I couldn’t help but notice the double standard employed by sympathetic Canadians last week as we had a trio of criminal incidents that could be culturally motivated. In Germany, many women were groped, possibly raped, and definitely the victims of theft as they were surrounded by as many as 1000 men; some of whom have been identified and later confirmed to be refugees. In Calgary, two Muslim men opened fire at a nightclub, but minimal damage was done as the main culprit was wrestled to the ground. The voices have been very loud from people who say to rush and pass judgement on these as an extremist terrorist act is premature and not the right thing to do until all the facts are collected. Well, on Saturday morning, a gathering of refugees were pepper sprayed by a passing cyclist, who was never caught or identified and the same people who don’t want us to rush to judgement on the other matters, are standing in front of television cameras apologizing for what has to be a hate crime from a racist Canadian, even though we don’t even know if the culprit is Canadian. We have no idea what the motivation was. Maybe it was a dare to pepper spray a large gathering of people and they just happened to be refugees. You see, two can play this silly game. I’m all for calling what walks, quacks, and flies like a duck, a duck. But, let’s do it on everything if that’s what we are going to do.
What I find, incredibly, interesting is that the New Year’s Eve attacks in Germany went very under-reported for quite a few days. I have my suspicions as to why, but let’s not get into that. Let’s just say if these women were the victims of an attack and it was discovered that a majority of them belong to the Department of Athletics at the local university, or were members of a sports team; don’t you think there would be round-the-clock coverage or an incredible overreaction? If you don’t, look no further than the University of Ottawa hockey team, who shut their program down after a complaint of sexual assault, which was later to be determined that only two people were involved and, to this day, nothing has been proven in court. It does sound like the hockey program will come back this Fall, but suspend it because of two out of twenty-two players?
Someone sent me a YouTube video last week that is well worth watching if you are, at all, interested in immigration. It’s an American video, but it applies to Canada as well. When you search for it, type in: Immigration, World Poverty, and Gum Balls. It’s a presentation, done extremely well, by a man who uses gum balls to drive home world poverty. It’s simplistic, but the United States takes in the equivalent of 1 gum ball for every 5600 available gum balls. Canada would do much less than that, however the powers that be would have us believe we are making a serious dent at tackling world poverty and they will, passionately, fight this cause at the expense of the most vulnerable people (working poor, those who need social programs the most, etc.) here in our own country. The argument this lecturer makes, and he’s very good at it, is that immigration can never be an effective way to deal with suffering people because the most energetic, the better educated, the most dissatisfied people are the ones who are most likely to come to Canada. Yet, those people are also the best agents for change in their own country. They are the true heroes. The ones who have the ability to immigrate, but choose to stay home and help. 99-percent of the people who need help the most, will never ever have the ability to immigrate. It’s an excellent six minute video. Watch it.
The federal government is trying to make spanking your child illegal. I can recall a child specialist telling me one time that I could get a lot further with my kids if I squatted down to their eye level and reasoned with them, negotiating for a happy medium so that the child would be more motivated to do what the parent wants. My response to that was that if the specialist is, truly, honest with himself he’d recognize that’s a great opportunity for a child to take a mile when given an inch. I don’t believe in beatings every time a child does wrong, but I do think it is an effective deterrent and even the fear of, possibly, getting a spanking can be a useful discipline tool. I don’t think schools should be allowed to use corporate punishment. That’s too far. Having said that, I think I may be one of the last Canadians to be strapped at school. Is that something to boast about? Of course, I didn’t deserve it ;-).
Nice person mentions this week to Sherry Popov, Kevin Elmy, Terri-Ann Lepowick, Cheryl Budzinski, and Ron Fedorowich.
