The End of Argument
One of my very Conservative friends on Facebook posted a link to a Sun Media article suggesting that Canadians aren’t very supportive of IdleNoMore.
Well, knock me over with a feather. Who could ever imagine Canadians wouldn’t be supportive of other Canadians protesting against our governments on behalf of their rights. (Which to me, as a Canadian, generally means that they’re protesting on behalf of all our rights, because more rights equal more rights, but I’ve got a general arts degree so what the hell do I know, right? Just ask Margaret Wente, she’ll tell you what a general arts degree from 1981 is worth in Stephen Harper’s Canada that we won’t recognize when he’s done with it in… well… the earliest I hear now is 2019. Although, nothing personal to him and his Cabinet but from the looks of it there will be more than one “<erk> <thud>” before then. And no, I’m not even going to pretend to care because I don’t. You can only be so rude to me before you’re crossed off my well wishes list. As far as I’m concerned, fewer members of the current Cabinet will leave oxygen for more deserving humans to breathe.)
I should clarify to say that my Facebook friend’s posts in general would indicate that she prefers cats to people, though, so I doubt it’s personal to the the IdlersNoMore that she posted the link. Not as personal as the above “<erk> <thud>” comment is to the current Cabinet, anyway, so who am I to call out others for being rude, eh?
Perhaps the same could be true of Sun Media, that it prefers cats to people, too, and that there’s nothing personal in its lack of regard for IdleNoMore. Although, the last I heard it was being picketed for exhibiting markedly racist tendencies in its coverage of said Idlers. And I doubt even white squatters (IdlersNoMore have downgraded settlers to squatters, just so’s you know, Sun Media fans) would argue that Sun Media isn’t marketed pretty directly to their demographic.
Meanwhile, cats are actively trying to kill my Beau, who, as per his professional relationship with Canadian media, likes to keep his powder dry with regard to protest movements. Still, yesterday it got a little wet as we journeyed with our very rightwing real life friend to Rogers for an upgrade due to a young adult male returned home for a few months.
(Aside: If you can, go in person to do your business with Rogers. And no, “do your business” is not a euphemism. Trust me when I say it’s the exact opposite of doing your business with Rogers over the phone, which does make me want to do my business (euphemism) at Rogers HQ. Is there a Rogers HQ? Where? I have some business I may want to do on its carpet.)
Our friend was going on in that way not very supportive Canadians have sometimes of overlooking whatever legitimate grievances other protesting Canadians may have against our governments, to express instead his increasingly prevalent “Kiplingesque” views and contention that government is the enemy unless it’s Conservative.
There’s one way to live in a Conservative Canada, don’t you know, and apparently it’s to adapt to whatever our Conservative government says it is.
Otherwise, of course, yes, Conservatives will agree, government is the enemy. It’s Lieberal or Communist and a terrible waste of our money and wrong, wrong, wrong. Human nature will out, don’t you know, and no amount of social engineering will prevent Conservative governments from being right when they do it.
Look, over there, oh no, homeless cats.
So he’ll argue against rights for others (he’s convinced, as a British Canadian, that there is no such need, that the white man woneth everybody all the rights they need), and when my Beau and I argue otherwise, and against our Conservative governments, he’ll agree with us, “yes, government is the enemy”.
He’ll even argue that Stephen Harper isn’t doing anything and that’s why he should be Prime Minister. If I argue that he’s doing plenty, he’ll argue, “see? government is the enemy”.
And yes, he watches Sun Media, but he recognizes that it’s all just Conservative opinion and editorializing – which is why he likes it – and that there’s no actual news on offer. Otherwise, he reads the Ottawa Citizen, which is part of the Postmedia chain, but which does offer up actual news, and a bit of non-Conservative opinion and editorializing every once in a while to provide what is known in Canadian medialand as “balance”.
The latest, of course, is that the PMO is even attacking Postmedia reporters in the style favoured by the PMO which is to attack the messenger. In this case, the messenger is Maher of McGregor Maher, the dynamic duo exposing the rampant Conservative Party fraud that took place over the last election.
(Aside: In defense of Canadian medialand, it does only take one non-Conservative pundit to cancel out ten, twenty or thirty Conservatives, so stop whining, all ye Lieberals and Communists, and accept your laurels. Geez louise. And stop being such Debbie Downers while you’re at it. If it’s the end of the world as we know it, well, who cares, then, eh? Stop acting locally and thinking globally, stock up on the grape and wait out the end.)
Yesterday, I finally got him to understand that referring to myself as conservative isn’t a concession to his argument that Canadians should all vote Conservative because being a Conservative is good.
He doesn’t drink anymore but over lunch I downed two pints of Shock Top in rapid succession. I should know better by now, but there’s something about the argument that drives me crazy. That’s because it’s not only always the same argument, almost no matter the topic, it’s the same argument I used to have as a little conservative socialist feminist up in Sault Ste. Marie against the blockhead patriarchs who doled out the rights, or not, in the families of my friends.
Although, because they did shift work they often weren’t around, and my friends and their moms would happily and freely help themselves to rights. Then they’d have to go back to waiting for them to be doled out again until the inevitable <erk> <thud> and all would be as it should.
Anyway, this is my public declaration that I’m not having the argument anymore. The fact is, when Conservatives claim to not like government, what they mean is, they don’t like government for other people, they just like government for themselves. And since they don’t seem to understand that more rights equals more rights, of course they aren’t going to be supportive of political movements like IdleNoMore.
And I suppose, when all the fallout of Stephen Harper not doing anything (except re-engineering Canada so that we supposedly won’t recognize it when he’s done, although I would argue that we’ll recognize it all the more) hits the fan, the government will be Lieberal or Communist and the grabillions of dollars in rights righting we’ll be stuck paying for on behalf of each other (and that’s really the crazy part of all this official rights denial) will be their fault.
Meanwhile, I’m going to save myself the aggravation and hangovers and stop arguing so it’s not me who goes <erk> <thud>. Because that would be just too ironic, wouldn’t it.
The word “rights” appears many times in your post. The word “responsibilities” doesn’t appear once.
(Just testing the new anti-spambot plugin)
Okay. It is the responsibility of government to protect, indeed to expand, our rights.