Chop off voters fingers if they vote?
That’s what the Vancouver Sun reported from the Daily Telegraph in article by Ben Farmer titled Afghanistan Votes (8/15/09). Evidentially the Taliban are threatening to chop off fingers of anybody who votes in this week’s presidential election in Afghanistan. I wonder why. Oh, I know the Taliban are a ferocious, bloody bunch, but they can’t be entirely stupid as they are succeeding in stymieing western powers, including Canada. However, there is this: the president of Afghanistan, Hamid Karzai, has just signed into law edicts that are also dear to the heart of the Taliban. These edicts concern the behavior of women. Isn’t it remarkable how so very many of the laws stemming from Islam have to do with the behavior of women? An outsider might think that controlling women is the very basis of Islam, at least how it is practiced in Afghanistan.
For instance, in the same article in the Sun it is reported that President Karzai earlier had signed into law a ruling that was said to condone martial rape and decreed that a wife must satisfy her husband’s sexual desire at least every forth night. A somewhat amended version says that a husband can stop feeding his wife if she does not submit to him and in case the wife runs away she cannot take her children, as the custody of children is granted only to fathers and grandfathers. I don’t think there is such a great difference between President Karzai’s rulings and the Taliban rulings. So why the finger chopping threat? The big quarrel on the treatment of women between the Taliban and President Karzai must hinge on the difference between what can be done with women who disobey their husbands and fathers and even sons. Can you image that, dear sisters out there who can hardly wait for sons to leave the house, of having to ask your son if you can go out of the house yourself? Can you even imagine such a thing? It boggles the mind. But the Taliban say that a woman who disobeys her husband or father or son can be gang raped along with other punishments such as being killed. So why are Canadian soldiers giving up their lives to a foreign government that despise women only to a modicum degree less than the Taliban who are killing Canadian soldiers? And some of the police officers over there who have assisted? And all corrupted by the price of cocaine? More on the drug issue later.
Monday, August 17, 2009
Monday, August 03, 2009
FIRE AND ICE IN BC
FIRE AND ICE IN BC FORESTS
Some say the world will end in fire:
Some say in ice.
From what I’ve tasted of desire
I hold with those who favor fire…
In Robert Frost’s famous poem “Fire and Ice” the poet goes on to say that if the world had to perish twice he knew enough of hate to know that for destruction, ice was also great, and would suffice. While it’s hard to know exactly what was in any poet’s mind when they wrote a particular poem we can say (I think) it’s at least suggestive that Frost in this writing was thinking of ice as indifference, as neglect. This neglect is proving deadly in our collective indifference to our environment. However, like Frost, I hold with those who favor fire. And probably so would the majority of BC inhabitants’ at the moment as we survey our burning forests.
Anyone who sees the film “Home” will be impressed with the role trees have played not only in the evolution of soils, plants, animals, water, and oxygen, but also how we as humans have evolved with them. And in spite of the fact that trees have brought us life and health and happiness we have not loved them in return. Not so, you say? You have always loved trees, you say? Well, people try to protect what they love. When people love enough they will take risks to try to protect what they love, even if this involves financial or physical danger to them. Collectively, we have not done this. Collectively, we have passively watched our vast public forests fall to corrupt logging corporations and governments who have catered to them. As this combination of corporate greed, government duplicity and citizen passively has markedly contributed to global warming by resulting in a massive deforestation of the forests of our province. And this is a crime. It’s a crime against humanity and a crime against nature.
Is there nothing to be done except chant “Burn, baby, burn?” as massive areas of our forests burn to cinders? Yes, there is. When the fires die down we can love, really love, as individuals and citizens, what’s left of these trees, these forests. We can surround them with our love. We can protect them. Whatever this takes. Betty K
Some say the world will end in fire:
Some say in ice.
From what I’ve tasted of desire
I hold with those who favor fire…
In Robert Frost’s famous poem “Fire and Ice” the poet goes on to say that if the world had to perish twice he knew enough of hate to know that for destruction, ice was also great, and would suffice. While it’s hard to know exactly what was in any poet’s mind when they wrote a particular poem we can say (I think) it’s at least suggestive that Frost in this writing was thinking of ice as indifference, as neglect. This neglect is proving deadly in our collective indifference to our environment. However, like Frost, I hold with those who favor fire. And probably so would the majority of BC inhabitants’ at the moment as we survey our burning forests.
Anyone who sees the film “Home” will be impressed with the role trees have played not only in the evolution of soils, plants, animals, water, and oxygen, but also how we as humans have evolved with them. And in spite of the fact that trees have brought us life and health and happiness we have not loved them in return. Not so, you say? You have always loved trees, you say? Well, people try to protect what they love. When people love enough they will take risks to try to protect what they love, even if this involves financial or physical danger to them. Collectively, we have not done this. Collectively, we have passively watched our vast public forests fall to corrupt logging corporations and governments who have catered to them. As this combination of corporate greed, government duplicity and citizen passively has markedly contributed to global warming by resulting in a massive deforestation of the forests of our province. And this is a crime. It’s a crime against humanity and a crime against nature.
Is there nothing to be done except chant “Burn, baby, burn?” as massive areas of our forests burn to cinders? Yes, there is. When the fires die down we can love, really love, as individuals and citizens, what’s left of these trees, these forests. We can surround them with our love. We can protect them. Whatever this takes. Betty K
Tuesday, July 28, 2009
COME ON, LADIES!
COME ON LADIES, LET’S GET IT TOGETHER!
Who? Provincial party leaders Carol James, NDP and Jane Sterk, Green Party, that’s who. They both try to include women but consistently speak to men in their policies and speeches. But are women a separate class? Well, we know that it is male culture that decides what’s important; what will even be discussed during elections and policy making. But in my opinion, both the NDP and the Greens have the potential to break out of this male constructed straight jacket and awaken women to the distinct possibility that women’s issues of just trying to survive as not only poorly paid producers in a tough job market but also as no paid reproducers in the capacity of having and caring for children, also caring for the elderly, the disfranchised, plus, in our spare time, trying to save the entire earth, for Pete’s sake, these are the very issues that strike at the heart of humanity.
The NDP better understands social issues; the Greens know the environment better. Neither party did as well as expected in the last election because each party is only half of what many women are looking for, that is, a platform that acknowledges that the work of having and rearing children is our society’s most important activity. And that the people who do this, or most of it, should be given the money and status this social activity demands. If childless people object to their tax money being spent thus they can trade their owed tax amount for hours, days, weeks, whatever, spent in child care centers, nurseries, schools, doing cooking, cleaning, and teaching. Every citizen must take responsibility for the care of future generations.
We want a platform that stresses that no system of belief should be allowed to raise the sex of one child above another the other, before or after birth. Women fear prostitution and want a party that declares that no woman or child be stripped of their humanity by sexual violation of their bodies by men even if they agree for poverty’s sake. We worry about good food, that there is enough for the children, and that there should be stricter rules about what children can be fed, and corporations who poison food with chemicals and hormones and governments who allow this should be found guilty of child abuse just as the poisoning of the minds of children with pornography and violence on the Internet, film, and TV be declared a crime against children (and let the networks, corporations and the civil liberties unions howl).
Can the NDP and the Greens come together and form one party? I think it’s time. A clear vision releases creativity, both in leaders and the people. Have the corporations, the banks, the monetary experts done such a hot job? The only hot job they know how to do is steal. And then for their thievery demand more taxpayers money while they plunge us further into debt and social degradation. I’m serious, leaders of the Greens and the NDP. You want a majority? Form one party. Turn to your true, largely untapped base, women. Not to ignore or demean men, but to lead them, as well as more women, to a more comprehensive way of including women, children, and the earth in every policy making decision. At a time when mother’s breast milk is the most polluted food source on earth, we just have to do this. We must. And we can. Betty K
Who? Provincial party leaders Carol James, NDP and Jane Sterk, Green Party, that’s who. They both try to include women but consistently speak to men in their policies and speeches. But are women a separate class? Well, we know that it is male culture that decides what’s important; what will even be discussed during elections and policy making. But in my opinion, both the NDP and the Greens have the potential to break out of this male constructed straight jacket and awaken women to the distinct possibility that women’s issues of just trying to survive as not only poorly paid producers in a tough job market but also as no paid reproducers in the capacity of having and caring for children, also caring for the elderly, the disfranchised, plus, in our spare time, trying to save the entire earth, for Pete’s sake, these are the very issues that strike at the heart of humanity.
The NDP better understands social issues; the Greens know the environment better. Neither party did as well as expected in the last election because each party is only half of what many women are looking for, that is, a platform that acknowledges that the work of having and rearing children is our society’s most important activity. And that the people who do this, or most of it, should be given the money and status this social activity demands. If childless people object to their tax money being spent thus they can trade their owed tax amount for hours, days, weeks, whatever, spent in child care centers, nurseries, schools, doing cooking, cleaning, and teaching. Every citizen must take responsibility for the care of future generations.
We want a platform that stresses that no system of belief should be allowed to raise the sex of one child above another the other, before or after birth. Women fear prostitution and want a party that declares that no woman or child be stripped of their humanity by sexual violation of their bodies by men even if they agree for poverty’s sake. We worry about good food, that there is enough for the children, and that there should be stricter rules about what children can be fed, and corporations who poison food with chemicals and hormones and governments who allow this should be found guilty of child abuse just as the poisoning of the minds of children with pornography and violence on the Internet, film, and TV be declared a crime against children (and let the networks, corporations and the civil liberties unions howl).
Can the NDP and the Greens come together and form one party? I think it’s time. A clear vision releases creativity, both in leaders and the people. Have the corporations, the banks, the monetary experts done such a hot job? The only hot job they know how to do is steal. And then for their thievery demand more taxpayers money while they plunge us further into debt and social degradation. I’m serious, leaders of the Greens and the NDP. You want a majority? Form one party. Turn to your true, largely untapped base, women. Not to ignore or demean men, but to lead them, as well as more women, to a more comprehensive way of including women, children, and the earth in every policy making decision. At a time when mother’s breast milk is the most polluted food source on earth, we just have to do this. We must. And we can. Betty K
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