A Work In Progress

The website SHD (Shit Harper Did) is currently completing a documentary looking into Canada's surveillance programs. Now in post-production, it is seeking donors to help complete the process. If you would like to contribute, you can click here.

Following is a trailer of their work:

About That Gun Thing, Mr. Harper

Yesterday, I wrote about Prime Minister Harper hitting upon yet another red-meat issue, this one potentially quite dangerous, over which his base can salivate. He suggested that guns are an important part of personal safety, especially in rural areas.

Two letters in today's Globe suggest not everyone with rural experience embrace Mr. Harper's twisted vision.

PM, gun control

As one who resides in a rural area and has guns, the concept of having them for my safety has never been something I’ve thought about (Provocation, Pandering And Prejudice – March 17). I suppose if that were the case and I were truly worried about my safety, instead of locking them up and storing the ammunition separately, loaded guns would lying all over the place. It’s hard to believe that this is what Stephen Harper had in mind. Instead, chalk the comments up to the mouth moving faster than the brain.

Jeff Spooner, Kinburn, Ont.

.........

My father spent his early days on granddad’s horse ranch in the Cypress Hills where the ethic was to keep one’s doors open, whether at home or not, for anyone who needed shelter and a meal.

Americans across the border had a different approach. Our gunslinger PM wants seems to want to bring gun violence north.

Jerry Thompson, Ottawa

There Is No Depth To Which He Won't Sink

It is well-known that Stephen Harper is in constant election mode, ever in search of issues that will further divide Canadians as he makes almost exclusive appeal to his base. His positions on climate change, Mulsim dress habits, provincial relations or a whole host of other issues serve only an agenda that invites discord, quarrel, contempt and dismissal of all concerns other than his own.

Just when you thought he couldn't sink any further, the putative prime minister has achieved a new low. Disgust and outrage do not adequately convey what I feel about this:

Prime Minister Stephen Harper, after years of cautiously linking gun ownership to farmers and duck hunters, now says firearms are needed by rural Canadians for their own security so they can shoot people who pose a danger.

Harper’s comments are being promoted by the Conservatives’ election campaign manager, [Jenni Byrne] who says she is “proud” of how Harper said gun ownership is “important for safety for those of us who live a ways from immediate police assistance.” But a spokesman for the Canadian Bar Association is urging people to realize that they do not have an automatic right to defend themselves at home with a gun, and that they could end up facing criminal charges.

Never one to miss an opportunity, the Conservative party is distributing fund-raising emails that include Harper's remarks equating gun ownership to personal protection. And those remarks are being very well-received in some quarters. NFA president Sheldon Clare thinks what Harper said is just peachy:

On Monday, the National Firearms Association (NFA) applauded Harper for making a statement that was “long overdue.” The association said all Canadians — rural and urban — should have a clear right to use firearms to defend themselves against an intruder who breaks into their home.

Fortunately, not everyone embraces the concept of vigilante justice:

Eric Gottardi, chair of the Canadian Bar Association’s criminal justice section, rejected the notion Monday evening that Canadians have the legal right to defend their homes with a gun.

“Deadly force through the use of a gun would never be justified unless that situation turned into one that was life-threatening. And at that point, you’re really talking about self defence.”

“At 3 a.m., if someone is breaking into your house, you might think that your life is in danger. But the reality is that if it’s an unarmed intruder and you blow them away, you’re going to be arrested for murder.”

Others weighed in as well:

Wendy Cukier, president of the Coalition for Gun Control, reacted in an emailed statement to the Citizen.

“The Prime Minister seems to be implying firearms are used for personal protection against criminals which is not the usual purpose for having firearms in rural areas and is at odds with safe storage requirements that only allow guns to be unlocked if there is reason to assume that there is an imminent threat,” she wrote

Wayne Easter, Liberal public safety critic,

said Monday that this is not the message Canadians should hear from their prime minister.

“One thing that police always say is, ‘Do not take justice into your own hands”.

“That position has done Canadians well throughout time and it’s a position we should maintain. What Harper’s statement could lead to is (that) the prime minister is almost saying vigilante justice is fine.”

Clare, of the NFA, has an accurate take on Harper's ploy, for which he utters praise:

“We think it’s really something that he is well aware is an issue with people who would normally vote Conservative. I think he is reading his mail. I think he’s getting the message that people are concerned about defence as a fundamental right.”

"Unfit to govern" seems far too mild an assessment of this malevolent presence polluting the Canadian landscape.

Some Much Deserved Mockery

Enjoy:

Resisting The Fashion Fascists

If his shrill demagoguery is any indication, I suppose Herr Harper and his regime can be considered to be at war with Islam; the latter's offences range from embracing jihadism to being a culture that, according to our self-appointed fascist fashionista, is 'anti-women.'

In that war, Zunera Ishaq is what we might consider a resistance fighter. You will recall that the Pakistani woman and devout Sunni Muslim who is seeking Canadian citizenship, while willing to remove her niqab to an official before taking the citizenship test, wanted to remain veiled for the swearing-in ceremony. A federal judge overturned the ban on her veil, but the Harper regime is appealing the decision, while at the same time eagerly fanning the flames of intolerance to better reach his base.

In today's Star, Zunera Ishaq offers her perspective on the issue:

I am Zunera Ishaq. I am a mother. I am university educated. I believe that the environment needs saving and I try to do my part by joining campaigns to plant trees. Chasing my boys in the snow is one of the things I love most about winter. I believe we should strive to give back to others, and for me that means volunteering: at women’s shelters, for political candidates or at schools.

I also wear a niqab. And according to my prime minister, that is all you need to know about me to know that I am oppressed.

It’s precisely because I won’t listen to how other people want me to live my life that I wear a niqab. Some of my own family members have asked me to remove it. I have told them that I prefer to think for myself.

Ishaq, who has removed her niqab on every occasion that required facial identification (airport security, driver's licence, etc.) offers a spirited defense of her decision:

I will not take my niqab off at that same ceremony for the sole reason that someone else doesn’t like it, even if that person happens to be Stephen Harper.

I am not looking for Mr. Harper to approve my life choices or dress. I am certainly not looking for him to speak on my behalf and “save” me from oppression, without even ever having bothered to reach out to me and speak with me.

Had Harper asked why she wears the niqab, he might have learned a few things that would have challenged his rigid intolerance:

I would have told him that it was a decision I took very seriously after I had looked into the matter thoroughly. I would tell him that aside from the religious aspect, I like how it makes me feel: like people have to look beyond what I look like to get to know me. That I don’t have to worry about my physical appearance and can concentrate on my inner self. That it empowers me in this regard.

In her article, Zunera Ishaq emerges as a thoughtful and independent thinker. As we know, those qualities, while normally real assets, are seen as most unwelcome obstacles in Harperland.

Has Mr. Harper's Niqab's Misdirection Worked?

You decide.


H/t Michael Nabert

Meanwhile, Bruce Anderson wonders about the implications for our democracy in Mr. Harper's pontifications on what women should and should not wear.

Stephen Harper says covering your face is concealing, not expressing, a “Canadian” identity. He didn’t argue that it was a security threat. He was saying that if this is how you express your personal values, it’s not Canadian enough for his tastes.

Initially his comments were focused on the citizenship ceremony. But he has since wandered further, hazardously afield.

The problem, he says, is that the practice of wearing a niqab is rooted in a culture that is “anti-women.” He appeared to be generalizing about the Muslim faith. His reference was not specific to the Taliban or the Islamic State, or any radical faction.

His point was that those who cover their faces are not making a choice of their own free will – but are victims of subjugation.

You don’t have to be a Muslim to wonder if this line of commentary from a Prime Minister is a healthy development in our democracy.

I Start To Worry

This is, I believe, the second time in recent weeks that I have agreed with Rex Murphy. You see my problem.