4 ms·

Is Canada Broken?

24 points by laurex 7y ago

jjtheblunt 7y ago
Not Canadian, so the question, combined with what's visible in the news outside Canada, with Trudeau, clubbing animals for fur, exporting asbestos to poor countries, made me think of this: https://www.azquotes.com/quote/503127 https://www.azquotes.com/quote/503127 "Humanity's true moral test, its fundamental test…consists of its attitude towards those who are at its mercy: animals." The statement resonates, as it's simple, pithy, and no counterexample is obvious.
- helllooooo 7y ago
  The seal hunt is undertaken by the Inuit peoples. Seals are a major source of food and clothing for them. Commercial hunting is banned. Whats so different from it than hunting deer or duck? On the topic of asbestos, it’s up to those countries to ban it. If Canada stopped exporting it, those countries would just get it from somewhere else.
  - jjtheblunt 7y ago
    What a laughable justification for shameless behavior.
- notafraudster 7y ago
  "Clubbing animals for fur" is reductive. I think you can make a principled, ethical argument against meat consumption and animal hunting broadly, and if that's the point you mean to make here, I have nothing to push back in response. Clearly the ethics of the way we use animals should be reckoned with. But there is very little anomalous about the Canadian seal hunt. First, it goes without saying that "clubbing animals" accounts for a vanishingly tiny portion of the seal hunt. The traditional hakapik is not very efficient and is typically only used by a small number of indigenous Canadians who engage in small-scale subsistence hunting. Anti-hunt groups routinely publicize the hakapik because hunting in this manner produces the visually stunning image of red blood on white ice. Mostly, the seal hunt uses the same tools that any other commercial hunt does. Side note: Anti-hunt groups have also in the past commercially engaged hunters to hunt "white coat" seals (juvenile seals), a practice which is illegal and not economical. If your perception is coloured by the notion that Canadians are clubbing baby seals, that is not by and large accurate. Second, "for fur" is reductive. It is true that seal pelts are used -- to make boots, gloves, jackets, and everything else you imagine. But in fact the seal is used more efficiently than most hunted animals. Seal fat ("blubber") is used for vitamins and oil; the entire seal meat is eaten; and seal bones are used for tools and carvings. In recent years, Indigenous art has been seen as one way to bring economic growth to the rural north, and carved bone sculpture is one of the main mediums used. This is not comparable to, for example, poaching big game for their horns and leaving the carcasses to rot. Seals are used efficiently. Third, I wanted to speak a little bit to the ecological component of the seal hunt. There are millions of seals, millions more than there are people in the areas that hunt. Seals eat cod; the Atlantic Cod population has been severely depleted and there has been a full legal moratorium on the Atlantic Cod fishery for over 20 years to help replenish stocks. Currently, there are more seals than the carrying capacity of the ecosystem allows. This has bad knock-on effects. When they can't find cod to eat, they eat capelin; capelin are otherwise a food source for cod, and so seals contribute in a direct way to the ecological imbalance that is harming cod replenishment. Of course if you oppose killing animals at any time for any reason, then, clearly you would oppose this. But there are scientific and ecological reasons to intervene and cull the seal population. Finally, I wanted to speak a little bit about the economics, and about your attribution of the seal hunt to "Canada". In fact, the seal hunt is an economic feature of only Labrador, northern Quebec, northern Ontario, Nunavut, and the NWT. When the European Union considered barring the import of seal products, these provinces and territories implored the federal government to be an aggressive advocate of their economic interests. Largely, the federal government demurred. The result was that Europe -- a continent which still allows bullfighting and at the time, allowed fox hunting -- banned the import of Canadian seal products. This caused a decrease in the price of seal by over 80% due to a decline in demand. All's fair in love and capitalism, no doubt, but this has hurt a largely poor largely rural population of seal hunters, and also inhibited the above ecologically-motivated interventions. So, again... to the extent that you believe killing animals or consuming meat is unethical across the board, I hear you and I have nothing to say in defence. I do think we will look back on our treatment of animals in shame. But to the extent we allow and recognize the killing and eating of animals, I would hate for you to come away with the idea that those "stupid fat-cat Canucks club baby seals to death and leave them to rot". These misperceptions are harmful to our ability to discuss the overall point and stem largely from well-moneyed interest groups deliberately distorting reality. We could all use a little charity and kindness when engaging with one another, and that is sometimes lost when we go for pith.
- jwalton 7y ago
  Asbestos mining is banned in Canada, as of Jan. of this year, so we're not exporting it anymore.
viburnum 7y ago
Like everywhere else in the world, once reactionary plutocrats take over the media, the country becomes ungovernable.
- core-questions 7y ago
  Is there some implication here that the media was not always "taken over" by some group or other? It's a reasonable assumption that all mass media has been exploited to push people to take one path or another for the benefit of the publisher, sponsors, etc. I mean, if we're going to get into "who runs the media" conspiracy theories, well, most people know what kind of dialogue that's going to lead to. Whether there's anything at the bottom that's worth delving down to is a good question, but ultimately the solution is to decentralize the control of media by personally moving away from the consumption of mass media entirely, ideally replacing it with a balanced consumption of voices that allow us to synthesize our own conclusions.
grawprog 7y ago
Maybe it's just where I live, but I don't really see any of what's described in that article from average people. I see the usual election signs out, haven't heard anyone really saying anything either way or even had any conversations about the elections with anyone. The media's been playing it up pretty bad and I've heard some pretty ridiculous campaign ads from all the parties but that's about it. Haven't heard a lot of white power fascist sentiment either. Sometime last year though I remember they had a rally planned, but there wasn't actually enough of them to have a rally so nobody showed up. It really bugs me the media's trying to get Canadians to play the same stupid political games as America. Our election system doesn't even work the same here. You don't vote for the prime minister. You vote for the party representitive in your area. This bullshit started back when Trudeau was first running and it's just gotten worse. The political parties here haven't changed. A vote for NDP, liberal or conservative is still the same vote it would have been last election cycle. Their policies are all the same as they've ever been.
- afterburner 7y ago
  > It really bugs me the media's trying to get Canadians to play the same stupid political games as America. That's not quite right; the Conservative party is copying Republican tactics wholesale, the media didn't make them do that. Canada isn't broken, but the Conservative party definitely is.
  - core-questions 7y ago
    The Conservative Party is just the Liberal Party's policies delayed by 10-20 years combined with fake kowtowing to voting blocks with suggestions that they'll do what the block wants (and then virtually never executing on that). So yes, it's broken. True conservatives in Canada long for a real party to represent us without looking stupid / evil, but every time one is tried it's beset by problems and waylaid early in the game. The People's Party is the latest incarnation of that, assassinated by the CPC punching right, castigated to look racist when it's not, and so forth. It will probably die after one more election with no results, and then we'll all have to wait for some new hope, which _at best_ will have policies lining up with what the CPC professes now, while they'll have moved on to what the Liberals profess now, in the ever-moving march leftwards.
acl777 7y ago
Article covered a lot of ground for me about what's going in EU and US (especially since I'm not actively reading the news) This line spoke to me: > The more complexity there is in our mental frames, the more of it we are willing to tolerate in others. This leads me to think: the better read a society is, the more balance it is. Perhaps the recent issues of intolerance can be solved by, reading more?
- anpat 7y ago
  I think average person does read a lot more than they used to, IMO the problem seems to be the content. I’d like to mention that I’m utterly out of my depth here, I dont even know what the field of study is called that tries to understand this phenomena.
- deleted 7y ago
  [deleted]
- ivankolev 7y ago
  Right, educated, critically thinking people. The trend though, is to dumb down the masses with pointless entertainment
Cuuugi 7y ago
I think these types of conversations are setting the stage to "scuttle the ship" of political discourse. Stop making excuses for the Liberal party. They lost the plot and are going to lose seats because of it.
jlawson 7y ago
What an atrocious article, exemplifying and worsening the problem it claims to discuss. It starts out with a bit about the importance of dialogue and how bad polarization is. Then immediately switches to automatically, and totally assuming that anyone who opposes current immigration levels is simply a "racist". No discussion. Clearly the author thinks the problem isn't polarization. The author thinks the problem is the other side, and uses words literally synonymous with evil to refer to them. This kind of journalism isn't discussing the problem; it is the problem.
- mattnewport 7y ago
  It really shows a remarkable lack of self awareness and exemplifies the "liberal elite media bubble" which so much populist sentiment is a reaction to.
Palptine 7y ago
Lament from one camp that political discourse has been more polarized is often hard to distinguish from them hating on the world for leaving their camp. People don't have to stay in your camp forever, aka "not polarized".
Sytten 7y ago
Again an english speaking newspaper which says bill 21 in Quebec is outright xenophobic without even trying to understand where it comes from and why the majority supports it... The Quebec has a long history with religions dating from the beginning of the colony. In the 20th century, we had a long period of conservatism that we called the Grande Noiceur (the great darkness: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grande_Noirceur https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grande_Noirceur) during which the religion and the government were acting together against the interest of the population (think about censorship, fear based policies, mandatory brain washing of children, etc). This resulted in an important delay in the economic and cultural development of the province. This period ended abruptly in the 60s with the Quiet Revolution (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quiet_Revolution https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quiet_Revolution) where the Quebecers outright rejected the oppressive religion and conservatism that hold us back for so many years. We are now an open and very progressive society with strong values like woman/man equality. Now you can understand why everything related to religions is very sensitive as it brings bad collective memories from years of oppression and abuses. Some symbols (think burka) are seen as a threat to our collective values and we want to do something about it. Maybe our approach isn't perfect, but saying that we are just a bunch of racists is just acting in bad faith and it won't help us evolve as a society.

24 points by laurex 7y ago

Not Canadian, so the question, combined with what's visible in the news outside Canada, with Trudeau, clubbing animals for fur, exporting asbestos to poor countries, made me think of this: https://www.azquotes.com/quote/503127 https://www.azquotes.com/quote/503127 "Humanity's true moral test, its fundamental test…consists of its attitude towards those who are at its mercy: animals." The statement resonates, as it's simple, pithy, and no counterexample is obvious.

helllooooo 7y ago
The seal hunt is undertaken by the Inuit peoples. Seals are a major source of food and clothing for them. Commercial hunting is banned. Whats so different from it than hunting deer or duck? On the topic of asbestos, it’s up to those countries to ban it. If Canada stopped exporting it, those countries would just get it from somewhere else.
- jjtheblunt 7y ago
  What a laughable justification for shameless behavior.
notafraudster 7y ago
"Clubbing animals for fur" is reductive. I think you can make a principled, ethical argument against meat consumption and animal hunting broadly, and if that's the point you mean to make here, I have nothing to push back in response. Clearly the ethics of the way we use animals should be reckoned with. But there is very little anomalous about the Canadian seal hunt. First, it goes without saying that "clubbing animals" accounts for a vanishingly tiny portion of the seal hunt. The traditional hakapik is not very efficient and is typically only used by a small number of indigenous Canadians who engage in small-scale subsistence hunting. Anti-hunt groups routinely publicize the hakapik because hunting in this manner produces the visually stunning image of red blood on white ice. Mostly, the seal hunt uses the same tools that any other commercial hunt does. Side note: Anti-hunt groups have also in the past commercially engaged hunters to hunt "white coat" seals (juvenile seals), a practice which is illegal and not economical. If your perception is coloured by the notion that Canadians are clubbing baby seals, that is not by and large accurate. Second, "for fur" is reductive. It is true that seal pelts are used -- to make boots, gloves, jackets, and everything else you imagine. But in fact the seal is used more efficiently than most hunted animals. Seal fat ("blubber") is used for vitamins and oil; the entire seal meat is eaten; and seal bones are used for tools and carvings. In recent years, Indigenous art has been seen as one way to bring economic growth to the rural north, and carved bone sculpture is one of the main mediums used. This is not comparable to, for example, poaching big game for their horns and leaving the carcasses to rot. Seals are used efficiently. Third, I wanted to speak a little bit to the ecological component of the seal hunt. There are millions of seals, millions more than there are people in the areas that hunt. Seals eat cod; the Atlantic Cod population has been severely depleted and there has been a full legal moratorium on the Atlantic Cod fishery for over 20 years to help replenish stocks. Currently, there are more seals than the carrying capacity of the ecosystem allows. This has bad knock-on effects. When they can't find cod to eat, they eat capelin; capelin are otherwise a food source for cod, and so seals contribute in a direct way to the ecological imbalance that is harming cod replenishment. Of course if you oppose killing animals at any time for any reason, then, clearly you would oppose this. But there are scientific and ecological reasons to intervene and cull the seal population. Finally, I wanted to speak a little bit about the economics, and about your attribution of the seal hunt to "Canada". In fact, the seal hunt is an economic feature of only Labrador, northern Quebec, northern Ontario, Nunavut, and the NWT. When the European Union considered barring the import of seal products, these provinces and territories implored the federal government to be an aggressive advocate of their economic interests. Largely, the federal government demurred. The result was that Europe -- a continent which still allows bullfighting and at the time, allowed fox hunting -- banned the import of Canadian seal products. This caused a decrease in the price of seal by over 80% due to a decline in demand. All's fair in love and capitalism, no doubt, but this has hurt a largely poor largely rural population of seal hunters, and also inhibited the above ecologically-motivated interventions. So, again... to the extent that you believe killing animals or consuming meat is unethical across the board, I hear you and I have nothing to say in defence. I do think we will look back on our treatment of animals in shame. But to the extent we allow and recognize the killing and eating of animals, I would hate for you to come away with the idea that those "stupid fat-cat Canucks club baby seals to death and leave them to rot". These misperceptions are harmful to our ability to discuss the overall point and stem largely from well-moneyed interest groups deliberately distorting reality. We could all use a little charity and kindness when engaging with one another, and that is sometimes lost when we go for pith.
jwalton 7y ago
Asbestos mining is banned in Canada, as of Jan. of this year, so we're not exporting it anymore.

viburnum 7y ago

Like everywhere else in the world, once reactionary plutocrats take over the media, the country becomes ungovernable.

core-questions 7y ago
Is there some implication here that the media was not always "taken over" by some group or other? It's a reasonable assumption that all mass media has been exploited to push people to take one path or another for the benefit of the publisher, sponsors, etc. I mean, if we're going to get into "who runs the media" conspiracy theories, well, most people know what kind of dialogue that's going to lead to. Whether there's anything at the bottom that's worth delving down to is a good question, but ultimately the solution is to decentralize the control of media by personally moving away from the consumption of mass media entirely, ideally replacing it with a balanced consumption of voices that allow us to synthesize our own conclusions.

grawprog 7y ago

Maybe it's just where I live, but I don't really see any of what's described in that article from average people. I see the usual election signs out, haven't heard anyone really saying anything either way or even had any conversations about the elections with anyone. The media's been playing it up pretty bad and I've heard some pretty ridiculous campaign ads from all the parties but that's about it. Haven't heard a lot of white power fascist sentiment either. Sometime last year though I remember they had a rally planned, but there wasn't actually enough of them to have a rally so nobody showed up. It really bugs me the media's trying to get Canadians to play the same stupid political games as America. Our election system doesn't even work the same here. You don't vote for the prime minister. You vote for the party representitive in your area. This bullshit started back when Trudeau was first running and it's just gotten worse. The political parties here haven't changed. A vote for NDP, liberal or conservative is still the same vote it would have been last election cycle. Their policies are all the same as they've ever been.

afterburner 7y ago
> It really bugs me the media's trying to get Canadians to play the same stupid political games as America. That's not quite right; the Conservative party is copying Republican tactics wholesale, the media didn't make them do that. Canada isn't broken, but the Conservative party definitely is.
- core-questions 7y ago
  The Conservative Party is just the Liberal Party's policies delayed by 10-20 years combined with fake kowtowing to voting blocks with suggestions that they'll do what the block wants (and then virtually never executing on that). So yes, it's broken. True conservatives in Canada long for a real party to represent us without looking stupid / evil, but every time one is tried it's beset by problems and waylaid early in the game. The People's Party is the latest incarnation of that, assassinated by the CPC punching right, castigated to look racist when it's not, and so forth. It will probably die after one more election with no results, and then we'll all have to wait for some new hope, which _at best_ will have policies lining up with what the CPC professes now, while they'll have moved on to what the Liberals profess now, in the ever-moving march leftwards.

acl777 7y ago

Article covered a lot of ground for me about what's going in EU and US (especially since I'm not actively reading the news) This line spoke to me: > The more complexity there is in our mental frames, the more of it we are willing to tolerate in others. This leads me to think: the better read a society is, the more balance it is. Perhaps the recent issues of intolerance can be solved by, reading more?

anpat 7y ago
I think average person does read a lot more than they used to, IMO the problem seems to be the content. I’d like to mention that I’m utterly out of my depth here, I dont even know what the field of study is called that tries to understand this phenomena.
deleted 7y ago
[deleted]
ivankolev 7y ago
Right, educated, critically thinking people. The trend though, is to dumb down the masses with pointless entertainment

Cuuugi 7y ago

I think these types of conversations are setting the stage to "scuttle the ship" of political discourse. Stop making excuses for the Liberal party. They lost the plot and are going to lose seats because of it.

jlawson 7y ago

What an atrocious article, exemplifying and worsening the problem it claims to discuss. It starts out with a bit about the importance of dialogue and how bad polarization is. Then immediately switches to automatically, and totally assuming that anyone who opposes current immigration levels is simply a "racist". No discussion. Clearly the author thinks the problem isn't polarization. The author thinks the problem is the other side, and uses words literally synonymous with evil to refer to them. This kind of journalism isn't discussing the problem; it is the problem.

mattnewport 7y ago
It really shows a remarkable lack of self awareness and exemplifies the "liberal elite media bubble" which so much populist sentiment is a reaction to.

Palptine 7y ago

Lament from one camp that political discourse has been more polarized is often hard to distinguish from them hating on the world for leaving their camp. People don't have to stay in your camp forever, aka "not polarized".

Sytten 7y ago

Again an english speaking newspaper which says bill 21 in Quebec is outright xenophobic without even trying to understand where it comes from and why the majority supports it... The Quebec has a long history with religions dating from the beginning of the colony. In the 20th century, we had a long period of conservatism that we called the Grande Noiceur (the great darkness: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grande_Noirceur https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grande_Noirceur) during which the religion and the government were acting together against the interest of the population (think about censorship, fear based policies, mandatory brain washing of children, etc). This resulted in an important delay in the economic and cultural development of the province. This period ended abruptly in the 60s with the Quiet Revolution (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quiet_Revolution https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quiet_Revolution) where the Quebecers outright rejected the oppressive religion and conservatism that hold us back for so many years. We are now an open and very progressive society with strong values like woman/man equality. Now you can understand why everything related to religions is very sensitive as it brings bad collective memories from years of oppression and abuses. Some symbols (think burka) are seen as a threat to our collective values and we want to do something about it. Maybe our approach isn't perfect, but saying that we are just a bunch of racists is just acting in bad faith and it won't help us evolve as a society.