courts have declared that aboriginal title supersedes private property. This cannot stand; nor can the basic notion of two classes of citizens with different rights. 

Unfortunately, again, aboriginal rights are enshrined in our current constitution, almost impossible to amend.

More generally, the authority given by the current constitution to the Canadian Supreme Court to reject, overturn, or demand, legislation of our elected bodies, is a violation of our democratic and our human rights. It is autocratic rule by an unelected clique. 

But this too cannot be corrected given our constitution.

Accordingly, we seem to face only three ways to save what we can of Canada as a free country. The first is revolution; but revolutions are always dangerous, and rarely turn out well. When you throw the royal sceptre in the street, there is no telling who will pick it up. The second is deconfederation: provinces could either go their own with their own new constitution, or separate in order to negotiate new terms of union. But this would require years of tumult, dislocation, and uncertainty. And the third is a takeover by a foreign power—most obviously, the US. They might impose a new constitution or governing system, as they did once for Japan. Or they might allow us to enter their union—and be given its protection for our rights.

Looking at each of the options, the one that seems surest, safest, and least painful is the last.

Just sayin’.

In Defense of Tobacco and Alcohol

 

My Chinese student had an interesting thought. With alcohol and tobacco made so expensive by government fiat in a place like Canada, what can the average Canadian do to escape their stress? It seems to him a cruel tax on the poor: those who cannot afford a vacation in Acapulco or a yacht or summer cottage or the like.

This prompts a second thought: is this in part why we have a growing crisis with fentanyl, suicide, self-harm, social discord, sudden violence, and “mental illness”? Because we have restricted access to relatively safe and less expensive opiates? 

Yes, we have marijuana expensively but extensively available. But cannabis has a different effect. Yes, we have growing access to video games. But these are not that calming; more exciting.

It is a strength of Chinese culture that they are sensitive to stress and its amelioration. I believe we in European and American culture are lousy at it. We ought to take some lessons here. Worth considering, at least.

The Solo Christian

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Kharg Island

There is much talk of the US seizing Iran’s Kharg Island. This makes sense; it gives the Americans control of Iran’s oil exports. Were I the Americans, though, I’d want three more islands: Qeshm, Hormuz, and Larak. These are in the Straits of Hormuz. The US could establish permanent bases there, and be able to control the Straits from then on, like the British at Gibraltar or, back in the day, Singapore. No more nonsense about the British, or the Qataris, or the Emiratis, not allowing them to use their bases on their territory.

Religious Extremism Is Not the Problem

 

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On Speaking in Tongues: The Real and the Bogus

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New Poetry Anthology

 

Today is Nowruz, the Iranian New Year celebration. And also the publication date for a new poetry anthology of poems in support of the current Iranian uprising. One of mine is included.

I urge all and sundry to order their own copy immediately. Show your support! At the link:

Where Words Defeat Bullets – Asemana Books