Dear retailers:
When I'm shopping, what I want to know is how many dollars I have to give you to acquire a specific product. I don't care why I have to pay you which dollars, I don't care where the money is allocated. I just want to know how much money I have to pay. Including the eco-fee in the sticker price does this. However, adding it on as a separate line item at the register is completely useless and makes me feel cheated, like those phone companies that advertise a low price and then add a system access fee and a 911 fee and a touch-tone fee (how are system access and 911 and touch tone not part of phone service?) or when I get my hydro bill and see a charge of $12 for the electricity I used and then an additional nearly $30 in regulatory charges and delivery charges and debt retirement charges and administrative charges.
Itemizing bills like this is useless. It's as meaningless to me as if you tell me that $X went to raw materials and $Y went to labour and $Z went to transportation costs. I don't care! Just tell me how many dollars you want for it! Posting one price and then adding additional fees that either aren't posted or that you have to look hard for is completely uninformative. "This costs $15, plus some extra amounts that we aren't going to tell you."
I blogged before about how I want them to include sales tax in the price, and some people mentioned that it used to be that way and people found it untransparent. So if they want to provide a breakdown on the price tag and/or on the receipt, that's fine. But please, I implore you, make the big price on the label the total, including eco-fees (and, ideally, sales taxes and any other additional fees there might be). Doing this would make me feel full-informed. Not doing it makes me feel cheated.
Sunday, July 11, 2010
Friday, July 09, 2010
Immigration policy FAIL
This article mentions in passing the Canadian immigration policy I hate the most:
I absolutely detest the fact that if you want to sponsor your spouse to come to Canada, Immigration has to approve the match. And they reject applications on such ridiculous grounds as a five-year age difference in a couple in their 30s.
Now you might be thinking "But this guy ended up being a fraud. They were right to reject his application!" But if they were going to reject his application because he's a fraud, it should have been on the grounds that he's a fraud. Using a five-year age difference as a reason to reject an application destroys any credibility they might have had.
As Canadian citizens, we can marry each other as stupidly as we want. I could propose to that scraggly homeless guy who walks around wrapped in a blanket with no pants and offer him an air conditioned apartment and a dental plan in exchange for spider-killing services and the right to use the phrase "my husband" in casual conversation. It would undoubtedly be a foolish thing to do, but at no point in the process would any government official scrutinize our relationship to evaluate whether it's a suitable match.
We also need to be able to enter into international marriages that are suboptimal matches, or foolishly impulsive, or ill-advised, or consensual marriages of convenience. As long as both parties fulfill the sponsorship agreement and they aren't defrauding each other, anything goes. If Immigration truly has to investigate relationships to prevent fraud, they need to figure out a way to detect genuine fraud without deeming invalid perfectly consensual marriages that are beyond the reach of some petty functionary's imagination. If a relationship can be deemed unsuitable because of a five-year age difference, what other perfectly legitimate relationships are being rejected?
Our country decided, long before I was born, that the state has no business in the bedrooms of the nation. This should also apply for immigration policy.
Badwal [age 35] met Shahi, 30, online in 2006. She lived in Brampton; he lived in a dusty village in Punjab, India. Soon, they exchanged photographs and were chatting on the phone. In November 2007, Badwal, who then worked for the Royal Bank of Canada, went to India and they got married.
“I totally believed he was the right person for me,” said Badwal. “He was open-minded, nice, attentive ...”
She returned to Canada and, in March 2008, filed an application to sponsor him. In December, the application was rejected because of the age difference and compatibility issues, said Badwal.
I absolutely detest the fact that if you want to sponsor your spouse to come to Canada, Immigration has to approve the match. And they reject applications on such ridiculous grounds as a five-year age difference in a couple in their 30s.
Now you might be thinking "But this guy ended up being a fraud. They were right to reject his application!" But if they were going to reject his application because he's a fraud, it should have been on the grounds that he's a fraud. Using a five-year age difference as a reason to reject an application destroys any credibility they might have had.
As Canadian citizens, we can marry each other as stupidly as we want. I could propose to that scraggly homeless guy who walks around wrapped in a blanket with no pants and offer him an air conditioned apartment and a dental plan in exchange for spider-killing services and the right to use the phrase "my husband" in casual conversation. It would undoubtedly be a foolish thing to do, but at no point in the process would any government official scrutinize our relationship to evaluate whether it's a suitable match.
We also need to be able to enter into international marriages that are suboptimal matches, or foolishly impulsive, or ill-advised, or consensual marriages of convenience. As long as both parties fulfill the sponsorship agreement and they aren't defrauding each other, anything goes. If Immigration truly has to investigate relationships to prevent fraud, they need to figure out a way to detect genuine fraud without deeming invalid perfectly consensual marriages that are beyond the reach of some petty functionary's imagination. If a relationship can be deemed unsuitable because of a five-year age difference, what other perfectly legitimate relationships are being rejected?
Our country decided, long before I was born, that the state has no business in the bedrooms of the nation. This should also apply for immigration policy.
Thursday, July 08, 2010
Three more G20 questions
1. As I blogged about recently, there have been instances of authorities making observably blatantly false statements in the media. The two I noticed were G20 Director General Sanjeev Chowdhury's assertion that downtown Toronto is empty on weekends, and Police Chief Bill Blair's (admittedly clever) attempt to imply that there's no valid reason why an innocent passer-by would be at Queen & Spadina on a beautiful Sunday afternoon.
But who was their target audience for these statements? Who were they trying to win over? By making such clearly false statements, they are losing all credibility in the eyes of the hundreds of thousands (millions? probably millions when you include tourists and former residents) of people who have seen these parts of the city with their own eyes. Which also means that the people they are trying to win over aren't among these millions. So who are these people who have never been to downtown Toronto, who are so concerned about the quality of security response in Toronto, and whose favour is so important that they're willing to throw away their credibility in the eyes of the millions?
2. A number of parties have gone out of their way to laud the police, most astonishingly City Council's recent vote to “commend the outstanding work” of the police department.
My question: What exactly did the police do that these parties think is exceptionally good?
I think we can all agree that rounding up and detaining hundreds of innocent people is subpar police work. We expect better of our police. And I think we can all agree that letting the black bloc people run their full gamut, change clothes, and vanish into the crowd unhindered when outnumbered 50 to one by police is also subpar police work.
So this means that, in some area, the police must have exceeded expectations. Especially for City Council to go out of their way to have this symbolic vote two weeks after the fact, when they could have just quietly gone about City business and no one would have noticed. So what did the police do that was good enough to outweigh the bad and earn them laurels whose absence would have gone unnoticed?
3. It seems that the G20 themselves are especially concerned about having all countries reduce their debt. My question, and you might have to explain it slowly because I have no economics training: why does a country care about other countries' debt levels? How does US or British or Greek debt affect Canada?
Is this analogous to individuals' household debt? I have always felt vaguely safer because I have less debt than most of my contemporaries. Am I mistaken in this feeling, and if so, why? Is my neighbour's debt really bad for me? If so, how?
But who was their target audience for these statements? Who were they trying to win over? By making such clearly false statements, they are losing all credibility in the eyes of the hundreds of thousands (millions? probably millions when you include tourists and former residents) of people who have seen these parts of the city with their own eyes. Which also means that the people they are trying to win over aren't among these millions. So who are these people who have never been to downtown Toronto, who are so concerned about the quality of security response in Toronto, and whose favour is so important that they're willing to throw away their credibility in the eyes of the millions?
2. A number of parties have gone out of their way to laud the police, most astonishingly City Council's recent vote to “commend the outstanding work” of the police department.
My question: What exactly did the police do that these parties think is exceptionally good?
I think we can all agree that rounding up and detaining hundreds of innocent people is subpar police work. We expect better of our police. And I think we can all agree that letting the black bloc people run their full gamut, change clothes, and vanish into the crowd unhindered when outnumbered 50 to one by police is also subpar police work.
So this means that, in some area, the police must have exceeded expectations. Especially for City Council to go out of their way to have this symbolic vote two weeks after the fact, when they could have just quietly gone about City business and no one would have noticed. So what did the police do that was good enough to outweigh the bad and earn them laurels whose absence would have gone unnoticed?
3. It seems that the G20 themselves are especially concerned about having all countries reduce their debt. My question, and you might have to explain it slowly because I have no economics training: why does a country care about other countries' debt levels? How does US or British or Greek debt affect Canada?
Is this analogous to individuals' household debt? I have always felt vaguely safer because I have less debt than most of my contemporaries. Am I mistaken in this feeling, and if so, why? Is my neighbour's debt really bad for me? If so, how?
Quick thought
From the Twitter-worthy but too long for Twitter files:
There seem to be some people out there who think the fact that the police rounded up and arrested a whole bunch of innocent people makes up for the fact that they didn't stop any of the black bloc vandals. As though mass arrests of passers-by aren't another problem. As though it all averages out. There was even a letter to the editor of the Globe & Mail to the effect of "People complain that the police didn't do enough on Saturday and did too much on Sunday. Maybe they did just right?"
These people should be arrested.
Seriously. It's perfectly consistent with the internal logic of the universe they occupy. They'll think they're helping the police solve crimes.
There seem to be some people out there who think the fact that the police rounded up and arrested a whole bunch of innocent people makes up for the fact that they didn't stop any of the black bloc vandals. As though mass arrests of passers-by aren't another problem. As though it all averages out. There was even a letter to the editor of the Globe & Mail to the effect of "People complain that the police didn't do enough on Saturday and did too much on Sunday. Maybe they did just right?"
These people should be arrested.
Seriously. It's perfectly consistent with the internal logic of the universe they occupy. They'll think they're helping the police solve crimes.
Tuesday, July 06, 2010
Why I feel the police are currently the biggest threat to me
This post builds on ideas from my G20 braindump. There may be some repetition.
Let's brainstorm. What bad things could happen to me in normal everyday life?
I could be attacked. I could be sexually assaulted. I could be robbed. I could be abducted.
The police attacked people - there are bruises to show for it. There are reports of the police sexually assaulting people. There are reports of people getting their personal effects confiscated and not getting them back. Plainclothes police grabbed people off the street and threw them in vans and detained them for 36 hours.
Now you're thinking "Yeah, sure, 'there are reports'. We weren't there, we don't know the whole story, we just have someone else's word" That's true. That's also the case where these things are done by non-police perps. I have never witnessed anyone being attacked, sexually assaulted, robbed, or abducted. I've just heard tell about it. But it still needs to be considered a credible threat.
But the difference between regular bad guys doing bad things and the police doing bad things is that it's easier to stop regular bad guys. If some random attacks me while, a passer-by who intervenes would be a hero. If police attack me, a passer-by who intervenes would be charged with obstructing justice. (To say nothing of the fact that many passers-by would assume I'm a bad guy by virtue of the very fact that I'm being attacked by police, whereas being attacked by a random automatically makes me a damsel in distress.) Plus, yes, there is the fact that if a bad guy grabs me and takes me away, the police might try to find me, whereas if the police detain me there's nothing much anyone can do.
Now you're thinking "Exactly! The police are the ones who try to find you when a bad guy abducts you! That's why you should trust them." But that, too, is the case with non-police perps. There are all kinds of not-purely-trustworthy characters out there who might help you when you face a bigger risk. For example, I was once riding on a subway late at night when a drunk guy got on and started verbally harassing people (including me). Another man, a rather shady-looking character, intervened and got rid of the drunken harasser. (He was rather clever about it, too. When we pulled into the next station, he said to the drunk guy "Hey man, this is your stop." The drunk guy replied "Thanks, man!" and got off.) But that doesn't mean I should inherently trust shady-looking men on the subway late at night. They're still a credible threat unless proven otherwise.
Analogy: Some, and maybe even most, strange men on subways are actually nice guys who will protect a damsel in distress. But imagine if there were reports of a number of men who, whenever they saw a woman being harassed in public, would grab her, throw her in their van against her will, and lock her in their basement for a couple of days for safekeeping. Then, just to be safe, they go back out and grab every other woman they can find and do the same. Suddenly, all strange men are threats, even if they are purportedly trying to protect us.
Understand, I'm a law-abiding citizen. I've never been in any sort of trouble, never even had a ticket. If the police have any record of me whatsoever, all it will show is the police checks that I've passed for my job so I can be entrusted with confidential and personal information.
But the police can hurt me as badly as anyone else can, while making it harder for others to help me than if I were being hurt by a civilian bad guy. And based on what we saw during the G20, I cannot trust that the fact that I'm doing nothing wrong will be enough to make them not want to hurt me. So they are a credible threat unless proven otherwise.
Let's brainstorm. What bad things could happen to me in normal everyday life?
I could be attacked. I could be sexually assaulted. I could be robbed. I could be abducted.
The police attacked people - there are bruises to show for it. There are reports of the police sexually assaulting people. There are reports of people getting their personal effects confiscated and not getting them back. Plainclothes police grabbed people off the street and threw them in vans and detained them for 36 hours.
Now you're thinking "Yeah, sure, 'there are reports'. We weren't there, we don't know the whole story, we just have someone else's word" That's true. That's also the case where these things are done by non-police perps. I have never witnessed anyone being attacked, sexually assaulted, robbed, or abducted. I've just heard tell about it. But it still needs to be considered a credible threat.
But the difference between regular bad guys doing bad things and the police doing bad things is that it's easier to stop regular bad guys. If some random attacks me while, a passer-by who intervenes would be a hero. If police attack me, a passer-by who intervenes would be charged with obstructing justice. (To say nothing of the fact that many passers-by would assume I'm a bad guy by virtue of the very fact that I'm being attacked by police, whereas being attacked by a random automatically makes me a damsel in distress.) Plus, yes, there is the fact that if a bad guy grabs me and takes me away, the police might try to find me, whereas if the police detain me there's nothing much anyone can do.
Now you're thinking "Exactly! The police are the ones who try to find you when a bad guy abducts you! That's why you should trust them." But that, too, is the case with non-police perps. There are all kinds of not-purely-trustworthy characters out there who might help you when you face a bigger risk. For example, I was once riding on a subway late at night when a drunk guy got on and started verbally harassing people (including me). Another man, a rather shady-looking character, intervened and got rid of the drunken harasser. (He was rather clever about it, too. When we pulled into the next station, he said to the drunk guy "Hey man, this is your stop." The drunk guy replied "Thanks, man!" and got off.) But that doesn't mean I should inherently trust shady-looking men on the subway late at night. They're still a credible threat unless proven otherwise.
Analogy: Some, and maybe even most, strange men on subways are actually nice guys who will protect a damsel in distress. But imagine if there were reports of a number of men who, whenever they saw a woman being harassed in public, would grab her, throw her in their van against her will, and lock her in their basement for a couple of days for safekeeping. Then, just to be safe, they go back out and grab every other woman they can find and do the same. Suddenly, all strange men are threats, even if they are purportedly trying to protect us.
Understand, I'm a law-abiding citizen. I've never been in any sort of trouble, never even had a ticket. If the police have any record of me whatsoever, all it will show is the police checks that I've passed for my job so I can be entrusted with confidential and personal information.
But the police can hurt me as badly as anyone else can, while making it harder for others to help me than if I were being hurt by a civilian bad guy. And based on what we saw during the G20, I cannot trust that the fact that I'm doing nothing wrong will be enough to make them not want to hurt me. So they are a credible threat unless proven otherwise.
Monday, July 05, 2010
Things They Should Invent: free esthetics services in nursing homes
A friend of mine used to be a personal support worker in a nursing home. Once she was telling me about how when the residents had people visiting them, they'd get their hair done and she'd help them get dressed in their favourite clothes etc., and one of the things she said she did was shaved their whiskers. Like on female patients.
I was shocked. "You don't tweeze?" I asked, "Or thread? Or wax or sugar?"
"I'm not an esthetician!" my friend replied.
That makes me want to weep. I've had whiskers since adolescence - a few coarse, dark hairs that grow out of my chin and would probably grow to be a couple of inches long if I let them. They disgust me, so my morning and evening beauty routines include a visual and tactile inspection for any emerging coarse hairs, which are then promptly and ruthlessly pulled out with tweezers. Using tweezers makes them grow back slower and less frequently, but if they had to be shaved off with a razor then I'd have masculine stubble by dinnertime. And since it seems to be done only for special occasions, that means they're probably walking around with visible long whiskers the rest of the time. They're in a nursing home and need a PSW to help them dress and groom, they probably lack the dexterity and/or eyesight to take care of it themselves.
I hate my masculine body hair - it's a humiliation - so the idea of being sentenced to the rest of my life without ever having my always-visible facial hair properly groomed makes me want to curl up in a ball and cry my eyes out. But a more appropriate-for-female-facial-hair method of hair removal is beyond the scope and/or the skill set of the PSW.
So what they need is esthetician services in nursing homes. They already have some provisions for a barber and/or hairdresser (because you don't see elders sitting around nursing homes with long hippie hair), so just adding an esthetician shouldn't be too difficult. And services that bring the patient up to general social standards of grooming (removal of facial hair from the root, separation of unibrows, etc.) should be included in the price of the nursing home. The esthetician should be empowered to recommend treatments rather than waiting for the patient to ask, because patients with failing eyesight or cognitive abilities might not be able to or think to ask to have their chin waxed.
A patient who can't bathe themselves properly gets help from someone professionally trained in bathing patients. A patient who can't control their waste functions get a colostomy bag from someone professionally trained in installing such things. So why not also provide basic personal grooming services by someone professionally trained? It's a matter of dignity!
I was shocked. "You don't tweeze?" I asked, "Or thread? Or wax or sugar?"
"I'm not an esthetician!" my friend replied.
That makes me want to weep. I've had whiskers since adolescence - a few coarse, dark hairs that grow out of my chin and would probably grow to be a couple of inches long if I let them. They disgust me, so my morning and evening beauty routines include a visual and tactile inspection for any emerging coarse hairs, which are then promptly and ruthlessly pulled out with tweezers. Using tweezers makes them grow back slower and less frequently, but if they had to be shaved off with a razor then I'd have masculine stubble by dinnertime. And since it seems to be done only for special occasions, that means they're probably walking around with visible long whiskers the rest of the time. They're in a nursing home and need a PSW to help them dress and groom, they probably lack the dexterity and/or eyesight to take care of it themselves.
I hate my masculine body hair - it's a humiliation - so the idea of being sentenced to the rest of my life without ever having my always-visible facial hair properly groomed makes me want to curl up in a ball and cry my eyes out. But a more appropriate-for-female-facial-hair method of hair removal is beyond the scope and/or the skill set of the PSW.
So what they need is esthetician services in nursing homes. They already have some provisions for a barber and/or hairdresser (because you don't see elders sitting around nursing homes with long hippie hair), so just adding an esthetician shouldn't be too difficult. And services that bring the patient up to general social standards of grooming (removal of facial hair from the root, separation of unibrows, etc.) should be included in the price of the nursing home. The esthetician should be empowered to recommend treatments rather than waiting for the patient to ask, because patients with failing eyesight or cognitive abilities might not be able to or think to ask to have their chin waxed.
A patient who can't bathe themselves properly gets help from someone professionally trained in bathing patients. A patient who can't control their waste functions get a colostomy bag from someone professionally trained in installing such things. So why not also provide basic personal grooming services by someone professionally trained? It's a matter of dignity!
Sunday, July 04, 2010
Now I understand what "semantic chicanery" means
I once knew someone whose favourite phrase was "semantic chicanery". Cool combination of words, fun to day, but I didn't grok it. At least not until I heard this quote from Toronto Police Chief Bill Blair regarding Queen and Spadina:
This is factually correct. No one at Queen and Spadina would be trying to catch a bus. But this is only because both Queen and Spadina both have streetcars.
However, the connotations of the statement - that this isn't a place where people would find themselves accidentally unless they were deliberately up to mischief - are blatantly, observably false. Anyone who has ever been to Queen and Spadina - or indeed any other major intersection in Toronto - knows that there's myriad of perfectly valid, non-protest-related reasons why someone might be there.
I know the police know better and are well aware of the natural traffic patterns of our neighbourhood. There was once a high-profile investigation in my neighbourhood - mobile command centre parked across the street from me and everything. Internet commentators who were obviously not part of the neighbourhood had theories that were absolutely ridiculous when you've observed how people use the space IRL, but police activity appeared to be directed into precisely the right places, without following any of the red herrings being bandied about on the internet. They know their turf.
So with Bill Blair apparently attempting to mislead the public on the very nature of the neighbourhood, combined with G20 Director General Sanjeev Chowdhury's statement that the downtown core is empty on weekends, I can't help but wonder what else they're lying to our faces about. That Queen & Spadina is full of all kinds of people doing all kinds of legitimate things and that downtown is full of people at all times are both clearly observable facts. There are tens of thousands (hundreds of thousands? millions?) of people who have observed them with their own eyes. You wouldn't even think to fact-check them because you can observe them. It would be like if I lied to you about how many stories tall my building is.
There are lots of other, very important things that are less immediate observable. How much of that are they lying to us about?
“This was not a site where somebody casually walked up to catch a bus”
This is factually correct. No one at Queen and Spadina would be trying to catch a bus. But this is only because both Queen and Spadina both have streetcars.
However, the connotations of the statement - that this isn't a place where people would find themselves accidentally unless they were deliberately up to mischief - are blatantly, observably false. Anyone who has ever been to Queen and Spadina - or indeed any other major intersection in Toronto - knows that there's myriad of perfectly valid, non-protest-related reasons why someone might be there.
I know the police know better and are well aware of the natural traffic patterns of our neighbourhood. There was once a high-profile investigation in my neighbourhood - mobile command centre parked across the street from me and everything. Internet commentators who were obviously not part of the neighbourhood had theories that were absolutely ridiculous when you've observed how people use the space IRL, but police activity appeared to be directed into precisely the right places, without following any of the red herrings being bandied about on the internet. They know their turf.
So with Bill Blair apparently attempting to mislead the public on the very nature of the neighbourhood, combined with G20 Director General Sanjeev Chowdhury's statement that the downtown core is empty on weekends, I can't help but wonder what else they're lying to our faces about. That Queen & Spadina is full of all kinds of people doing all kinds of legitimate things and that downtown is full of people at all times are both clearly observable facts. There are tens of thousands (hundreds of thousands? millions?) of people who have observed them with their own eyes. You wouldn't even think to fact-check them because you can observe them. It would be like if I lied to you about how many stories tall my building is.
There are lots of other, very important things that are less immediate observable. How much of that are they lying to us about?
Saturday, July 03, 2010
Why are plainclothes police officers allowed to grab people off the street?
I missed this at first in all the commotion, but:
So a bunch of strange men grab me and try to throw me in a van. You know what? At that point, I'm fighting for my life. If they're in plain clothes and an unmarked vehicle, you have no way of knowing they're cops. This doesn't even give you the opportunity to go along peacefully, because you're operating under the assumption that you're being abducted.
And if you are being abducted the further away your abductors take you, the less chance you have of escaping. So you're doing everything it takes, no matter the risk, to stop them. I've given a lot of thought to what I'd do if someone tries to grab me off the street, and that includes trying to run into traffic, trying to crash the vehicle that we're in, trying to blind or disable the driver while he's driving - at this point I'm quite willing to risk my life. So how is this even a good idea from a policing perspective? I'm sure it puts the officers at much greater risk, because the people are assuming they're being abducted and therefore fighting for their life. Sure, they could shout at the person that they're police while trying to subdue them, but are you going to take your abductor's word on that? Are you going to stop fighting off your abductor to check ID?
And how much you want to bet these people still got charged with resisting arrest?
Although the group was peaceful and chanting, mayhem erupted at about noon, seemingly without warning. A black van pulled up and four plainclothes officers emerged, darted into the crowd and quickly snatched a man and a woman.
We are finding police are meeting them there with brutality,” she said. “They are circling groups of people in smaller groups. We have seen plainclothes officers snatching people and throwing them into cars.”
A man is detained as a peaceful protest descended into chaos after plain clothes officers pulled up in a van in front of the protestors and raced into the crowd to grab several suspects, in front of the temporary detention centre at Eastern Ave. and Pape Ave.
So a bunch of strange men grab me and try to throw me in a van. You know what? At that point, I'm fighting for my life. If they're in plain clothes and an unmarked vehicle, you have no way of knowing they're cops. This doesn't even give you the opportunity to go along peacefully, because you're operating under the assumption that you're being abducted.
And if you are being abducted the further away your abductors take you, the less chance you have of escaping. So you're doing everything it takes, no matter the risk, to stop them. I've given a lot of thought to what I'd do if someone tries to grab me off the street, and that includes trying to run into traffic, trying to crash the vehicle that we're in, trying to blind or disable the driver while he's driving - at this point I'm quite willing to risk my life. So how is this even a good idea from a policing perspective? I'm sure it puts the officers at much greater risk, because the people are assuming they're being abducted and therefore fighting for their life. Sure, they could shout at the person that they're police while trying to subdue them, but are you going to take your abductor's word on that? Are you going to stop fighting off your abductor to check ID?
And how much you want to bet these people still got charged with resisting arrest?
Friday, July 02, 2010
Let's identify the guy who wrecked the police cruisers
Here's a video of two of the police cruisers getting wrecked:
As you can see, it's one guy responsible for a lot of the wrecking. Other people are watching or filming or trying to de-escalate or doing their own thing or playing with the siren.
Here is a really good picture that multiple people (including eyewitnesses) agree is the same person. Looks like the same person to me too.
The wrecked cruisers would probably be what pissed off the police the most and, whether they'll admit it or not, led to all the subsequent horrendous treatment that our people suffered.
So let's identify him. Does he look familiar? Have you seen him around? Report what you have to CrimeStoppers. OpenFile is also trying to find him. This would be a good story for mainstream media to pick up.
As you can see, it's one guy responsible for a lot of the wrecking. Other people are watching or filming or trying to de-escalate or doing their own thing or playing with the siren.
Here is a really good picture that multiple people (including eyewitnesses) agree is the same person. Looks like the same person to me too.
The wrecked cruisers would probably be what pissed off the police the most and, whether they'll admit it or not, led to all the subsequent horrendous treatment that our people suffered.
So let's identify him. Does he look familiar? Have you seen him around? Report what you have to CrimeStoppers. OpenFile is also trying to find him. This would be a good story for mainstream media to pick up.
Thursday, July 01, 2010
My personal Vimy
I've known as long as I can remember that Vimy Ridge was a WWI battle that took place in France. It's the sort of thing you absorb from your environment, just like you can name-check Dieppe and Ypres and Hastings and Hiroshima.
I studied it formally in Grade 10 History class. My teacher spent rather a lot of time on it, detailing the historical significance of having all the Canadian divisions working together in a Canadian-led operation, enumerating all the bravery and valour, and describing the influence this victory had on Canada's self-concept, making Canadians feel like they're their own proper grown-up country that they can be proud of rather than a colonial branch plant of the UK.
He then look at us expectantly, as though he expected us to suddenly have a changed view of our country. But I felt nothing. My concept of my country was exactly the same. I'd learned the material, I could rattle off the correct answer to the test, but it had no influence whatsoever on my view of my Canada, because it's something that has always been there.
***
The year is 2003. George W. Bush is president of the United States. I'd just finished my last semester of university, and in between completing final projects and frantically trying to find a job and an apartment for after graduation, I'd been protesting the invasion of Iraq and trying to keep Canada out. Every day a new right-wing political outrage would arrive in my inbox.
At the time of this story, I was in Quebec. When I'm in Quebec I like to immerse myself, so I had the TV tuned to RDI while I went about my evening chores. Suddenly, I heard something that made me stop and stare at the TV. That can't possibly be right! I must have misheard! But I couldn't imagine anything else that combination of words could possibly mean. I ran to the computer and pulled up an English-language news site. I'd heard correctly. Same-sex marriage had just become legal in Ontario.
It just smacked me in the face. I live somewhere that I can be proud of! We aren't a branch plant of the US, we're different! And better!
***
I was 22 years old when this happened, and it was the first time I was ever actively proud of my country. Before, I could rattle off all the reasons I should be proud of my country and conjure up an appropriate response, but this was the first time I actually felt it in my gut, unprovoked.
One day, in a couple of decades, we will be celebrating the 20th or 25th anniversary of the legalization of same-sex marriage. I will be in my late 40s, with lines on my face like my father's and salt-and-pepper hair dyed chestnut like my mother's, wearing no-line bifocals as though that little line is the only thing that betrays my age. My co-workers and I (for in my imagined future I'm still in the same workplace with the same co-workers) will sit around the break room reminiscing. Where were you when you first heard? Who was the first same-sex married couple you knew? When was your first big gay wedding? Newspapers will tell the story of how this all came about, track down the court justices and the Michaels and do "Where are they now?" profiles. And in our office will be some new hires, kids in their early 20s just out of university, who will look at all this fuss we're making and feel nothing, because for them it will be something that has always been there.
I very much look forward to that day.
Happy Canada Day and Happy Pride Week!
I studied it formally in Grade 10 History class. My teacher spent rather a lot of time on it, detailing the historical significance of having all the Canadian divisions working together in a Canadian-led operation, enumerating all the bravery and valour, and describing the influence this victory had on Canada's self-concept, making Canadians feel like they're their own proper grown-up country that they can be proud of rather than a colonial branch plant of the UK.
He then look at us expectantly, as though he expected us to suddenly have a changed view of our country. But I felt nothing. My concept of my country was exactly the same. I'd learned the material, I could rattle off the correct answer to the test, but it had no influence whatsoever on my view of my Canada, because it's something that has always been there.
***
The year is 2003. George W. Bush is president of the United States. I'd just finished my last semester of university, and in between completing final projects and frantically trying to find a job and an apartment for after graduation, I'd been protesting the invasion of Iraq and trying to keep Canada out. Every day a new right-wing political outrage would arrive in my inbox.
At the time of this story, I was in Quebec. When I'm in Quebec I like to immerse myself, so I had the TV tuned to RDI while I went about my evening chores. Suddenly, I heard something that made me stop and stare at the TV. That can't possibly be right! I must have misheard! But I couldn't imagine anything else that combination of words could possibly mean. I ran to the computer and pulled up an English-language news site. I'd heard correctly. Same-sex marriage had just become legal in Ontario.
It just smacked me in the face. I live somewhere that I can be proud of! We aren't a branch plant of the US, we're different! And better!
***
I was 22 years old when this happened, and it was the first time I was ever actively proud of my country. Before, I could rattle off all the reasons I should be proud of my country and conjure up an appropriate response, but this was the first time I actually felt it in my gut, unprovoked.
One day, in a couple of decades, we will be celebrating the 20th or 25th anniversary of the legalization of same-sex marriage. I will be in my late 40s, with lines on my face like my father's and salt-and-pepper hair dyed chestnut like my mother's, wearing no-line bifocals as though that little line is the only thing that betrays my age. My co-workers and I (for in my imagined future I'm still in the same workplace with the same co-workers) will sit around the break room reminiscing. Where were you when you first heard? Who was the first same-sex married couple you knew? When was your first big gay wedding? Newspapers will tell the story of how this all came about, track down the court justices and the Michaels and do "Where are they now?" profiles. And in our office will be some new hires, kids in their early 20s just out of university, who will look at all this fuss we're making and feel nothing, because for them it will be something that has always been there.
I very much look forward to that day.
Happy Canada Day and Happy Pride Week!
Wednesday, June 30, 2010
G20 braindump
This is not complete, comprehensive, organized, or well-structured. I might add more later or I might repurpose material into better-organized posts. Right now I just need to clear out my head. (I had a good, structured blog post that took all my panic and fear and emotions and expressed it in a way that's informative to others for whom this is all non-immediate, but it took a long time to write and I got too sleepy before I could finish it. So I made an outline of the rest and went to bed. But Blogger ate my outline! I almost feel like this is a conspiracy.)
1. I've been thinking a lot about laws and society lately, even before this all started. I think I like laws. If people are following laws because they're the law (rather than just so as to not be a dick), then laws make life easy. I don't have to fight for my life when I walk down the street. My employer pays me the amount due on the proper date. Stores sell me their products at the posted price. This is good. It makes life easy. And then, instead of having to ceaselessly stand up for myself in every area of life, I can put my energies into learning and thinking and translating and creating, which makes life more pleasant and I think allows me to make a greater contribution to society as a whole. So that got me thinking about why I follow laws and, more than that, why I'm Being Good. Being Good is doing what's right, what's expected of you. Here I'm using it as shorthand to mean that I got a job, go to work, try to be nice to people, try not to mess stuff up, etc. I thought about this long and hard - I've never had to articulate it before! - and I came to the conclusion that it's because I like to be comfortable. I like places where there's nothing crawling out of the walls. I like hot showers and air conditioning and comfy chairs and everything I ever want to eat or drink at my fingertips.
After reading about what happened at Queen and Spadina and then about the detention conditions, I'm utterly terrified because the law, which has always served to make me comfortable as long as I'm Being Good, is now being use to grab people who were Being Good and make them uncomfortable.
So what's my motivation to continue obeying the law? But the thing is, I'm a shy, quiet, stay-at-home kind of person. I'm not likely to break the law too badly just because most of what I want to do is already legal. But what's other people's - people who are more interested in doing things that are illegal - motivation to continue obeying the law?
2. Currently, there exists empirical evidence that the police want to grab me when I'm walking down the street, detain me for hours with no protection from the elements, deprive me of water and give me only food that will make me thirstier, lock me in a crowded room with vomit on the floor, prevent me from being able to use the bathroom for hours and hours and then make me go where people are watching and there is no toilet paper, restrain my arms and then beat me (as though they couldn't already beat me up unrestrained), and sexually harass and sexually assault me. On the other hand, there is empirical evidence that the black bloc people want to vandalize property and taunt people whom they perceive to be part of the problem. The worst thing I could imagine them doing is beating me up if they perceive me to be part of the problem (and I haven't heard any anecdotes of them actually beating someone up), and I'd much rather be beaten up and then at least get to go home than be detained for 36 hours (which might still involve being beaten up).
3. People say I have nothing to worry about if I'm not doing anything wrong. But being denied use of a bathroom for hours and hours, being boxed in on the street and unable to leave, being locked up and denied water - that's something to worry about. To me, that's practically torture. (Yes, there are many worse ways to torture, but that doesn't negate its tortuousness.) People say the police are only trying to protect me, but this is all a threat from which I need protection. In fact, it might be a greater threat than any other I face. If some random bad guy tries to attack me or abduct me in the street, it is possible for other people to jump in and stop him. If some random bad guy tries to attack me in my home, it will likely at least be over in less than an hour. I've also heard people say there's no need to worry because it's just a one-off thing because of the G20. WTF? None of the don't worry people saw this coming beforehand. I didn't hear anyone say "Now, they might grab you off the street on the way to work and lock you up for 36 hours because of the G20, but that's just because of this G20 thing and it isn't going to be happening again." So what other future circumstances aren't they seeing? (Not to say it would be acceptable even if it were just a one-time thing, but if that were true it would at least reduce future worrying.)
4. Analogy:
Are you in love with me? You should be, you know! You should love me! I'm lovable! Sure, I'm not perfect, but who is? I'm just a decent human being doing my best. You'd better love me, because if not you're going to be alone forever or stuck with some idiot!
That's not going to make you love me, now is it? Even if everything I've said there is true, it's not enough to make you love me. I'd need to provide evidence of my loveability, over a long period of time and ideally through some adversity.
Now imagine if there were a bunch of people out there, saying that they're my former lovers, all with stories of how unlovable I am. Some of these people are public figures with a reputation to maintain, for whom there would be no benefit in repeating this information if it weren't true. Their stories are all consistent, pointing to clear patterns of behaviour (as opposed to being one-off flukes), and some of them are backed up with photographic and video evidence.
In that case, I'd have to work even harder to make you love me. I'd have to show, over an even longer period of time and with greater reliability, that it's safe to love me. I'd also probably have to articulate to you what has changed that will prevent this unlovable behaviour from recurring in the future. If I said "Oh, I was doing that because I once had a lover who treated me poorly," that wouldn't be enough to mitigate your concerns. I would need to give you clear specifics of what has changed that this incident in the past will no longer be a problem in the future, and also show positive behaviour over the long-term, including through the kinds of adversity that triggered my previous unlovable behaviour. The more you hear, the more you can't just love me.
This is why I can't just trust the police, no matter how much people tell me I should trust them.
5. I do wonder how much the intimidating sight of massive hoards of police in riot gear led to the escalation.
Analogy:
Imagine you're walking down the street. About 100 metres in front of you, there are half a dozen large, intimidating men, dressed thuggishly. (Whatever you, personally, consider thuggish.)
- Imagine they're sitting on a patio, eating and drinking.
- Imagine they're standing outside a building, smoking and shouting things at passers-by
- Imagine they're standing outside a building, smoking and talking among themselves.
- Imagine one of them has a puppy, and the rest of them are all petting and admiring it.
- Imagine they're all standing in a row, arms folded, blocking your path.
- Imagine they're huddled around a car that has its hood up.
- Imagine they're sitting around drinking beers somewhere where you're not suppose to be drinking, with empty bottles scattered around them.
Your reaction would be somewhat different in these different scenarios, wouldn't it? If one of them called out to you, you'd react differently. Might this not have escalated if, at first sight, the police presence was more like what we're accustomed to seeing?
6. And what are we to make of the fact that the reason given for not stopping the black bloc people from wrecking the city was that they were trying to protect the fence? (The Globe & Mail says the fence was 6 km long, and I've heard numbers ranging from 10,000 to 25,000 for the number of police officers. What were they doing, standing shoulder to shoulder around the fence? Why bother with a fence then?) So they're letting the city get wrecked to protect a precious few elite? Just how many people were behind the fence anyway? Wouldn't it be awesome if some world leader showed the noblesse oblige to say to their security people "Do what you need to do to protect me, but only if it doesn't inconvenience the citizens I represent."?
7. They said they did the massive sweep at Queen & Spadina because they thought some of the people in the intersection were black bloc people dressed in civvies. But how am I supposed to know the back stories of the people in the intersection with me? In a typical crowded intersection on a beautiful day there are like 100 people. What, specifically, do they expect me to do so I can go about life (including crowded intersections) normally without getting caught up in a police sweep?
8. They said one of the reasons they were after these particular people is because they did not dissociate themselves from the black bloc. The thing is, neither did I. Why not? Because what the black bloc did was so fucking dumb-ass that I figured my condemnation of their asshattery would be taken as a given! I've never dissociated myself from Hitler or Than Shwe or Paul Bernardo or Kanye West when he was interrupting Taylor Swift or those dickheads who sit with their legs spread on the subway either, for the same reason (although I'll take the opportunity to do so now). So whom do they want us to dissociate from? Which circumstances require an explicitly state dissociation and which are obvious? How, precisely, do we dissociate from someone to the satisfaction of the police? We need clear instructions on this!
9. Some people have said that the reason the police arrested everyone at Queen & Spadina is because they said not to go past a certain line, and a few people did. (According to the explanation I was given, the people in the video who were sitting on the ground with their backs to the police had crossed the invisible line, but I can't vouch for that personally.) I've also heard people complaining that legitimate protesters did nothing to stop the black bloc people (although we have video evidence that some people did). But how could I possibly stop a stranger from doing something stupid? I'm not big or strong enough to tackle a person, nor persuasive enough to convince them from crossing an invisible line. People don't generally listen to me. That was a method our teachers used in middle school. Sometimes they'd punish the whole class because we didn't stop the person from doing something wrong. Why didn't they understand that if I could get my peers to do what I wanted, I'd make them stop bullying me? Not being influential is...well, I might not go so far as to say it's punishment in and of itself, but it's certainly an inconvenience in every area of life as compared with being able to get people to do what you tell them. And now I have to worry about the police punishing me for being uninfluential in the general vicinity of an idiot.
10. If the police want to get ordinary citizens onside, they could do a world of good with humane detention conditions. One of my favourite guilty pleasures is the In Death series, which are police procedurals (although I'm finding them difficult to read now, bastards!) From these books, I've learned that sometimes the police need to investigate people to eliminate them, sometimes they need to ask questions of people who were present at the time or might have seen or heard something, sometimes they need to go through certain procedures for the record, etc. And because of this, before last weekend, if I found myself questioned by police officers, I would just assume they're doing their job. If I'd had to wait around several hours but I'd been indoors, not handcuffed because I'm no threat, reasonable access to washroom facilities and drinking water, I would totally be right up there with the people who are saying that they're just doing their jobs trying to protect us and we have to accept a certain amount of inconvenience. What makes me fear the police is the prospect of being kept outside in the elements unprotected (because if you're just running down to the corner store and the rain isn't forecast to start for several hours, you don't bring gear for three hours in the rain), not able to go to the washroom, detained for 36 hours, insufficient water, the only food available makes you thirstier, threatened with sexual harassment, overcrowded room, no room to lie down for 36 hours, vomit on the floor, etc. If they'd just gone through the motions of giving everyone the benefit of the doubt, they wouldn't be facing any complaints now.
11. Something needs to be done. We need to have assurances that we aren't going to be rounded up when we're just innocently walking down the street. (Or even if we're walking down the street doing something stupid and/or obnoxious, but perfectly legal and ultimately harmless.) We need assurances that we won't be forced to pee our pants or go without water or be sexually assaulted just because we happened to be in the wrong place at the wrong time. We need assurances that we can trust our police. There are elements out there that are still threats to us and from which the police are supposed to protect us. You often hear that crimes aren't solved because witnesses don't come forward to the police. How can any of this work if we can't trust our police? This is detrimental to society as a whole!My now-octogenerian grandmother fled with her family from behind the iron curtain and sacrificed greatly her entire life so her descendents wouldn't have to go through this! If they can't provide us with assurances, they should at least provide my grandmother, and all those like her, with a refund!
12. I mentally wrote that last paragraph before I learned that police chief Bill Blair lied about the fence law. So even if they give us these assurances, how can we trust them? What are we supposed to do in a world where the police outright lie to us, publicly and on record, about what the laws are? How is our society going to function?
13. Do the police even want us to trust them? Or do they just want us to fear them? If it's the latter, couldn't they at least have a word with all the people who keep scolding me for not trusting the police?
Edited to add: Since 2007, I'd been wanting Eddie Izzard to come to Toronto, and asking him to do so at every opportune moment. Last month he did just that, and there was much rejoicing. But now I'm even more glad that he's already come to see us, because as it stands right this minute I could not in good conscience ask him to come here. He probably would because he's brave, and from a purely selfish fannish perspective I do want him to, but I cannot look someone I so like and admire in the metaphorical eye and say "You should come here. It's a good idea."
1. I've been thinking a lot about laws and society lately, even before this all started. I think I like laws. If people are following laws because they're the law (rather than just so as to not be a dick), then laws make life easy. I don't have to fight for my life when I walk down the street. My employer pays me the amount due on the proper date. Stores sell me their products at the posted price. This is good. It makes life easy. And then, instead of having to ceaselessly stand up for myself in every area of life, I can put my energies into learning and thinking and translating and creating, which makes life more pleasant and I think allows me to make a greater contribution to society as a whole. So that got me thinking about why I follow laws and, more than that, why I'm Being Good. Being Good is doing what's right, what's expected of you. Here I'm using it as shorthand to mean that I got a job, go to work, try to be nice to people, try not to mess stuff up, etc. I thought about this long and hard - I've never had to articulate it before! - and I came to the conclusion that it's because I like to be comfortable. I like places where there's nothing crawling out of the walls. I like hot showers and air conditioning and comfy chairs and everything I ever want to eat or drink at my fingertips.
After reading about what happened at Queen and Spadina and then about the detention conditions, I'm utterly terrified because the law, which has always served to make me comfortable as long as I'm Being Good, is now being use to grab people who were Being Good and make them uncomfortable.
So what's my motivation to continue obeying the law? But the thing is, I'm a shy, quiet, stay-at-home kind of person. I'm not likely to break the law too badly just because most of what I want to do is already legal. But what's other people's - people who are more interested in doing things that are illegal - motivation to continue obeying the law?
2. Currently, there exists empirical evidence that the police want to grab me when I'm walking down the street, detain me for hours with no protection from the elements, deprive me of water and give me only food that will make me thirstier, lock me in a crowded room with vomit on the floor, prevent me from being able to use the bathroom for hours and hours and then make me go where people are watching and there is no toilet paper, restrain my arms and then beat me (as though they couldn't already beat me up unrestrained), and sexually harass and sexually assault me. On the other hand, there is empirical evidence that the black bloc people want to vandalize property and taunt people whom they perceive to be part of the problem. The worst thing I could imagine them doing is beating me up if they perceive me to be part of the problem (and I haven't heard any anecdotes of them actually beating someone up), and I'd much rather be beaten up and then at least get to go home than be detained for 36 hours (which might still involve being beaten up).
3. People say I have nothing to worry about if I'm not doing anything wrong. But being denied use of a bathroom for hours and hours, being boxed in on the street and unable to leave, being locked up and denied water - that's something to worry about. To me, that's practically torture. (Yes, there are many worse ways to torture, but that doesn't negate its tortuousness.) People say the police are only trying to protect me, but this is all a threat from which I need protection. In fact, it might be a greater threat than any other I face. If some random bad guy tries to attack me or abduct me in the street, it is possible for other people to jump in and stop him. If some random bad guy tries to attack me in my home, it will likely at least be over in less than an hour. I've also heard people say there's no need to worry because it's just a one-off thing because of the G20. WTF? None of the don't worry people saw this coming beforehand. I didn't hear anyone say "Now, they might grab you off the street on the way to work and lock you up for 36 hours because of the G20, but that's just because of this G20 thing and it isn't going to be happening again." So what other future circumstances aren't they seeing? (Not to say it would be acceptable even if it were just a one-time thing, but if that were true it would at least reduce future worrying.)
4. Analogy:
Are you in love with me? You should be, you know! You should love me! I'm lovable! Sure, I'm not perfect, but who is? I'm just a decent human being doing my best. You'd better love me, because if not you're going to be alone forever or stuck with some idiot!
That's not going to make you love me, now is it? Even if everything I've said there is true, it's not enough to make you love me. I'd need to provide evidence of my loveability, over a long period of time and ideally through some adversity.
Now imagine if there were a bunch of people out there, saying that they're my former lovers, all with stories of how unlovable I am. Some of these people are public figures with a reputation to maintain, for whom there would be no benefit in repeating this information if it weren't true. Their stories are all consistent, pointing to clear patterns of behaviour (as opposed to being one-off flukes), and some of them are backed up with photographic and video evidence.
In that case, I'd have to work even harder to make you love me. I'd have to show, over an even longer period of time and with greater reliability, that it's safe to love me. I'd also probably have to articulate to you what has changed that will prevent this unlovable behaviour from recurring in the future. If I said "Oh, I was doing that because I once had a lover who treated me poorly," that wouldn't be enough to mitigate your concerns. I would need to give you clear specifics of what has changed that this incident in the past will no longer be a problem in the future, and also show positive behaviour over the long-term, including through the kinds of adversity that triggered my previous unlovable behaviour. The more you hear, the more you can't just love me.
This is why I can't just trust the police, no matter how much people tell me I should trust them.
5. I do wonder how much the intimidating sight of massive hoards of police in riot gear led to the escalation.
Analogy:
Imagine you're walking down the street. About 100 metres in front of you, there are half a dozen large, intimidating men, dressed thuggishly. (Whatever you, personally, consider thuggish.)
- Imagine they're sitting on a patio, eating and drinking.
- Imagine they're standing outside a building, smoking and shouting things at passers-by
- Imagine they're standing outside a building, smoking and talking among themselves.
- Imagine one of them has a puppy, and the rest of them are all petting and admiring it.
- Imagine they're all standing in a row, arms folded, blocking your path.
- Imagine they're huddled around a car that has its hood up.
- Imagine they're sitting around drinking beers somewhere where you're not suppose to be drinking, with empty bottles scattered around them.
Your reaction would be somewhat different in these different scenarios, wouldn't it? If one of them called out to you, you'd react differently. Might this not have escalated if, at first sight, the police presence was more like what we're accustomed to seeing?
6. And what are we to make of the fact that the reason given for not stopping the black bloc people from wrecking the city was that they were trying to protect the fence? (The Globe & Mail says the fence was 6 km long, and I've heard numbers ranging from 10,000 to 25,000 for the number of police officers. What were they doing, standing shoulder to shoulder around the fence? Why bother with a fence then?) So they're letting the city get wrecked to protect a precious few elite? Just how many people were behind the fence anyway? Wouldn't it be awesome if some world leader showed the noblesse oblige to say to their security people "Do what you need to do to protect me, but only if it doesn't inconvenience the citizens I represent."?
7. They said they did the massive sweep at Queen & Spadina because they thought some of the people in the intersection were black bloc people dressed in civvies. But how am I supposed to know the back stories of the people in the intersection with me? In a typical crowded intersection on a beautiful day there are like 100 people. What, specifically, do they expect me to do so I can go about life (including crowded intersections) normally without getting caught up in a police sweep?
8. They said one of the reasons they were after these particular people is because they did not dissociate themselves from the black bloc. The thing is, neither did I. Why not? Because what the black bloc did was so fucking dumb-ass that I figured my condemnation of their asshattery would be taken as a given! I've never dissociated myself from Hitler or Than Shwe or Paul Bernardo or Kanye West when he was interrupting Taylor Swift or those dickheads who sit with their legs spread on the subway either, for the same reason (although I'll take the opportunity to do so now). So whom do they want us to dissociate from? Which circumstances require an explicitly state dissociation and which are obvious? How, precisely, do we dissociate from someone to the satisfaction of the police? We need clear instructions on this!
9. Some people have said that the reason the police arrested everyone at Queen & Spadina is because they said not to go past a certain line, and a few people did. (According to the explanation I was given, the people in the video who were sitting on the ground with their backs to the police had crossed the invisible line, but I can't vouch for that personally.) I've also heard people complaining that legitimate protesters did nothing to stop the black bloc people (although we have video evidence that some people did). But how could I possibly stop a stranger from doing something stupid? I'm not big or strong enough to tackle a person, nor persuasive enough to convince them from crossing an invisible line. People don't generally listen to me. That was a method our teachers used in middle school. Sometimes they'd punish the whole class because we didn't stop the person from doing something wrong. Why didn't they understand that if I could get my peers to do what I wanted, I'd make them stop bullying me? Not being influential is...well, I might not go so far as to say it's punishment in and of itself, but it's certainly an inconvenience in every area of life as compared with being able to get people to do what you tell them. And now I have to worry about the police punishing me for being uninfluential in the general vicinity of an idiot.
10. If the police want to get ordinary citizens onside, they could do a world of good with humane detention conditions. One of my favourite guilty pleasures is the In Death series, which are police procedurals (although I'm finding them difficult to read now, bastards!) From these books, I've learned that sometimes the police need to investigate people to eliminate them, sometimes they need to ask questions of people who were present at the time or might have seen or heard something, sometimes they need to go through certain procedures for the record, etc. And because of this, before last weekend, if I found myself questioned by police officers, I would just assume they're doing their job. If I'd had to wait around several hours but I'd been indoors, not handcuffed because I'm no threat, reasonable access to washroom facilities and drinking water, I would totally be right up there with the people who are saying that they're just doing their jobs trying to protect us and we have to accept a certain amount of inconvenience. What makes me fear the police is the prospect of being kept outside in the elements unprotected (because if you're just running down to the corner store and the rain isn't forecast to start for several hours, you don't bring gear for three hours in the rain), not able to go to the washroom, detained for 36 hours, insufficient water, the only food available makes you thirstier, threatened with sexual harassment, overcrowded room, no room to lie down for 36 hours, vomit on the floor, etc. If they'd just gone through the motions of giving everyone the benefit of the doubt, they wouldn't be facing any complaints now.
11. Something needs to be done. We need to have assurances that we aren't going to be rounded up when we're just innocently walking down the street. (Or even if we're walking down the street doing something stupid and/or obnoxious, but perfectly legal and ultimately harmless.) We need assurances that we won't be forced to pee our pants or go without water or be sexually assaulted just because we happened to be in the wrong place at the wrong time. We need assurances that we can trust our police. There are elements out there that are still threats to us and from which the police are supposed to protect us. You often hear that crimes aren't solved because witnesses don't come forward to the police. How can any of this work if we can't trust our police? This is detrimental to society as a whole!My now-octogenerian grandmother fled with her family from behind the iron curtain and sacrificed greatly her entire life so her descendents wouldn't have to go through this! If they can't provide us with assurances, they should at least provide my grandmother, and all those like her, with a refund!
12. I mentally wrote that last paragraph before I learned that police chief Bill Blair lied about the fence law. So even if they give us these assurances, how can we trust them? What are we supposed to do in a world where the police outright lie to us, publicly and on record, about what the laws are? How is our society going to function?
13. Do the police even want us to trust them? Or do they just want us to fear them? If it's the latter, couldn't they at least have a word with all the people who keep scolding me for not trusting the police?
Edited to add: Since 2007, I'd been wanting Eddie Izzard to come to Toronto, and asking him to do so at every opportune moment. Last month he did just that, and there was much rejoicing. But now I'm even more glad that he's already come to see us, because as it stands right this minute I could not in good conscience ask him to come here. He probably would because he's brave, and from a purely selfish fannish perspective I do want him to, but I cannot look someone I so like and admire in the metaphorical eye and say "You should come here. It's a good idea."
Monday, June 28, 2010
The things people assume about me
In terms of noteworthiness, this is more appropriate for Twitter than for Blogger, but there's no way I can get it down to 140 characters.
I get into the elevator in my apartment building. I'm carrying three shopping bags, my purse, a parcel, and two newspapers, so the man in the elevator (maybe 50ish?) asks me which floor. I tell him my floor, he presses the button, and then he starts talking.
He has this sort of patter/banter thing going on. I suspect he makes his living in sales. So he sees my newspapers and says "News! What's in the news? Riots and arrests! Terrible stuff! Oh well, it's not like we were in it!" Then we reached his floor and he got off.
He just automatically assumed I wasn't in it! What a weird assumption!
It's true that I wasn't actually in it, but I should have been. Rightfully, if I were doing my proper duty as a citizen, I should have been in the labour march. But I was afraid of getting arrested because my driver's licence is expired. So why did he just automatically think I wasn't in it? I freely concede that I may in fact look as chickenshit as I actually am, but it seems an odd thing to explicitly assume to someone's face on 10 seconds' acquaintance.
In retrospect, I should have burst into tears and come up with a story about having been an innocent passer-by caught in the police crush at Queen and Spadina. Although that's disrespectful to the people who actually were.
Another weird assumption came a while back. I was in line at the grocery story, facing (but not reading) a turny magazine rack. A worker clearing out the carts - a lady maybe in her 40s who I often see behind the cash register - turns the magazine rack around so a men's fitness magazine with a picture of a muscley shirtless male is facing me. "Now isn't that nicer to look at?" she says.
Why would she assume I like men?
As it happens, I do like men (although I'm not so very into the overly muscley variety in the picture in question), but why would you walk up to someone and explicitly assume their sexual orientation in a situation where there's absolutely no reason to do so?
I get into the elevator in my apartment building. I'm carrying three shopping bags, my purse, a parcel, and two newspapers, so the man in the elevator (maybe 50ish?) asks me which floor. I tell him my floor, he presses the button, and then he starts talking.
He has this sort of patter/banter thing going on. I suspect he makes his living in sales. So he sees my newspapers and says "News! What's in the news? Riots and arrests! Terrible stuff! Oh well, it's not like we were in it!" Then we reached his floor and he got off.
He just automatically assumed I wasn't in it! What a weird assumption!
It's true that I wasn't actually in it, but I should have been. Rightfully, if I were doing my proper duty as a citizen, I should have been in the labour march. But I was afraid of getting arrested because my driver's licence is expired. So why did he just automatically think I wasn't in it? I freely concede that I may in fact look as chickenshit as I actually am, but it seems an odd thing to explicitly assume to someone's face on 10 seconds' acquaintance.
In retrospect, I should have burst into tears and come up with a story about having been an innocent passer-by caught in the police crush at Queen and Spadina. Although that's disrespectful to the people who actually were.
Another weird assumption came a while back. I was in line at the grocery story, facing (but not reading) a turny magazine rack. A worker clearing out the carts - a lady maybe in her 40s who I often see behind the cash register - turns the magazine rack around so a men's fitness magazine with a picture of a muscley shirtless male is facing me. "Now isn't that nicer to look at?" she says.
Why would she assume I like men?
As it happens, I do like men (although I'm not so very into the overly muscley variety in the picture in question), but why would you walk up to someone and explicitly assume their sexual orientation in a situation where there's absolutely no reason to do so?
Sunday, June 27, 2010
In loving memory of the dog next door
His ears were pointy, his tail was curly, and he was unwaveringly diligent in fulfilling what he saw as his sworn duties: to warn the neighbourhood of impending squirrels and to catch any frisbees that may pass his way.
He came into my parents' neighbours' household as a companion for an elderly lady, whom he brought much joy and ended up outliving. When I was in high school (which I guess shows how old he was!), when I came home from school he'd trot up to the fence to investigate and stick his snout underneath. I'd give him my hand and he'd give me a sniff and a lick. Then I'd go inside with a smile on my face.
I just received word that he was put down, following an illness that made eating and breathing difficult. He must have been at the very least 13 years old.
We didn't really have much of a relationship beyond our daily encounter at the fence. I don't even know if I ever even had a chance to pet him face to face. But he made me smile every single day, sometimes the only smile I'd get that day. For that alone, he will never be forgotten.
He came into my parents' neighbours' household as a companion for an elderly lady, whom he brought much joy and ended up outliving. When I was in high school (which I guess shows how old he was!), when I came home from school he'd trot up to the fence to investigate and stick his snout underneath. I'd give him my hand and he'd give me a sniff and a lick. Then I'd go inside with a smile on my face.
I just received word that he was put down, following an illness that made eating and breathing difficult. He must have been at the very least 13 years old.
We didn't really have much of a relationship beyond our daily encounter at the fence. I don't even know if I ever even had a chance to pet him face to face. But he made me smile every single day, sometimes the only smile I'd get that day. For that alone, he will never be forgotten.
Things They Should Invent: text transcription of Web 2.0
A lot of the very important G20 record is on YouTube or Twitter. The problem with this is it's more difficult to read. This is an issue because it's most important to get this information to the people who don't want to invest the time in reading it.
For example, I think everyone should read Steve Paikin's tweets from last night, starting from "leaving the media ctr. heading for the scene of the rioting. want to see for myself." He walked around the city and live-tweeted what he saw in real time. But currently the only way to read these tweets is to go to his twitter feed, click the "More" button currently seven times (it's going to increase as he keeps tweeting), find the first tweet in the series, and read through by counterintuitively scrolling up.
There are also youtubes that allegedly show the use of agents provocateurs. I say "allegedly" because I haven't watched them yet. Why not? Because youtubes are inconvenient. You have to watch the whole thing, you don't know when the interesting and relevant stuff is going to happen, you don't know if you even care about the contents.
I could read a transcript of a youtube much faster than I could watch a youtube, and I could read a chronological transcript of a twitter feed much more easily than I could read an actual twitter feed.
They need to invent a way to do this, either automatically for everything that's posted, or by sending the material through some website that automatically transcribes it.
I find it inconvenient and burdensome to keep up on everything I should to be fully informed (I know, I know, #FirstWorldProblems), and I actually do feel morally obligated to intake all available information. It's even more important to get this information into the minds of people who refuse to believe that the situation could be more nuanced than they originally thought, and they're certainly not going to want to go to the effort of watching youtubes and reading twitter feeds that they don't care about!
For example, I think everyone should read Steve Paikin's tweets from last night, starting from "leaving the media ctr. heading for the scene of the rioting. want to see for myself." He walked around the city and live-tweeted what he saw in real time. But currently the only way to read these tweets is to go to his twitter feed, click the "More" button currently seven times (it's going to increase as he keeps tweeting), find the first tweet in the series, and read through by counterintuitively scrolling up.
There are also youtubes that allegedly show the use of agents provocateurs. I say "allegedly" because I haven't watched them yet. Why not? Because youtubes are inconvenient. You have to watch the whole thing, you don't know when the interesting and relevant stuff is going to happen, you don't know if you even care about the contents.
I could read a transcript of a youtube much faster than I could watch a youtube, and I could read a chronological transcript of a twitter feed much more easily than I could read an actual twitter feed.
They need to invent a way to do this, either automatically for everything that's posted, or by sending the material through some website that automatically transcribes it.
I find it inconvenient and burdensome to keep up on everything I should to be fully informed (I know, I know, #FirstWorldProblems), and I actually do feel morally obligated to intake all available information. It's even more important to get this information into the minds of people who refuse to believe that the situation could be more nuanced than they originally thought, and they're certainly not going to want to go to the effort of watching youtubes and reading twitter feeds that they don't care about!
Now taking suggestions for a new word
The protesters who were wrecking stuff were using black bloc tactics, complete with full black costumes. This does is a great favour semantically, because we can now call them "black bloc protesters", which is a clear and simple way to distinguish them from the majority of legitimate peaceful protesters.
What we need is a similar term for law enforcement who abuse their power. It needs to be clear, straightforward, and easily understood, so there are no barriers to using it every time you need to describe the concept. It will eliminate any ambiguity without making the speaker seem an apologetic for the police (which could hinder the speaker's perceived neutrality and/or credibility).
The word needs to be neutral, without casting any positive or negative connotations on the people it refers to. Black bloc is a specific protest technique, so people who engage in it can rightfully, neutrally, and unquestionably be called black bloc protesters. It's like how a person playing a vuvuzela can rightfully, neutrally, and unquestionably be called a vuvuzela player. Regardless of how you feel about the people being referred to, it is inherently non-judgemental.
(At this point, someone usually points out that the people in question deserve to be spoken of judgementally, but we can't do that properly unless we also have the option of referring to them neutrally, thereby making any aspersions case an informed and deliberate choice.)
Suggestions welcome. If any journalists or anyone else with broader reach than me would like to take this up, you're welcome to it. If your suggestion is clear, obvious, and justifiable enough that I can use it in translations, I will do so if the topic ever comes up.
What we need is a similar term for law enforcement who abuse their power. It needs to be clear, straightforward, and easily understood, so there are no barriers to using it every time you need to describe the concept. It will eliminate any ambiguity without making the speaker seem an apologetic for the police (which could hinder the speaker's perceived neutrality and/or credibility).
The word needs to be neutral, without casting any positive or negative connotations on the people it refers to. Black bloc is a specific protest technique, so people who engage in it can rightfully, neutrally, and unquestionably be called black bloc protesters. It's like how a person playing a vuvuzela can rightfully, neutrally, and unquestionably be called a vuvuzela player. Regardless of how you feel about the people being referred to, it is inherently non-judgemental.
(At this point, someone usually points out that the people in question deserve to be spoken of judgementally, but we can't do that properly unless we also have the option of referring to them neutrally, thereby making any aspersions case an informed and deliberate choice.)
Suggestions welcome. If any journalists or anyone else with broader reach than me would like to take this up, you're welcome to it. If your suggestion is clear, obvious, and justifiable enough that I can use it in translations, I will do so if the topic ever comes up.
Saturday, June 26, 2010
Journalism wanted
I have a number of questions about recent G20 happenings. In more or less chronological order:
1. On June 16, it was announced that health cards wouldn't count as ID for the security zone. Why not? What does this achieve from a security perspective? What aspect of health cards makes them inadequate as ID? Why did they announce this too late for anyone to acquire ID that was considered acceptable in time for the summit? The nature of health cards hasn't changed. Why didn't they know they would be unacceptable earlier? What do they want people who don't have a driver's licence or a passport but do legitimately need to access the security zone to do? What are the intentions of the people who made this rule?
2. Why were the new laws not announced and widely publicized before the first person was arrested under them? What is the security/law enforcement benefit to doing this? Presumably laws are made because they want people to follow them, and to get people to follow them they have to tell people about them. If this is not the case, why not? What were their intentions?
3. I have heard a number of reports from actual journalists (including the Toronto Star's G20 blog and Steve Paikin's twitter feed) that police were banging their batons against their shields. What is their intention in doing this? I'm not in the crowd in question, but it seems like the sort of thing that could escalate.
4. Who exactly are these black bloc people? What are their goals? Why do they think their goals are best achieved through violent action? Why did they choose to take violent action in a way that would be detrimental to the safety and reputation of peaceful demonstrators? Are they opposed to what the peaceful demonstrators stand for? I would very much like to see an extensive interview with some black bloc people, and I think protecting the sources' anonymity if necessary would be appropriate. We have a right to know at the very least the reasoning, goals, and intentions of the people who are hurting our city's body, soul and reputation and setting legitimate activism back decades.
5. What was the ratio of black bloc people to legitimate demonstrators to police? How does this compare to demonstrator/police ratios at demonstrations? I've heard reports that the police weren't doing anything to stop the black bloc people from destroying property. Is this true? If so, were the ratios such that it would not have been possible to do so? Is there another law enforcement reason? Where else were the police deployed and why?
6. I've heard from a number of eyewitness sources via twitter that the police seemed to be attempting to rather aggressively drive protesters out of Queen's Park. But Queen's Park is the designated protest area. What's the story here? Did something change? Why wouldn't you want to keep protesters inside the protest area? What triggered the aggressiveness?
I have a couple more things that are really more ideas for long-term research rather than journalism, so I'll be making another blog post either tonight or tomorrow.
I'll close with a conspiracy theory. If you're just tuning in to this blog, I like to make conspiracy theories - it's a bit of a hobby. (Maybe I should give them their own blog category?) I tend not to actually believe the conspiracy theories I make, I just find it an entertaining intellectual exercise to assemble the elements of a situation in a way that produces a good conspiracy theory.
So here's my conspiracy theory for today's events: the black bloc people are ultimately operatives/tools of the powers that be, sent into today's protests for the express purpose of making the unprecedented security measures look justified, and perhaps also to distract from what the G20 actually is or is not doing.
I'm sure no one involved likes that conspiracy theory. I'm sure even those not involved want it to be false. Therefore, I hope everyone will be absolutely scrupulous in disclosing and reporting all the facts and all the truth in order to disprove me beyond any doubt, and the unanswered questions won't be left to slide just because the barricades have come down and the rainbow flags have gone up.
1. On June 16, it was announced that health cards wouldn't count as ID for the security zone. Why not? What does this achieve from a security perspective? What aspect of health cards makes them inadequate as ID? Why did they announce this too late for anyone to acquire ID that was considered acceptable in time for the summit? The nature of health cards hasn't changed. Why didn't they know they would be unacceptable earlier? What do they want people who don't have a driver's licence or a passport but do legitimately need to access the security zone to do? What are the intentions of the people who made this rule?
2. Why were the new laws not announced and widely publicized before the first person was arrested under them? What is the security/law enforcement benefit to doing this? Presumably laws are made because they want people to follow them, and to get people to follow them they have to tell people about them. If this is not the case, why not? What were their intentions?
3. I have heard a number of reports from actual journalists (including the Toronto Star's G20 blog and Steve Paikin's twitter feed) that police were banging their batons against their shields. What is their intention in doing this? I'm not in the crowd in question, but it seems like the sort of thing that could escalate.
4. Who exactly are these black bloc people? What are their goals? Why do they think their goals are best achieved through violent action? Why did they choose to take violent action in a way that would be detrimental to the safety and reputation of peaceful demonstrators? Are they opposed to what the peaceful demonstrators stand for? I would very much like to see an extensive interview with some black bloc people, and I think protecting the sources' anonymity if necessary would be appropriate. We have a right to know at the very least the reasoning, goals, and intentions of the people who are hurting our city's body, soul and reputation and setting legitimate activism back decades.
5. What was the ratio of black bloc people to legitimate demonstrators to police? How does this compare to demonstrator/police ratios at demonstrations? I've heard reports that the police weren't doing anything to stop the black bloc people from destroying property. Is this true? If so, were the ratios such that it would not have been possible to do so? Is there another law enforcement reason? Where else were the police deployed and why?
6. I've heard from a number of eyewitness sources via twitter that the police seemed to be attempting to rather aggressively drive protesters out of Queen's Park. But Queen's Park is the designated protest area. What's the story here? Did something change? Why wouldn't you want to keep protesters inside the protest area? What triggered the aggressiveness?
I have a couple more things that are really more ideas for long-term research rather than journalism, so I'll be making another blog post either tonight or tomorrow.
I'll close with a conspiracy theory. If you're just tuning in to this blog, I like to make conspiracy theories - it's a bit of a hobby. (Maybe I should give them their own blog category?) I tend not to actually believe the conspiracy theories I make, I just find it an entertaining intellectual exercise to assemble the elements of a situation in a way that produces a good conspiracy theory.
So here's my conspiracy theory for today's events: the black bloc people are ultimately operatives/tools of the powers that be, sent into today's protests for the express purpose of making the unprecedented security measures look justified, and perhaps also to distract from what the G20 actually is or is not doing.
I'm sure no one involved likes that conspiracy theory. I'm sure even those not involved want it to be false. Therefore, I hope everyone will be absolutely scrupulous in disclosing and reporting all the facts and all the truth in order to disprove me beyond any doubt, and the unanswered questions won't be left to slide just because the barricades have come down and the rainbow flags have gone up.
Currently wondering: are politicians open to specific solutions from citizens?
Sometimes when I write to my elected representatives, it's because I've come up with a solution to a problem. When the debate of the moment is "Free widgets for all!" vs. "Ban widgets!", sometimes I think of a new way to keep widgets affordable and accessible for everyone who needs them while also greatly reducing the widget-related injuries that have cause people to call for a ban in the first place.
Are politicians equipped to handle this? If my idea is in fact new and original, is there even a mechanism for them to take what's useful from my new idea and run with it and build a better widget? Or are they only equipped to check off X votes in the pro-widget box and Y votes in the non-widget box?
Are politicians equipped to handle this? If my idea is in fact new and original, is there even a mechanism for them to take what's useful from my new idea and run with it and build a better widget? Or are they only equipped to check off X votes in the pro-widget box and Y votes in the non-widget box?
Friday, June 25, 2010
How security people can get ordinary citizens onside
If people who want to implement questionable-looking and inconvenient security measures want to get the citizenry onside, they need to give us success stories. Give us examples of tangible results produced by previous security actions - ideally security actions taken by the same parties that seemed equally unreasonable going in.
"We took these measures and nothing happened" isn't good enough. (And if you think it's good enough, I have a tiger-proof hat I'd like to sell you.) We need examples of specific and tangible threats that were actually prevented because of specific measures that were taken.
"But we can't disclose this information for security reasons." I do see where you're coming from on that. I myself have a job where I spend my day immersed in information I'm not permitted to disclose. But the fact is, there have been enough abuses of trust in recent memory that we can no longer trust you blindly. As Jean-Paul Sartre once said, "La confiance se gagne en gouttes, et se perd en litres." Trust is won in drops and lost in litres. Give us success stories and get us onside, or stay behind a wall of silence and continue going about your work as an object of thankless suspicion.
"We took these measures and nothing happened" isn't good enough. (And if you think it's good enough, I have a tiger-proof hat I'd like to sell you.) We need examples of specific and tangible threats that were actually prevented because of specific measures that were taken.
"But we can't disclose this information for security reasons." I do see where you're coming from on that. I myself have a job where I spend my day immersed in information I'm not permitted to disclose. But the fact is, there have been enough abuses of trust in recent memory that we can no longer trust you blindly. As Jean-Paul Sartre once said, "La confiance se gagne en gouttes, et se perd en litres." Trust is won in drops and lost in litres. Give us success stories and get us onside, or stay behind a wall of silence and continue going about your work as an object of thankless suspicion.
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