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by Dr. Brenda Gill on Jan 31 2012 -
by Alex Atamanenko MP on Jan 30 2012 -
by Erin Perkins on Jan 29 2012 -
by Contributor on Jan 28 2012 -
by Boundary Sentinel on Jan 27 2012
I strongly recommend this Canadian-made documentary. It's a great primer on how the world really works....
And things are not about to change as Canadians are too self satisfied and even when some try make changes they are ridiculed. As always the rich get richer and the poor get poorer. Maybe when we become a third world country some may wake up to the fact that the middle class is disapearing and the governments are breaking unions. Check out these links.
http://www.forbiddenknowledgetv.com/page/1258.html
Part 2 - 'The Corporation':
http://www.forbiddenknowledgetv.com/page/1259.html
It's funny how 'news' that the gap is widening is popping up lately in corporate media. In reality that chasm has been gaping wider and wider since the early 1980s, I think. It's only coming up lately as a 'hot topic' for journalists--a flavour of the month--because it's getting too big to ignore safely. Thanks, big media!
We were content with the gap as long as we could get easy credit and spend as if we were wealthier than we actually were (thanks Big Banks and Communist China!). Now that things are getting tight, we're forced to acknowledge the reality of poverty and the existence of legitimate questions around social justice. Let's hope A) that it's not too late and B) that we won't forget justice again if things ever improve.
As I said in my previous comment here, there are two culprits: corporate media (that fiddles with bread and circuses while Rome burns) and human nature (if I can convince myself that I'm doing okay, I'm happy to elect radical, slash-and-burn conservative governments so long as they promise me tax cuts).
It's within our power to deal with both of these issues, but only if we choose to.
Hmmm... Directing your healthcare decisions is one thing- stating that MDMA is not a typically deadly drug is entirely another. Did I say that I think you should be taking MDMA? No. I stuck to the facts. (By the way, no-one should be 'directing' your healthcare decisions but you. We are only here to provide information, and that includes your doctor.) What we practice in my profession is harm-reduction and health promotion.
Secondly, you entirely missed my point. Yes, feel nervous about the deaths that have been happening. But get informed about what is actually killing these kids before you just accept what you read in the paper. Please note that not once did I call it the 'friendly' drug. MDMA is not typically a 'deadly drug'. This article clearly states that it is. I have seen a lot of overdoses that get quite serious, and rarely, if ever, is MDMA the culprit. There are a lot of other drugs being used out there that are potentially much more dangerous. This is my beef with this article: We need less sensational misinformation right now, and more facts. it missed the point and confused MDMA with the 'e' that is implicated in the recent deaths. You are correct in saying that many of the pills being sold on the streets contain all sorts of other chemicals in them. So perhaps we should be talking about what is really killing these kids? Spreading false information is going to lead to more deaths. End of story.
Also, aside from insulting my profession (I guess nurses aren't 'real' professionals?), you over-simplified to make a point. I am confident that our doctors are aware of what is happening out there. I am also sure that they follow protocol in situations like this, and don't just offer advice to abstain from drinking. That is what he told this person, because that is what happened in this particular case. The doctor had already done testing and knew what this kid had taken. Considering this kid was awake and coherent, and went home later that night, I am pretty sure this doc had it handled. I would wager that he knows a lot more about this than you do. Or maybe he should leave his job to you, or other 'real' professionals?
Finally, I agree with you about discouraging people from taking 'e' right now. it's the best thing to do.
Hmmm- did you deliberately miss the point? The healthcare professional who wrote that letter was saying that in this case, the kid had passed out due to drinking while on ecstasy, which is what the doctor had decided after examining him in emerg. Clearly his particular case is nothing like the other stories we are seeing in the news.
It seems obvious to me that this person wrote the article with the intent on setting the story straight- this article was written in a sensational manner in light of all the stories coming out about kids dying of overdoses. And he or she hits the nail on the head- until we figure out which chemicals to focus on and get that information to the public instead of spreading misinformation and buying into the pandemonium, more deaths will occur.
Another couple of things- Nurses and doctors (who are 'real' professionals, FYI) work hard to try and keep us healthy. If you are doomed, that's not because of them. Take some responsibility for yourself. Furthermore, you need to learn to share a point without being a jerk.
So the healthcare professional here is stating that MDMA is "Typically...not a deadly drug." Well done.....and these are the ones that are directing our health decisions for us! No wonder we are doomed.
We are all a little nervous about the deaths that are occuring for those taking pills that are being sold as ecstasy, after all there has been three related deaths in the last couple weeks (oh yes, eight more in Alberta, but whose counting)
According to a real professional who sees the carnage left by the drug use, there have actually been 18 ecstasy related deaths in BC alone since August of last year - the latest one being this 16 year old boy in the article below. And surprising, only five of these are related to PPMA. So 13 that are not related to PPMA. http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/british-columbia/story/2012/01/16/bc-ecstasy-death-langley-boy.html
Even if MDMA is "Typically not a deadly drug" the problem is that very few of the pills being sold by dealers actually contain MDMA. They contain any assortment of drugs - our person from Ankors should be able to comment on that.
If one of our doctors is telling patients who are coming into our emergency wards, its okay to take E right now as long as you don't drink, we may want to educate that doctor that we have a really bad batch of E going around and maybe we might want to discourage taking any E, at least for now.
So health care professional, thanks for your input, but I think I will be discouraging my friends from taking any E...whether they are drinking or not. People are dying - needlessly.
I am just watching the CBC news report on the widening gap between the rich and the poor in Canada, but I am somehow not too hopeful that Canadians have the wherewithall to stand up and demand economic justice, as the Scandinavians did.
I would almost expect, with the new tough, poor-exclusive federal budget on the way, that the majority of Canadians, most of whom elected the current government, are more worried about gaining wealth during the current regime, than to be concerned about the lot of the poor in Canada.
Otherwise, I would expect a huge outcry from the general populace, demanding: "Where did this mandate of restraint come from, when, just a year ago, we were being told that our economy was robust enough to to weather the economic storm befalling much of the rest of the world?" Less than a year after this new government was elected, we are being told that there isn't enough to go around, at least as far as the poorer in our society are concerned. Funny, I haven't heard anything about tax increases for the top 20% of income earners in Canada. Maybe too much money was pumped into ridings that voted for the current government for there to be enough in the 'bank' for the election winners to not have to once again make the poor have to suffer for their election extravagences.
It's not a new story; it has happened continually in our fair land. But I just can't believe how we lined up at the polls to make sure that it would happen once again. If times get hard enough perhaps we will be ready to sell off what's left of our land for the sake of a 'return to prosperity'.
Or perhaps we should, as good Canadians, apologise for 'being upset' and turn our attention back to whatever distracts us from worrying what is really happening to our country.
the people who have died in BC and Alberta died of hyperthermia due to ingesting PMMA, not MDMA.
please see ANKORS blog: http://ankorsblog.inthekoots.com/ for some thorough information.
also, please drop in (monday - thursday 10 - noon and 2 - 4 pm) or call Jamie at 250-505-5506 or visit the partysafe page on facebook for information on safer drug use, PMMA, MDMA, hyperthermia and more.
have fun, be safe, take good care of yourselves and of each other.
if you are with someone who has taken "E", which could contain PMMA, and they begin to have symptoms of hyperthermia (overheating) get them to hospital, or call 911, fast. timeliness could save their life.
Thanks for this analysis, Charles--it should probably be a column and not a comment, in fact. I agree that we can't translate systems of governance willy nilly from one country to another, but the main obstacle to greater social justice in Canada isn't, I believe, cultural, but rather the result of media-driven ignorance and distraction. Canadians favour humane policies like universal health care and OAS culturally, but sit idly by while recent governments undermine and subvert them. Why? Because people are busy digesting trivial media.
I think that if the real options were laid out before the Canadian people they would make choices not unlike those of these Scandanavian countries. But will that happen? Umm....
as a healthcare professional and a person who was an outpatient at the emerg department on friday night, I have to tell you that this article is so full of half and non-truths that it is laughable. it is articles like this that perpetuate inaccurate information and the public panic that goes along with it.
Do some research. Typically, MDMA is not a 'deadly drug'. Furthermore, the young man may have tested positive for MDMA, but it should be said that he was told by his doctor that he passed out because he was drinking. The doctor explained to this young man (who was awake and coherent) how and why MDMA can intensify the effects of alcohol. He was advised not to drink when on 'e'.
I understand that that is not as sensational a headline in the light of all the recent stories of PMMA overdoses (a totally different chemical concoction, FYI) and that yours is more likely to draw readers, but that's the hard truth. And shame on you for serving the interest of the NCP rather than the public with this drivel.
you should be embarassed for jumping on that bandwagon without any factual information to back it up.
I don't understand why it would not work here, why must everything be owned by the 1% and have the labour done in other countries thus putting Canadians out of work? Why must we support those on welfare as well as the corporate bums as well? Why are they allowed to go tax free at our expense?
Most of us who want socialism or social democracy for Canada have looked at Sweden, Norway, Finnland or the Netherlands at some time and wondered why we could not practice their kind of government and social order. The British, who are much closer to these states, have never copied it to the UK, nor have the Irish or French.
I am a keen student of history. I always ask about the consciousness of the people of any society whose history seems extreme. The success of socialisms in those nations i mention is pretty peculiar, it has not been capable of export. Exporting our Canadian way of life to Afghanistan or the American way to Iraq, has been dismally stupid in conception yet has been ofered to us as a reason to go and kill people in foreign lands. (many Canadians seem to have bought this Harper-ite/ Ignatief-fool nonsense too.)
And yet... America did somehow rebuild Japan as a liberal democracy after WWII, with many caveats on how Japanese capitalism and Japanese hierarchy are major obstacles to what I would agree is democracy. The consciousness of the J people is not the same as ours. They live a version of democracy I would not want to import here.
And yet... Germany was rebuilt as a progressive republic after WWII. The consciousness of Germans has been through more wrenches, twists and reversals of any modern European nation, and perhaps only the Chinese have a comparable recent history of radical drastic changes. Now I admire much about the German socio-political order, its distrust of war, its Green politics, its relative liberality compared to places east. But then again, Germans have shown a degree of contempt for the Greeks that is not pleasant.
Conclusions: It is not only good policy, wise political choices, intelligent design of economy, compassionate insight into how equality should work, that makes a social order possible. The Scandinavians have a unique history, as do we all. Some histories shape a popular consciousness that supports a vigorous social democracy. I would posit that Canada's does not.
Our colonial origins militated from the get go, against an egalitarian society, and against strong traditions of resistance to capitalist excess. Racism, against Indians, Irish, French speakers, East Europeans etc is a sad fact of our history. So is class prejudice. So is religoius prejudice. All that is at a level of masses of people. Our education system has tried in the past to dilute our prejudices. Now, the advance of private schooling and the decline of public education, puts that agenda at risk.
Then there is our ruling class and elite bourgeois. Officially they are quite "liberal" in many attitudes, towards femnism, gay rights, etc. All well and good as far as it goes. It does not go far when transforming the capitalist foundations of our society. Constant cutting of taxes on corporations has not bothered Canadians in any notable way.
Our union movement has been in retreat since the 1970s' as it has been in the USA. We never had such an ideologically-devoted Prime Minister as we do now in Harper. The National Post newspaper and several tabloid sized papers in the West are more right wing since the 1990s than any papers of such circulation in the past. Our "conservatism" has been transformed into US-style reactionary politics.
Our ruling class is not much like the Swedes' was or is, and a good book to read about that is by a Swede: Goran Therborn, "What does the Ruling Class do when it rules?"
For me, an incisive analysis of socialism in a small homogenous nation with a stable past of progress and modernity such as Sweden enjoys, and a culture of vigorous individualism and self-help, is wonderful to read --- but the lessons that it can teach a nation as unlike that as we are in Canada, are limited lessons indeed. LIving next to the world's most gargantuan experiment in plutocracy, imperialism, militarism and consumptive materialism, we are not well-placed to become another model of Northern social democracy. Sigh. I wish it were otherwise.
charles Jeanes, Nelson
This shows the 99% can have a say if they had the guts to stay together. However the middle class still have it too good. Yet they don't seem to realize that they are slowly but shurley being squeezed out and the unions are in danger of being put out of business by the 1% and Governments. I guess we will never learn from lessons of others till it is too late. The companies are having products produced by 3rd world countries and we are buying now but what good does it do for our country. Yes they get rich but as more and more here are put out of work eventually there will be no one here left to buy. Government polatitions get enormous pentions after 7 years and wage increases but skwak if the workers want a raise-- wake up Canada.
World Bank Creating Poverty
BBC Newsnight
COPY AND PASTE
Add this to the mix and it all makes sense...lol. "Nonetheless, there is reason to believe that strict right-wing ideology might appeal to those who have trouble grasping the complexity of the world." Proof at last!
Absolutely, public trust is the issue. If you run for public office you must be prepared for public scrutiny.
Any minor offenses that happenned years ago would likely have been pardoned anyway.
According to the Rail Trail Dog Sled Race web blog, the race was called off in the wee hours of Sunday, Jan. 22 due to poor weather conditions.
Last year's winner and veteran musher Steve Mullen, 42, of Clearwater, B.C. was the last one left running when the race marshall made the decision to pull everyone off the course.
An awards banquet is still being held this evening at the Legion Hall.
Thanks Daniel for your comment. The quarry pictured is in fact a granite quarry. While you are correct, the current applications are not for such extensive work, this is an example of a quarry and should this project go forward, residents of the area could be dealing with more than just samples being withdrawn.
But yes, fair comment that perhaps this graphic representation may not have set the best tone, but does match the tone of concerns raised by the citizens and certainly encourages attention to the topic.