A polite man in his mid seventies, grey and not of robust health, he came into the post office from the cold sleet. After initial greetings he earnestly asked me again, “And how are you?”, as if he was a Salvation Army officer inquiring into the spiritual health of a homeless man. His name was Noel and was a respected conservationist and trail-builder on Quadra who had fought many environmental battles. We only spoke but 5 minutes every 3 or 4 months. This time he was determined it was going to be different.
“Could you stop for coffee, I would like to chat longer with you.?”, he asked. “Sure, I said, see you in 5 at the café. But I only have 20 minutes today.”
Noel spent the first 10 minutes talking about his dog. That turned out just to be the ice breaker. It turned out that Noel had been delegated to speak to me on behalf of the Sierra Club. What I heard from him was essentially what I heard from them in the spring. I did not appreciate all the good, hard work they were doing in so many areas. Yes, they knew that I was concerned about population. Some club members were too. But if only I were not so abrasive, and would acknowledge their good works, they might listen to me.
My turn to speak. I told Noel things he did not know. Two words that no one in the Sierra Club has ever heard of. “David Gelbaum”. I said that it is difficult to respect an organization which is a corrupt, money-grubbing corporate lackey. And that population growth is not just a “concern”. Anymore than that iceberg off the starboard bow of the Titanic was just a "concern". Sure there were Sierra crew doing good work below decks. Cleaning rooms. Stoking the fire. Preparing meals. But all of this of no consequence if the ship hits the iceberg. And the iceberg is overpopulation.
Then the truth came out. I am exaggerating. What about global warming? What about over-consumption? Besides the population explosion is in the developing world, what can we do about that?
Noel began the conversation by saying that “surely you and I have more in common with each other than with George Bush.” But his questions revealed that as the quintessential Sierran, he really didn’t have anything more in common with me than George Bush.
I told Noel about the incident last spring at the Gore film fest when as a member of Sierra Quadra I was prevented from distributing leaflets that asked critical questions following Gore’s documentary. Noel felt that the Sierra Quadra was within its rights to act that way.
What were they afraid of, I asked? “Well, you could have been a shill for the oil companies.” The problem Noel, is that the Sierra Club and the NDP have had a monopoly on the politics of the island for so long that the cosy clique who run it have become arrogant in the exercise of their control. What the island needs is competition. We have two auto mechanic shops, two supermarkets… why shouldn’t there be two political parties and two environmental groups. Does it now embarrass you that Sierra Quadra advertises itself as a “respectable” environmental organization when governments and corporations need fierce opposition? No, he replied, we also need organizations that can negotiate nature conservation set-asides like was just done in BC. “The only quarantee for nature is an end to the system of economic growth” That launched a heated exchange. “Noel, fundamentally the Sierra Club believes in growth.”
Noel’s mission was to draw me out and pacify me with soothing words of compromise. When I hit him with examples of Sierra Club sell-outs he was shaken and rattled and the meeting broke up with him somewhat hot-under the collar. Word will now fan out that I am indeed an unreconstructed, unrepentant zealout. And by the way, my business cards made their debut. I left him with one card that said “If you join an organization without knowing its history then a stranger is claiming your trust. Do you know the history of the Sierra Club, what It was and what it has become?.” Followed by a link where he can learn about David Gelbaum. The other card was “There is an Alternative to Economic Growth” with two links.
Make no mistake. Noel is a better man than I who has done a lot more "positive" things for the environmnent than I ever will. Trouble is, in these times I doubt whether those things will amount to a hill of beans. Our ship is already taking on water and I think we're going down. Forgive me if I can't find a diplomatic way of screaming about that.
Wednesday, January 2, 2008
ENVIONMENTALISTS AND GREENS NEED A SHRINK
We were told by Health and Welfare Canada that immigration could not reverse the inevitable aging of our population. The C.D. Howe Institute said the same thing. It is not the numbers of workers who support retirees which is important, but the productivity of those workers. And a non-growing population demands less spending on infrastructure and therefore allows more money available for spending on improved technology.
Meanwhile the Economic Council of Canada said that immigration was of no net ecomomic benefit to the country. A report by Dr. Grubel demonstrated that immigrants cost taxpayers over $18 billion more in benefits than they paid in taxes.
Given that population growth has lead to the loss of 18% of our Class 1 farmland in a nation of relatively poor soils and of which only 7% is arable. And that perhaps more than two thirds of endangered species are found with in the orbit of Canada’s major urban centres, threatened by sprawling subdivisions….One can only conclude:
Why environmentalists, Greens and social democrats or people who don’t own large factories would welcome mass immigration in this largely frozen landmass of tundra, mountains, lakes and rock cannot be explained by economics.
For that you need a psychiatrist.
Tim Murray,
Quadra Island, BC
December 23/07
Meanwhile the Economic Council of Canada said that immigration was of no net ecomomic benefit to the country. A report by Dr. Grubel demonstrated that immigrants cost taxpayers over $18 billion more in benefits than they paid in taxes.
Given that population growth has lead to the loss of 18% of our Class 1 farmland in a nation of relatively poor soils and of which only 7% is arable. And that perhaps more than two thirds of endangered species are found with in the orbit of Canada’s major urban centres, threatened by sprawling subdivisions….One can only conclude:
Why environmentalists, Greens and social democrats or people who don’t own large factories would welcome mass immigration in this largely frozen landmass of tundra, mountains, lakes and rock cannot be explained by economics.
For that you need a psychiatrist.
Tim Murray,
Quadra Island, BC
December 23/07
CANADIAN SOCIALIST AND GREEN ICONS CONTEST MULTICULTURALISM
Multiculturalism is Canada’s Ingsoc, a state ideology so powerfully pervasive that few in the media, in the educational institutions or the political parties would dare challenge it. One might think that the left would offer criticism, but apart from journalist and former socialist parliamentarian, Douglas Fisher, and columnist Larry Zolf, none come to mind.
The Liberal Party was able to steal the affections of working class voters earmarked for the social-democratic NDP by appealing to their cultural identities. Running candidates of the same ethnicity as the prevailing group in the riding, and granting federal money for the construction of ethnic centres was a classic Liberal formula for vote-buying. And it usually worked.
The NDP approach has always been to appeal to people’s class identity above and beyond the language they speak and to their sense of solidarity to people who live similar lives but have different cultures. Multiculturalism has not been good for class solidarity.
J.S. Woodsworth, the father of Canadian socialism, founder of the CCF-NDP and described as the “Saint of Canadian politics”, I think knew as much. Allen Mills in “Fool for Christ—The Political Thought of J.S. Woodsworth”, wrote that during his leadership in the twenties and thirties he continued to evince a profound concern for “ the social integration of the alien.” Allen writes that Woodsworth talked “of uniting immigrants into a new Canadian type: he worried that the melting pot was not working and the country would become ‘balkanized’, there was a necessity to ‘absorb’, ‘weld’ and ‘incorporate, immigrants into the Canadian way of life.’p.228
Although Woodsworth was an opponent of immigration in the 1920s and 30s because there were not enough jobs, he also recognized the need for more social cohesion. A higher proportion of newcomers of our own British traditions would mould these incoming armies of foreigners into ‘loyal subjects’.
Greens have been among the most effusive champions of Ingsoc, with Green leader Elizabeth May justifying the country’s absurdly high immigration levels as Canada’s ongoing “multicultural project”. Environmentalists claim that “cultural diversity” is the analogue to biological diversity, the necessary variation found in plant and animal forms. Trouble is, the immigration levels required to sustain these culturally diverse ethnic enclaves is fuelling urban sprawl and crowding out wildlife. Variety is the spice of life, but the human is flourishing at the expense of the non-human. Multiculturalism has not been good for the environment.
But there is a JS Woodsworth of Canadian greens. He is none other than the famous co-author of “Our Ecological Footprint”, Dr. William E. Rees. This is taken from his “Globalization, Trade and Migration: Undermining Sustainability?”
“…there is sufficient evidence to hypothesize that multi-racial or multi-cultural countries are more likely to unravel chaotically in the event of rapid ecological change, resource shortages, or economic decline than are more homogenous societies. Because socio-political stability is a prerequisite for ecological sustainability, we thus have yet another reason for a pre-emptive cautionary approach to large-scale migration in coming levels and adopt explicit ‘melting pot’ strategies designed to facilitate the integration and assimilation of new-comers into the social and economic fabric of their adopted countries. They should also include ongoing public education programs that stress both the need for, and the national benefits of, limited immigration.
The main objectives of this approach are to discourage the development of persistent immigrant enclaves, to accelerate immigrants’ development of a sense of identity with the larger society, and to improve public understanding of the modern role of economic and environmental changes that may be required for ecological sustainability. Immigration policies that favour multiculturalism and that apparently succeed during periods of growth and plenty may not be adaptive in the face of rapid global ecological change of economic decline.”
So while the sheep continue to bleet “diversity”, the wise old shepherds speak of the virtues of integration and cohesion.
Just as Central Asia exported the bubonic plague, and Central Africa exported the Ebola virus, Canada gave the world the ideology of Multiculturalism. It might be cautionary then to heed the words of our brave critics as they spoke them right in the guts of the ogre before the Thought Police could silence them.
Tim Murray,
Quadra Island, BC
Canada
December 23/07
The Liberal Party was able to steal the affections of working class voters earmarked for the social-democratic NDP by appealing to their cultural identities. Running candidates of the same ethnicity as the prevailing group in the riding, and granting federal money for the construction of ethnic centres was a classic Liberal formula for vote-buying. And it usually worked.
The NDP approach has always been to appeal to people’s class identity above and beyond the language they speak and to their sense of solidarity to people who live similar lives but have different cultures. Multiculturalism has not been good for class solidarity.
J.S. Woodsworth, the father of Canadian socialism, founder of the CCF-NDP and described as the “Saint of Canadian politics”, I think knew as much. Allen Mills in “Fool for Christ—The Political Thought of J.S. Woodsworth”, wrote that during his leadership in the twenties and thirties he continued to evince a profound concern for “ the social integration of the alien.” Allen writes that Woodsworth talked “of uniting immigrants into a new Canadian type: he worried that the melting pot was not working and the country would become ‘balkanized’, there was a necessity to ‘absorb’, ‘weld’ and ‘incorporate, immigrants into the Canadian way of life.’p.228
Although Woodsworth was an opponent of immigration in the 1920s and 30s because there were not enough jobs, he also recognized the need for more social cohesion. A higher proportion of newcomers of our own British traditions would mould these incoming armies of foreigners into ‘loyal subjects’.
Greens have been among the most effusive champions of Ingsoc, with Green leader Elizabeth May justifying the country’s absurdly high immigration levels as Canada’s ongoing “multicultural project”. Environmentalists claim that “cultural diversity” is the analogue to biological diversity, the necessary variation found in plant and animal forms. Trouble is, the immigration levels required to sustain these culturally diverse ethnic enclaves is fuelling urban sprawl and crowding out wildlife. Variety is the spice of life, but the human is flourishing at the expense of the non-human. Multiculturalism has not been good for the environment.
But there is a JS Woodsworth of Canadian greens. He is none other than the famous co-author of “Our Ecological Footprint”, Dr. William E. Rees. This is taken from his “Globalization, Trade and Migration: Undermining Sustainability?”
“…there is sufficient evidence to hypothesize that multi-racial or multi-cultural countries are more likely to unravel chaotically in the event of rapid ecological change, resource shortages, or economic decline than are more homogenous societies. Because socio-political stability is a prerequisite for ecological sustainability, we thus have yet another reason for a pre-emptive cautionary approach to large-scale migration in coming levels and adopt explicit ‘melting pot’ strategies designed to facilitate the integration and assimilation of new-comers into the social and economic fabric of their adopted countries. They should also include ongoing public education programs that stress both the need for, and the national benefits of, limited immigration.
The main objectives of this approach are to discourage the development of persistent immigrant enclaves, to accelerate immigrants’ development of a sense of identity with the larger society, and to improve public understanding of the modern role of economic and environmental changes that may be required for ecological sustainability. Immigration policies that favour multiculturalism and that apparently succeed during periods of growth and plenty may not be adaptive in the face of rapid global ecological change of economic decline.”
So while the sheep continue to bleet “diversity”, the wise old shepherds speak of the virtues of integration and cohesion.
Just as Central Asia exported the bubonic plague, and Central Africa exported the Ebola virus, Canada gave the world the ideology of Multiculturalism. It might be cautionary then to heed the words of our brave critics as they spoke them right in the guts of the ogre before the Thought Police could silence them.
Tim Murray,
Quadra Island, BC
Canada
December 23/07
NATURE CONSERVANCY CANADA ON THE CORPORATE PAYROLL
I would put the following questions and observations to the Nature Conservancy of Canada (NCC):
I understand that you have an arrangement with the Royal Bank of Canada. When customers agree to transfer to electronic bank statements, a portion of the savings remits to NCC. In return, the Royal Bank can advertise that, despite its role as one of the major drivers of economic growth in Canada, the force that wreaks havoc on biodiversity and generates GHG emissions, it is a responsible “green” corporate citizen.
Much in the way that Al Capone made himself a high-profile donor to the Catholic Church to buy respectability in the community. In granting the Royal Bank the respectability they crave, your actions are somewhat similar to those Pope Rodrigo Borgio when he promised heaven to large donors to the church. The Bank now has ecological dispensation, the PR brownie points, or rather “greenie” points it needs to cloak its raison d’etre: funding loans to developers and buyers so that they can keep building the sprawling subdivisions that threaten about 70% of the endangered species in this country, the ones you want to protect.
Do you think they will be safe forever, as you promise, behind the walls of your protected preserves in the face of an annual population growth rate of 1.08%, the highest in the G8?
Do you think they will be safe forever in your preserves, from pollution? Safe from mining corporations that a stroke of the Congressional pen allowed into the sacred Yosemite National Park? Safe from developers like the ones who built houses on the “no-go” pastures outside of Portland, Oregon, home of “smart growth”? Safe from the development pressures that finally broke down the walls of Britain’s sacrosanct Greenbelts to construct housing for population growth inflated by high immigration?
If your protected land is eternally safe why have you taken many people to court for damaging this “protected” land? Do you plan to hire a security company to walk the perimeter of your lands? And when population growth engulfs them, how are you going to pay for the higher tax assessments on your “protected” lands?
Final question, who is the author of the pressure that will be placed on your preserves? Think about this one. The five major banks, as was stated, underwrite development. Both the banks and the developers profit from a growing population. Who in parliament promotes that? The Harper government and the government in waiting, the Liberals. To whom does the Royal Bank and its corporate colleagues give generously to? No need to answer. They give to you and they give to them. Just as Capone gave to the Church and then funneled the bulk of his fortune into his illegal booze operation.
For your part in making this sordid deal with one of the major engines of habitat destruction, you are like a Christian charity that puts a donation box in a crack house. Of course you will use the rationalization that is now universal in the mainstream environmental movement. Growth can be stripped of its ecological consequences if it is properly managed or channeled out of harm’s way. The greenbelts of Portland, the UK and elsewhere put the lie to this self-deception.
The whole environmental and conservation movement in Canada is a disgrace. By looking the other way on economic growth, a function of our growing population level and rampant consumerism –again encouraged by the lending institutions---you are complicit in an intergenerational crime of unprecedented proportions. My nephew and niece will be robbed of experiencing much of Canada’s biodiverse treasures.
What do you have to say for yourself?
Tim Murray, Quadra Island, BC December 21/07
I understand that you have an arrangement with the Royal Bank of Canada. When customers agree to transfer to electronic bank statements, a portion of the savings remits to NCC. In return, the Royal Bank can advertise that, despite its role as one of the major drivers of economic growth in Canada, the force that wreaks havoc on biodiversity and generates GHG emissions, it is a responsible “green” corporate citizen.
Much in the way that Al Capone made himself a high-profile donor to the Catholic Church to buy respectability in the community. In granting the Royal Bank the respectability they crave, your actions are somewhat similar to those Pope Rodrigo Borgio when he promised heaven to large donors to the church. The Bank now has ecological dispensation, the PR brownie points, or rather “greenie” points it needs to cloak its raison d’etre: funding loans to developers and buyers so that they can keep building the sprawling subdivisions that threaten about 70% of the endangered species in this country, the ones you want to protect.
Do you think they will be safe forever, as you promise, behind the walls of your protected preserves in the face of an annual population growth rate of 1.08%, the highest in the G8?
Do you think they will be safe forever in your preserves, from pollution? Safe from mining corporations that a stroke of the Congressional pen allowed into the sacred Yosemite National Park? Safe from developers like the ones who built houses on the “no-go” pastures outside of Portland, Oregon, home of “smart growth”? Safe from the development pressures that finally broke down the walls of Britain’s sacrosanct Greenbelts to construct housing for population growth inflated by high immigration?
If your protected land is eternally safe why have you taken many people to court for damaging this “protected” land? Do you plan to hire a security company to walk the perimeter of your lands? And when population growth engulfs them, how are you going to pay for the higher tax assessments on your “protected” lands?
Final question, who is the author of the pressure that will be placed on your preserves? Think about this one. The five major banks, as was stated, underwrite development. Both the banks and the developers profit from a growing population. Who in parliament promotes that? The Harper government and the government in waiting, the Liberals. To whom does the Royal Bank and its corporate colleagues give generously to? No need to answer. They give to you and they give to them. Just as Capone gave to the Church and then funneled the bulk of his fortune into his illegal booze operation.
For your part in making this sordid deal with one of the major engines of habitat destruction, you are like a Christian charity that puts a donation box in a crack house. Of course you will use the rationalization that is now universal in the mainstream environmental movement. Growth can be stripped of its ecological consequences if it is properly managed or channeled out of harm’s way. The greenbelts of Portland, the UK and elsewhere put the lie to this self-deception.
The whole environmental and conservation movement in Canada is a disgrace. By looking the other way on economic growth, a function of our growing population level and rampant consumerism –again encouraged by the lending institutions---you are complicit in an intergenerational crime of unprecedented proportions. My nephew and niece will be robbed of experiencing much of Canada’s biodiverse treasures.
What do you have to say for yourself?
Tim Murray, Quadra Island, BC December 21/07
SHOULD I CARE THAT I OFFEND YOU?
SHOULD I CARE THAT I OFFEND YOU?
Speaking The Truth Trumps Ethnic Harmony
It was Benjamin Disraeli who, after reflecting on Britain’s vaunted intellectual liberty, observed the “we are a nation so fundamentally at one, that we can afford to differ.” By that measure, Britain today, together with its former colonies, are obviously not “at one.” With ethnic heterogeneity from mass immigration has come division, and to deal with that all Anglophone governments have sought to cure the fever by discarding the thermometer. Free speech has given way to racial vilification laws.
Mark Uhlmann, editor of the Record (in Australia) remarked that the purpose of such legislation “is to complement the social intimidation which already greets anyone who dares criticize matters connected to immigration and multiculturalism.” If no voices can be heard against government policy, or if nothing can be seen as remotely close to hatred or ridicule of any group, then the illusion of harmony can be maintained.
The Anzac countries share Canada’s misfortune. They never had a revolutionary break with the British tradition, which was to embrace liberty only as a byproduct of public order. The absurdity of this priority was never better illustrated in the summer of 2007 when the City of Peterborough fined a man for wearing a T-shirt that violated Section 5 of the “Public Order Act”. It read “Don’t Piss Me Off or I Won’t Tell You Where I’ve Hidden The Bodies.” It is interesting that the city council felt it was their mandate to tell the good burghers of their town what they couldn’t read when they had yet to find shelters for the homeless. Most significant was the fact that the offending T-shirt was purchased in Los Angeles, California in the Land of the Free. In America the philosophy has been that you say what you need to say and let the political chips fall where they may. In Britain, on the other hand, Nick Griffin of the British National Party was in court for making anti-Islamic statements. Why? Gordon Brown said that it was important that British Muslims not feel “insulted”. It would be hard to imagine a US Congressman in court for making anti-Hispanic remarks.
Canada has taken the British attitude to censorship to new and higher levels. In August 2004, radio “CHOI FM”, Quebec City’s most popular talk show station, was dissolved by the Canadian government. Its 33 employees were put out of work. Its offence? One of its talk show hosts criticized African dictators whose children were educated in Canadian universities. This was considered a hate crime against blacks.
Three provisions in the Canadian Criminal Code sections 318.319, and 320 seek to curb the promotion of hate propaganda. Section 319 betrays that British preoccupation with statements made in any public place which could incite hatred and lead, my God, to “ a breach of the peace.” In Canada freedom of speech, we are constantly told, is not an absolute right, but merely one right to be balanced off against other rights, like the God-given right of Islamic wife-beaters to be shielded from criticism of Koranic patriarchal culture. In America, however, freedom of speech is understood to be the condition of all other rights. In Canada most disagreements begin with “I feel offended that you said that.” In New York City it’s “I don’t give a fuck how you feel bitch, grow up.” Canada is like one big group therapy session. A gigantic diversity awareness and sensitivity workshop where what you emote is more relevant than what you think. What emerges is cultural diversity, but not intellectual diversity, for there is no independent critical thought. Fostering “respect” and boosting minority “self-esteem” is considered more important than exposing the truth.
The difference between the two North American political cultures can be defined succinctly by contrasting America’s constitutional commitment to “life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness” with Canada’s “peace, order and good government.” So the new totalitarian regime of multicultural and politically correct thought control falls well within our more “British” tradition.
It is no wonder then, that outspoken Canadian Captain Paul Watson of the Sea Shepherd Conservation Society has set up shop just outside our multicultural police state in Friday Harbor, Washington, where he can write the truth unmolested, like the following:
“I remember walking along the beaches in Vancouver a few decades ago. Every single stone sent a flurry of disturbed baby crabs scurrying to find new cover. I was fascinated by the sheer number of tiny crustaceans that I observed on those walks. Today, I have not found a single young crab under a single rock on those beaches. They were picked clean by Vietnamese immigrants that descended like locusts onto those beaches and stripped them clean. And criticism of that exploitation immediately elicited accusations of racism. Today racism, cultural rights, and the right to exploit nature for commercial gain are the weapons used to defend gross over-exploitation of species and the destruction of natural habitats.” (The Beginning of The End For Life As We Know It , May 4/07)
Vancouver Aquarium director Larry Nightingale made similar accusations against the Vietnamese some ten years ago, citing their rape of the west coast fishery by brazenly illegal methods, but it is unlikely that if he were to make them now, he would keep his job or his freedom. Nevertheless, Vietnamese behaviour persists today as it did when they arrived as boat people in the late 70s, and when I told my incredulous Member of Parliament that admitting them to Canada was like allowing wolves into a sheep pen. A better metaphor would have been human starlings, a foreign species of bird so aggressive and ruthless that native species are driven out.
The fallacy of anti-vilification laws, or the abolition of ethnic crime statistics, is that by covering our vision with a shroud public hostility will evaporate. It is not hate speech or unflattering crime statistics which “incites” public anger but our cumulative personal experience with the ethnic law-breakers. What ivory-tower academics derisively call “anecdotal” evidence. Academics can conduct all the studies they want telling us that folks from Timbucktu or Booga-Booga are just people like you and me, but as Winston Smith knew, it is what you your own eyes are telling you that counts, not what the Ministry of Truth, the ABC, the Sydney Herald or the CBC say is happening, how wonderfully everybody is getting along, or how the wolves have been transformed into sheep just by setting foot on our shores. If you won’t trust your own senses, at least prefer the copper on the beat in Melbourne to his superior at the police station who must kow-kow to diversity sensitivity guidelines, the media and the like. What Tim Priest said of NSW is I suspect true of police bureaucracies everywhere in Anglo-America. They are lying mouthpieces of political correctness staffed by gutless wonders with no connection to the reality of street life and whose only ambition is to ingratiate themselves to politicians and reporters.
My eyes see what Watson sees. I see eco-crime committed not just by wicked whites but non-whites. His rogue’s gallery would include the McCaw Indians of Washington State for their “ceremonial” slaughter of whales in Puget Sound. The Australian Aborigines for removing 85% of the mega-fauna of the continent before everybody’s whipping boy, the English, arrived. Native Americans and Aboriginal Canadians can be held to account in many instances for poor stewardship of the land and capitalist development. The Japanese are still whaling. Should these culprits be able to hide behind a shield of anti-villification laws? Surely no more than the Icelandic whalers or the Newfoundland sealers, who, although white, can claim these activities as supportive of a rare culture. My list would also include the male white yahoos who trash the environment with their ATVs and off-road vehicles, and the Mormons and Muslims who burden the environment with irresponsibly large families. All of these “identifiable groups” are fair game for ruthless criticism. As someone half Icelandic, I am not offended by Watson’s attack on the culture of my mother’s people. If the shoe fits, wear it. Earth First.
Whether my speech is “hateful” or “offensive” is immaterial. The point is, is it true?
Tim Murray, November 8/07
Speaking The Truth Trumps Ethnic Harmony
It was Benjamin Disraeli who, after reflecting on Britain’s vaunted intellectual liberty, observed the “we are a nation so fundamentally at one, that we can afford to differ.” By that measure, Britain today, together with its former colonies, are obviously not “at one.” With ethnic heterogeneity from mass immigration has come division, and to deal with that all Anglophone governments have sought to cure the fever by discarding the thermometer. Free speech has given way to racial vilification laws.
Mark Uhlmann, editor of the Record (in Australia) remarked that the purpose of such legislation “is to complement the social intimidation which already greets anyone who dares criticize matters connected to immigration and multiculturalism.” If no voices can be heard against government policy, or if nothing can be seen as remotely close to hatred or ridicule of any group, then the illusion of harmony can be maintained.
The Anzac countries share Canada’s misfortune. They never had a revolutionary break with the British tradition, which was to embrace liberty only as a byproduct of public order. The absurdity of this priority was never better illustrated in the summer of 2007 when the City of Peterborough fined a man for wearing a T-shirt that violated Section 5 of the “Public Order Act”. It read “Don’t Piss Me Off or I Won’t Tell You Where I’ve Hidden The Bodies.” It is interesting that the city council felt it was their mandate to tell the good burghers of their town what they couldn’t read when they had yet to find shelters for the homeless. Most significant was the fact that the offending T-shirt was purchased in Los Angeles, California in the Land of the Free. In America the philosophy has been that you say what you need to say and let the political chips fall where they may. In Britain, on the other hand, Nick Griffin of the British National Party was in court for making anti-Islamic statements. Why? Gordon Brown said that it was important that British Muslims not feel “insulted”. It would be hard to imagine a US Congressman in court for making anti-Hispanic remarks.
Canada has taken the British attitude to censorship to new and higher levels. In August 2004, radio “CHOI FM”, Quebec City’s most popular talk show station, was dissolved by the Canadian government. Its 33 employees were put out of work. Its offence? One of its talk show hosts criticized African dictators whose children were educated in Canadian universities. This was considered a hate crime against blacks.
Three provisions in the Canadian Criminal Code sections 318.319, and 320 seek to curb the promotion of hate propaganda. Section 319 betrays that British preoccupation with statements made in any public place which could incite hatred and lead, my God, to “ a breach of the peace.” In Canada freedom of speech, we are constantly told, is not an absolute right, but merely one right to be balanced off against other rights, like the God-given right of Islamic wife-beaters to be shielded from criticism of Koranic patriarchal culture. In America, however, freedom of speech is understood to be the condition of all other rights. In Canada most disagreements begin with “I feel offended that you said that.” In New York City it’s “I don’t give a fuck how you feel bitch, grow up.” Canada is like one big group therapy session. A gigantic diversity awareness and sensitivity workshop where what you emote is more relevant than what you think. What emerges is cultural diversity, but not intellectual diversity, for there is no independent critical thought. Fostering “respect” and boosting minority “self-esteem” is considered more important than exposing the truth.
The difference between the two North American political cultures can be defined succinctly by contrasting America’s constitutional commitment to “life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness” with Canada’s “peace, order and good government.” So the new totalitarian regime of multicultural and politically correct thought control falls well within our more “British” tradition.
It is no wonder then, that outspoken Canadian Captain Paul Watson of the Sea Shepherd Conservation Society has set up shop just outside our multicultural police state in Friday Harbor, Washington, where he can write the truth unmolested, like the following:
“I remember walking along the beaches in Vancouver a few decades ago. Every single stone sent a flurry of disturbed baby crabs scurrying to find new cover. I was fascinated by the sheer number of tiny crustaceans that I observed on those walks. Today, I have not found a single young crab under a single rock on those beaches. They were picked clean by Vietnamese immigrants that descended like locusts onto those beaches and stripped them clean. And criticism of that exploitation immediately elicited accusations of racism. Today racism, cultural rights, and the right to exploit nature for commercial gain are the weapons used to defend gross over-exploitation of species and the destruction of natural habitats.” (The Beginning of The End For Life As We Know It , May 4/07)
Vancouver Aquarium director Larry Nightingale made similar accusations against the Vietnamese some ten years ago, citing their rape of the west coast fishery by brazenly illegal methods, but it is unlikely that if he were to make them now, he would keep his job or his freedom. Nevertheless, Vietnamese behaviour persists today as it did when they arrived as boat people in the late 70s, and when I told my incredulous Member of Parliament that admitting them to Canada was like allowing wolves into a sheep pen. A better metaphor would have been human starlings, a foreign species of bird so aggressive and ruthless that native species are driven out.
The fallacy of anti-vilification laws, or the abolition of ethnic crime statistics, is that by covering our vision with a shroud public hostility will evaporate. It is not hate speech or unflattering crime statistics which “incites” public anger but our cumulative personal experience with the ethnic law-breakers. What ivory-tower academics derisively call “anecdotal” evidence. Academics can conduct all the studies they want telling us that folks from Timbucktu or Booga-Booga are just people like you and me, but as Winston Smith knew, it is what you your own eyes are telling you that counts, not what the Ministry of Truth, the ABC, the Sydney Herald or the CBC say is happening, how wonderfully everybody is getting along, or how the wolves have been transformed into sheep just by setting foot on our shores. If you won’t trust your own senses, at least prefer the copper on the beat in Melbourne to his superior at the police station who must kow-kow to diversity sensitivity guidelines, the media and the like. What Tim Priest said of NSW is I suspect true of police bureaucracies everywhere in Anglo-America. They are lying mouthpieces of political correctness staffed by gutless wonders with no connection to the reality of street life and whose only ambition is to ingratiate themselves to politicians and reporters.
My eyes see what Watson sees. I see eco-crime committed not just by wicked whites but non-whites. His rogue’s gallery would include the McCaw Indians of Washington State for their “ceremonial” slaughter of whales in Puget Sound. The Australian Aborigines for removing 85% of the mega-fauna of the continent before everybody’s whipping boy, the English, arrived. Native Americans and Aboriginal Canadians can be held to account in many instances for poor stewardship of the land and capitalist development. The Japanese are still whaling. Should these culprits be able to hide behind a shield of anti-villification laws? Surely no more than the Icelandic whalers or the Newfoundland sealers, who, although white, can claim these activities as supportive of a rare culture. My list would also include the male white yahoos who trash the environment with their ATVs and off-road vehicles, and the Mormons and Muslims who burden the environment with irresponsibly large families. All of these “identifiable groups” are fair game for ruthless criticism. As someone half Icelandic, I am not offended by Watson’s attack on the culture of my mother’s people. If the shoe fits, wear it. Earth First.
Whether my speech is “hateful” or “offensive” is immaterial. The point is, is it true?
Tim Murray, November 8/07
WILL RUDD’S IMMIGRATION POLICY BURY THE WELFARE STATE?
According to what I see on the Internet tonight at 8pm PST, Mr. Rudd will be forming a government in Australia. The corrupt and incompetent Mr. Howard, architect of criminally reckless population growth, opponent of Kyoto, Mr. Bush’s accomplice on Iraq, is done. Good riddance. But now along comes Mr. Rudd.
Will Rudd slow growth down? Is there any conception in the Labor Party that growth is not necessarily an unmitigated good? Does this party have a Population policy? There are 21 million now, are they going to stop at 25 million, 30 million? What’s the plan?
The real immigration rate under Howard was said to be 300,000. Are you confident Rudd would cut this back to pre-Howard levels? It is fashionable on the centre-left and greens to favour fewer professional-business migrants and more asylum-seekers. Is that a good trade-off?
In an article I wrote about ethnic crime, my argument was dismissed as alarmist and inaccurate in part because Australia’s crime future could not be predicted on the basis of American statistics. Why? Australia, in effect, drew immigrants from a better “class’ than America did. The United States admits a great many more unskilled migrants who proportionately tend to impose greater costs on the education, welfare and prison systems. Since, under Howard, Australian selection criteria favoured professionals and the skilled, immigrants to Australia of all ethnicities tended to be much more law-abiding than American or European counterparts.
Yet, some of those same critics would turn around and argue for the selection mix to mimic North American patterns. Slash the skilled , business and professional quota, and instead welcome more refugees, the great majority of whom are unskilled.
The case for this position is prima facie, humanitarian, but an economic rationale is also advanced. Accepting professionals from undeveloped countries who have spent precious resources training them is a kind of poaching that negates whatever foreign aid we provide them. The environmentalist perspective though, is that professional, skilled and business migrants promote economic growth in the host country. The other class of non-skilled immigrants would retard it. Slowing growth is what we need to do.
My dispute with this latter contention is an unpopular one. It has tones of neo-liberalism that is not quite resonant with many on the left today. But here it is a nutshell.
Since the late 1970s, left-wing governments, first in Britain, then in France, Greece and Spain and ending in 1991 with the flagship government of Social Democracy in Sweden, accepted “The Laffer Curve”. That is, marginal tax rates in a market economy could only be pushed up so high before tax revenue began to fall. To further social spending programs, the leftist raison d’etre, revenue could only be found by growing the economic pie. That is, by forming an ideological bond with the right in a joint commitment to economic growth. Most socialist governments went further. They even sold off public companies for more cash.
Once upon a time Socialist leaders in North America fought to protect the wage levels of workers by restricting immigration. Now you would be hard put to find any social democratic leader or party that is not willing to fight for an open doors immigration policy at the expense even of the workers who vote for them. Dutch Labour Party leader Marjinnsen is an exception to this rule, as is the Socialist Senator of Vermont, Bernie Sanders.
The desire to open the floodgates, except at election when all social democrat leaders protest their desire for more reasonable levels, is simply a reflection their total faith in population growth as an agency of economic growth, and economic growth as a means to fund the welfare state and lift the poor out of poverty.
Well, statistics show that ten years of Blairism has failed to do that. The income gap between north and south England is as large now as it was under John Major and Thatcher. There is essentially no class mobility in Britain either. No wonder 85% of Britons polled this fall declared that their class background prevented their advancement. The top student in the country had the misfortune of carrying a Geordie accent, and as a consequence neither Oxford nor Cambridge would accept her. But Harvard would. Economic growth never solved poverty, created opportunity or improved equality. It’s just done a number on the planet.
Mass immigration is like a herione fix. A new injection affords temporary relief. In response to the new demand more shopping malls and subdivisions are built. What Bob Carr called “stupid growth”. But guess what. That growth creates more labour shortages. So many houses are built, there is a short of electricians, and the new subdivisions with all those new people need doctors. Where are they going to come from? Ah ah. South Africa. Why not? Those poor blacks over there don’t really need them, do they? We need another fix.
Immigration. Growth. Labour shortages. Immigration. Growth. Ad infinitum. And you can’t hop off this mad carousel because there are just too many people making big money from this demographic scam. But aside from the volume of immigrants, the content affects the equation too. OK, skilled professionals and business class migrants promote growth. Indirectly, though, unskilled migrants and asylum seekers do as well. How so?
The Rector Report of the Heritage Foundation submitted this year found that each unskilled illegal immigrant family in the United States drew $23,000 more per year in government benefits than they paid in taxes. The American taxpayer was in effect donating a Ford Mustang convertible to each and every illegal immigrant family (4-13 million of them) per year. Their higher incarceration rates were not factored in.
The Grubel Report done for the Fraser Institute a few years ago came to much the same conclusion for Canada. Over the 12 year period studied, immigrants cost the Canadian taxpayer $18.3 billion more per year in the services provided to them than the taxes they paid. The problem is, about three-quarters of immigrants do not have the skill-set to earn sufficient income to pay high enough taxes to compensate for their use of Canada’s vaunted welfare state.
The question is, can we realistically defend the welfare state from mass immigration of the historic scale that we have recently seen from non-traditional sources, or can we accept refugees in such unlimited numbers that future environmental and political catastrophes promise? Can we become the soup kitchen to the whole world? Can Australia pay out $250,000 in medical benefits to each senior sponsored by an immigrant or refugee? What are the settlement costs for refugees, ESL costs etc?
What’s your answer? Tax the rich? It has been tried. In Britain. Mitterand’s France. In socialist Greece and Spain and Sweden pushed the envelope. Re-nationalize what has been privatized? That takes money too. And remember, Britain and France already had a large public enterprise sector. But it was hamstrung because socialists believed in break-even pricing policies. State enterprises were discouraged from making a profit. Without making profits, no revenues went into government coffers to fund the welfare state.
Bottom line. The welfare state can only be supported by growth or taxes. Growth will bury the environment which will eventually bring down the economy. And if there are limits to growth, in a market economy there are limits to taxes.My crystal ball tells me that the welfare state will be looked upon one day as the relic of a golden age, a quaint luxury. When the oil economy collapses, we’ll be fortunate to have the social safety net of Bangledesh. Except we won’t an extended family structure to fall back on .
Tim Murray
Quadra Island, BC
Canada
Nov.07/24
Will Rudd slow growth down? Is there any conception in the Labor Party that growth is not necessarily an unmitigated good? Does this party have a Population policy? There are 21 million now, are they going to stop at 25 million, 30 million? What’s the plan?
The real immigration rate under Howard was said to be 300,000. Are you confident Rudd would cut this back to pre-Howard levels? It is fashionable on the centre-left and greens to favour fewer professional-business migrants and more asylum-seekers. Is that a good trade-off?
In an article I wrote about ethnic crime, my argument was dismissed as alarmist and inaccurate in part because Australia’s crime future could not be predicted on the basis of American statistics. Why? Australia, in effect, drew immigrants from a better “class’ than America did. The United States admits a great many more unskilled migrants who proportionately tend to impose greater costs on the education, welfare and prison systems. Since, under Howard, Australian selection criteria favoured professionals and the skilled, immigrants to Australia of all ethnicities tended to be much more law-abiding than American or European counterparts.
Yet, some of those same critics would turn around and argue for the selection mix to mimic North American patterns. Slash the skilled , business and professional quota, and instead welcome more refugees, the great majority of whom are unskilled.
The case for this position is prima facie, humanitarian, but an economic rationale is also advanced. Accepting professionals from undeveloped countries who have spent precious resources training them is a kind of poaching that negates whatever foreign aid we provide them. The environmentalist perspective though, is that professional, skilled and business migrants promote economic growth in the host country. The other class of non-skilled immigrants would retard it. Slowing growth is what we need to do.
My dispute with this latter contention is an unpopular one. It has tones of neo-liberalism that is not quite resonant with many on the left today. But here it is a nutshell.
Since the late 1970s, left-wing governments, first in Britain, then in France, Greece and Spain and ending in 1991 with the flagship government of Social Democracy in Sweden, accepted “The Laffer Curve”. That is, marginal tax rates in a market economy could only be pushed up so high before tax revenue began to fall. To further social spending programs, the leftist raison d’etre, revenue could only be found by growing the economic pie. That is, by forming an ideological bond with the right in a joint commitment to economic growth. Most socialist governments went further. They even sold off public companies for more cash.
Once upon a time Socialist leaders in North America fought to protect the wage levels of workers by restricting immigration. Now you would be hard put to find any social democratic leader or party that is not willing to fight for an open doors immigration policy at the expense even of the workers who vote for them. Dutch Labour Party leader Marjinnsen is an exception to this rule, as is the Socialist Senator of Vermont, Bernie Sanders.
The desire to open the floodgates, except at election when all social democrat leaders protest their desire for more reasonable levels, is simply a reflection their total faith in population growth as an agency of economic growth, and economic growth as a means to fund the welfare state and lift the poor out of poverty.
Well, statistics show that ten years of Blairism has failed to do that. The income gap between north and south England is as large now as it was under John Major and Thatcher. There is essentially no class mobility in Britain either. No wonder 85% of Britons polled this fall declared that their class background prevented their advancement. The top student in the country had the misfortune of carrying a Geordie accent, and as a consequence neither Oxford nor Cambridge would accept her. But Harvard would. Economic growth never solved poverty, created opportunity or improved equality. It’s just done a number on the planet.
Mass immigration is like a herione fix. A new injection affords temporary relief. In response to the new demand more shopping malls and subdivisions are built. What Bob Carr called “stupid growth”. But guess what. That growth creates more labour shortages. So many houses are built, there is a short of electricians, and the new subdivisions with all those new people need doctors. Where are they going to come from? Ah ah. South Africa. Why not? Those poor blacks over there don’t really need them, do they? We need another fix.
Immigration. Growth. Labour shortages. Immigration. Growth. Ad infinitum. And you can’t hop off this mad carousel because there are just too many people making big money from this demographic scam. But aside from the volume of immigrants, the content affects the equation too. OK, skilled professionals and business class migrants promote growth. Indirectly, though, unskilled migrants and asylum seekers do as well. How so?
The Rector Report of the Heritage Foundation submitted this year found that each unskilled illegal immigrant family in the United States drew $23,000 more per year in government benefits than they paid in taxes. The American taxpayer was in effect donating a Ford Mustang convertible to each and every illegal immigrant family (4-13 million of them) per year. Their higher incarceration rates were not factored in.
The Grubel Report done for the Fraser Institute a few years ago came to much the same conclusion for Canada. Over the 12 year period studied, immigrants cost the Canadian taxpayer $18.3 billion more per year in the services provided to them than the taxes they paid. The problem is, about three-quarters of immigrants do not have the skill-set to earn sufficient income to pay high enough taxes to compensate for their use of Canada’s vaunted welfare state.
The question is, can we realistically defend the welfare state from mass immigration of the historic scale that we have recently seen from non-traditional sources, or can we accept refugees in such unlimited numbers that future environmental and political catastrophes promise? Can we become the soup kitchen to the whole world? Can Australia pay out $250,000 in medical benefits to each senior sponsored by an immigrant or refugee? What are the settlement costs for refugees, ESL costs etc?
What’s your answer? Tax the rich? It has been tried. In Britain. Mitterand’s France. In socialist Greece and Spain and Sweden pushed the envelope. Re-nationalize what has been privatized? That takes money too. And remember, Britain and France already had a large public enterprise sector. But it was hamstrung because socialists believed in break-even pricing policies. State enterprises were discouraged from making a profit. Without making profits, no revenues went into government coffers to fund the welfare state.
Bottom line. The welfare state can only be supported by growth or taxes. Growth will bury the environment which will eventually bring down the economy. And if there are limits to growth, in a market economy there are limits to taxes.My crystal ball tells me that the welfare state will be looked upon one day as the relic of a golden age, a quaint luxury. When the oil economy collapses, we’ll be fortunate to have the social safety net of Bangledesh. Except we won’t an extended family structure to fall back on .
Tim Murray
Quadra Island, BC
Canada
Nov.07/24
WHO PAYS THE PRICE FOR RESPECTING THAT WHICH DOESN’T DESERVE RESPECT?
WHO PAYS THE PRICE FOR RESPECTING THAT WHICH DOESN’T DESERVE RESPECT?
Multiculturalism
"...a fatuously stupid 'belief in belief'. It is hard to know which is the more evil, these Islamic customs themselves or the craven, cowardly, and above all PATRONIZING 'respect' for them which the rest of us are expected to show." Richard Dawkins
Multiculturalists believe they are defending immigrants. But in fact they are betraying 51% of them---women.
Environmentalists who praise 'cultural diversity' because they think it analogous to the healthy variation in natural systems are the unwitting architects of the loss of biodiversity. Only mass migration can breath life into subcultures that for want of new arrivals would assimilate. To keep the circus going fresh infusions of foreigners are required, and these numbers help to crowd out wildlife habitat and vanquish species. And as Garrett Hardin observed, in a multicultural nation each "tribe" lobbies government for a larger intake. Culturally homogeneous nations like Japan can more easily reach consensus to reduce their populations, as the Japanese did by cutting their post-war birth rate in half in just a decade. In a nutshell, multiculturalism is bad for the environment. So as they would say in California, take your choice. Is it Redwoods, or Immigrants? Mountain lions or tacos?
Tim Murray
Canada
Home of Multiculturalism
Growing cities, Vanishing Wilderness
Multiculturalism
"...a fatuously stupid 'belief in belief'. It is hard to know which is the more evil, these Islamic customs themselves or the craven, cowardly, and above all PATRONIZING 'respect' for them which the rest of us are expected to show." Richard Dawkins
Multiculturalists believe they are defending immigrants. But in fact they are betraying 51% of them---women.
Environmentalists who praise 'cultural diversity' because they think it analogous to the healthy variation in natural systems are the unwitting architects of the loss of biodiversity. Only mass migration can breath life into subcultures that for want of new arrivals would assimilate. To keep the circus going fresh infusions of foreigners are required, and these numbers help to crowd out wildlife habitat and vanquish species. And as Garrett Hardin observed, in a multicultural nation each "tribe" lobbies government for a larger intake. Culturally homogeneous nations like Japan can more easily reach consensus to reduce their populations, as the Japanese did by cutting their post-war birth rate in half in just a decade. In a nutshell, multiculturalism is bad for the environment. So as they would say in California, take your choice. Is it Redwoods, or Immigrants? Mountain lions or tacos?
Tim Murray
Canada
Home of Multiculturalism
Growing cities, Vanishing Wilderness
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