Monday, August 18, 2014

Their ought to be a law!

Their ought to be a law!
            Every election needs its side show, you know the distraction from the mundane that we see as election tripe that is rolled out every election to ensure we know logical positions, emotional stances and integrity points about each candidate. That stuff is dull and distracting from the real taste bits…who had an extra marital affair, who is married to a person 20 years their junior, who stole what, who is a bible thumping idiot, who is a bigot, who is a sexist and well, who is the least of all of these!  Then there is the side show, the complete clusterfuck of a person that opens their mouth and inserts their foot so far down their own gullet that they get athletes foot of the colon! This time around it’s a good one, one that will get you scratching your head and wondering WTF! Is this person for real? What pumpkin patch did this loser come from?
            First off she is only 20 years old! So, that alone should stop her from being able to run for a political position in my mind. Heck I know 30 year olds with less life experience than is needed and having a to look at this nutter running for a school trustee position just scares the tar out of me. She came out of Rural Manitoba with a bible in one hand and a cross strung over her shoulder and she is wanting to make ALL Manitobans see her religion as the one and true religion. She is intolerant and homophobic and a redneck weirdo that even the other redneck weirdo’s don’t like much.
                She first “burst” onto the scene as a youth leader for the PC party(….does that not kind of sound Hitler youth-esk?) Next she jumped around a bit working for right wing politically active people, actual people who held seats of power, but some say they never knew her or never interacted with her, I wonder why…she is a nut job! Her strategy at this point seems to be a leader on social media and get her message out…even if her message is a throwback to the middle ages! Yes that time tested and treasured truth high way Twitter.  A place that twits go to tweet and normal people go to make fun of them…so everything is okay right? No, because this nut job is serious about playing a part in teaching our children.
                Here is the funny thing, she doesn’t get it when it comes to twitter. For someone so tech and social media savvy she does not get that trending is not always a good thing when it comes to twitter. She threw up some controversial ideas and backed them up with typical religious rhetoric and ignorance that can only be bore from a true born again bible thumper (or one so indoctrinated that its about the same level of religious fervor) and everyone jumped all over her, quashed her, pushed her, questioned her and made fun of her.  But like a true believer, blinded by a biblical blindfold she took it on the chin thinking the jabs were pecks of approval and threw her head back into the sand, or clouds depending on your preference and thought her trending was a good thing.
                I almost felt sorry for her, almost till I realized she kind of scares me. I am glad that others are upset and perhaps will zip out and vote for Tom Parker or Hugh Coburn in the coming election to ensure that she gets the message, the best way to send it is to cut her chances of running again off by showing her that she should go and live a bit and learn a bit before she comes back to the big kid table.
                Twit…er Candace Maxymowich is running for school trustee of the Louis Riel School division, and even God is thinking WHAT THE F&*K! This weirdo of a human, and trust me I don’t insult her when I say this, has a weird past and comes from an area of Manitoba that actually believes the world and all that exists is only about 6,000 years old…you know despite that pesky evidence that keeps popping up, you know…..science! Okay, so lets put aside the whole “Science vs Religion” thing and just realize that Creationism is diametrically opposed to evolution and only one of the two has PROOF on its side, real and solid evidence that there is a line of progression from the big bang to the spot we stand right now.
                Creationism states that God created the earth in seven days about 6 thousand years ago. Well we already know what was going on 6,000 years ago and it was not creation! Creation also suggests that God created man in his image, but we now need to wonder what image that is, Homo erectus, Homo Habilis, which of our ancestors looked most like God, and more so, which of us in Race is Gods image, black, Chinese, White, Native American, or any of the others? So, no proof other than a book that is less than 2,000 years old and written by a bunch of barely literate peasants in the middle east, led by a Rabi that had “different” ideas than the status quo at the time?  And Science has techniques for carbon dating skulls and bone that show us that they are 10,000 or greater years old……
                She actually feels that teaching a religious ideology is best done in science class….no you read this right, science class.  What is next history in Phys’ed, or English in math?  Seriously, there is a time and a place for bible studies, its called church. In our mixed and multi cultural society there is no place for religion in school. Seriously what is next…are we going to force Muslims to take bible studies, or Jews to study the new testament. I will tell you what, when you pick up a copy of the Koran or Torah and read it end to end and study it, write some papers on it and attend lectures on these books then I will consider throwing the bible back into schools…along with the Koran, Torah and Buddhist, Hindu, Shikh and other religious texts.  Ignorance is about the only way to describe her myopic view of society. School should be for book learning, not religious book learning, it should be for development of the arts and sciences that our society is based on.
 Speaking of Science…. what does she stand for that we can look forward to our kids being bathed in with her at the helm (note, school trustees have a lot less to do with curriculum than we fear…er think). Well she feels that the only sex ed that should be taught in school is abstinence! So, she does know that Sex Ed is not just about the dirty deed right? Or is she some sex starved harlot that has sex on the mind….probably not! Sex ed is about the changes in kids body, you remember….Zits, hair in places you never had it before, deeper voice, growing things (Breasts…get your mind out of the gutter) and new attractions. The current “Growing up okay” booklet that the school system uses has tones of interesting “NON SEXUAL” information in it. All Candace wishes to focus on is the Don’t poke your girlfriend, hell don’t have a girlfriend talk that she wants school teachers to have with students. Personally I would much rather have my conversation with my son/daughter backed up with some science and sex ed at school, also I would not want some crazy bible lady yelling “DON’T POKE YOUR GIRLFRIEND” at my kid…unless it was funny, then I’d want it taped! And teach it like Robin Williams would!!!
So she has shown a complete lack of understanding in educational matters and has shown that she dips her religious ideology into every aspect of her decision making. She has demonstrated that she cannot and will not be seeing things from a neutral point of view and she feels religion and morality trumps education and common sense, now we can see how her morality actually plays out.     
                She is against Bill 18, specifically the part that requires schools receiving provincial funding to support any students who ask for a form of Gay-Straight alliance in the school. Bill 18 is also called the Safe and Inclusive schools act because it protects students from being bullied for their sexual preference, religious ideologies and just being different. Yes, it covers the whole Gay/Lesbian thing pretty obviously, but the anti-bullying bill protects all students from being picked on for just being different. The bill covers kids who want to start an anti-bullying club in their school….it does stipulate ANY anti bullying club. The LGTBQ groups just so happen to need this kind of club at the moment as they are picked on and bullied the most out of the school minorities.
                Now Im not a lawyer and I don’t know how to read a law, but the idea that we even need a law to protect minority rights and keep people from being bullied in school kind of makes me sick. And for some religious moron to stand up and say “NO, just our thoughts should be taught in school”, well that proves I am wrong, we do need this law and we do need to make sure it is working and protecting others. The idea behind bill 18 is that even the little guy can voice their opinions and live life without being crushed by the weight of the established majority. It also means that the little guy (minority) is not forced to follow the “rules” set out by the majority if they are not fair and logical. 
                She also is an activist in Conservative youth policies, urging parents to protect the religious freedom and their children’s moral education.  Personally I don’t have an issue with people protecting their “moral education” but I also think that the moral education should be done AT HOME.  I can understand if the teachers were teaching smut or were teaching intolerance in the class rooms, but for someone to want to bring their own religion into a class room is intolerant. There is no place for religion or personal moral education in a school room. The problem being who’s morals do we teach?  My moral code says live and let live, help others when they need help and let them believe what they want. You can debate, lord knows I like a good debate, but you need to shut it off when it comes to school. Teach solid basics, teach kids the skills they need to compete and create a brighter future, and teach them to love their neighbor and really help, don’t throw hell fire and brim stone around like its what everyone believes and should follow, what of the Jews, Muslim, Hindi, Buddhist or just plain atheists out in the school system? Should be bully those that don’t believe what we believe or should we let them think what they want and just be the best people we can be?
She is anti-abortion….so since when do we allow teachers and those involved in our children’s education to put forwards their views on this. And since when is this a school board issue? I’m big on Anti-crime, pro choice, pro cold beer, pro feminists, Anti big government, Anti right wing and pro puppy/Kitten…and none of it…let me say that again….NONE OF IT has anything to do with being a school trustee. You need to know how to allocate funds,  figure out how to organize schools, move programs, establish programs, work with politicians for funding and make decisions that will impact education…not someone else’s Uterus. That’s more Federal law kind of stuff.  Why not whip out your opinion on foreign affairs or health care while you are at it…it just shows that she cannot focus on  the job at hand and will create a circus out of this whole campaign.
                She does not understand the issues and makes ad Hominem arguments and innovation elenchi arguments. She also uses Moralistic fallacies in her arguments and attacks good people and their moral stances on things that have NO MEASURABLE MORAL AFFILIATION. She went after Hugh Coburn, whom I knew growing up, and stated that because he moved a program to accommodate the growing French emersion program in a school that he should have spoken with the local parents, and then questions how he can sleep at night. I would hope very well! He did his job, and well at that and made the proper changes to a schools program structure to move forwards, you know….not backwards…Yes, I am saying that the holly roller of school trustee wanna bee’s is backwards…just so we are clear here!
                So, she attacks Hugh Coburn and the other incumbents, she has the nerve to attack a decorated police officer (retired) who served this city and worked the hard undercover gigs that most did not want to, so he could help protect our city, a city hero that should be beyond her petty pokes and jabs, but as a child she does not understand what kind of risk he put himself in so we could be safe growing up, or safer. What has she done…she grew up a selective mute in a small rural town, not even knowing what a big city childhood looks like, but she wants to have some control over that big city childhood now!
                Okay, so all the complaining about this religious nut aside, the two things that really upset me are that first the press is giving her such a huge amount of coverage and next that she is now the center of attention above all else in the elections. Now I get that the school trustee positions are not as exciting as the mayoral race or council seat positions, but we really don’t need that changed in this way. The real sad part is that we give this poor girl so much attention when she really needs some solid deprogramming that only comes with life and “time in” that her youth really is not allowing her.
                Its sad because she is thriving on this attention and mistakes our laughing at her for laughing with her, our pointing and talking with our paying attention. The sad part really will be when she wakes up and realizes that she has been the butt of the joke, the punchline that kept our ever shrinking attention spans busy while real politics were going on and at the end she will lose the election by a land slide, ensure that solid leaders like Coburn and others are still in power at the end of the day, but they will have to live through the silly attacks and moronic accusations all for the right to serve their community. Does not seem fair to me, so lets stop feeding the troll and go back to really ignoring this race the way we had been, or better yet…lets ask the press to cover all angles of this race, not just the train wrecky parts.

Friday, August 15, 2014

Folklorama : how to make a good pavilion

What you need to have a good Folklorama pavilion!

                First let me say that I am officially a Folklorama goer! An Expert if you will! A trained professional even! How is that, well I have been going to this celebration of our cities culture since I was a small kid, that’s 40 years of going to the largest cultural festival in north America! My father played in the famous Mug Pub and my mom, sister and brother and I traveled around Folklorama from one pavilion to another and we still do! Well, now a days its just my mom and I, but we still trooper on to the different pavilions and grab a bit of food, take in the cultural displays and watch some entertainment every summer when the event is on. Now, we have cut back a lot since I got married and had a kid, its only fair to not do three pavilions a night both weeks, actually it used to be one week from what I recall, and smartly they extended it to two!
                Anyways, I have seen pavilions come and pavilions go. Some left because they just did not make sense…like the USA pavilion….and some left with out making any sense…like us not having ANY sort of aboriginal pavilion this year…what is with that?
                For those that have never gone to a single pavilion let me tell you a few things, there are great ones, and there are ROTTEN ones. One of the Great ones is one I would  like to welcome back….the UK pavilion. First off its not Mug Pub, but its darn close. They have all the four key elements that you need for a good Pavilion and some are missing that generally take away from a pavilions ability to be seen as great.
                So, what are the great things you need, the four golden points that can be seen as markers in the “great Pavilion” hierarchy of pavilions? Food! Live entertainment! Well practiced performers! And great food….er cultural displays that are live and relevant.

                Lets look at the last one first.  The cultural displays should look newer, not like you knocked the dust off them and threw them out for the display. They need to look new and fresh, and relevant. I actually saw a map with a pre WWII boarder on it! And it was not for the country that was being displayed…..and when I asked they said it was an older map…Yah, older like 50 years older! New maps are cheap, especially for European countries. If you simply don’t care then screw it and move on! The display also has to look well put together, not like it was a kids social studies project. Now, I have to admit that most of the displays are “nice” but some of the newer ones are fantastic and covered in cultural identity. The Punjab pavilion stands out in my mind as does the Slovenia one. New displays that are fresh and tight.

                The food, well the food speaks volumes about a pavilion. Is it fresh, well cooked and taste original to the country of origin?  I had a horrible experience two years in a row at the Chinese pavilion with limp veggies, food that looked like it sat under a heat lamp for hours and basically looked like something you pick up in a food court. It was horrible. Even my favorite spring roll was soggy!  The Pilipino one last year had a great cultural display and the darn food was so great my mom and I were tempted to go back this year again….and we should have skipped the Chinese one and done the pearl of the orient.
The new pavilions, England and Punjab, had food that was off the chain. The Punjab was a surprise to me, I was expecting far more hot food, with Curry melting my face, it was not like that at all! The flavor of the Goat (yes, never had that before) was fantastic, and the curry potatoes were delicious. The only down side was I was not ready for the desert ball and it kind of sat in me heavy, but I am sure if I was aware of this effect going into this I would have had half of it and enjoyed it as a desert. The British pavilion had OFF THE HOOK food, great Shepard’s pie, fish and chips were decent and the filo pastry dish with sausage in it was great too. Really worth going to this pavilion just for the food.

The performers need to be well practiced as well. By this I mean not a week of dance lessons and choreographing from your aunt or friends mom and away you go. The pavilions performers really make the whole show, and without professionally developed programs you miss out.  A few shining examples of great groups would again be England and Punjab.  Now the English pavilion takes it to another level, but they have a dance group that is both entertaining and well trained.  They stole this year’s Folklorama for us. They also had a great English singer that came out to entertain with his guitar, something that gives and inviting and non-threatening approach. It was truly fantastic. The African/Caribbean pavilion had a great limbo dancer and some cute kids dancing. Very interesting and kept the flow of the program going. Brazil was probably the most entertaining I have been to….both of them. The samba dancers and Capoeira fighters were entertaining, unique and well the girls were almost wearing a interesting outfit! Point being that the program was interesting and kept you watching.
Some programs fall to far into a kids dance recital. You watch board and you hope the food is better or the display is interesting enough to make you not feel ripped off. Don’t get me wrong, the odd kids dance class can be fun to watch, but if they come out unprepared in really bad costumes and kind of move about looking un prepared then you have an issue.
Worse yet is the unengaging adult dancers who look totally unprepared and like they never rehearsed the show at all. The south Sudanese pavilion was one that almost makes you feel uncomfortable watching them because the adults, some of them at least, looked like they were board, dressed in a tiger skin pelt that did not cover their everyday clothing and kind of made everyone feel a tad uncomfortable. More practice I think would make this show really pop.  Now having said that the stage size of some of these places is not enough to put on a real show. You need space to dance and in defense of the poor south Sudanese pavilion dancers, they were all dancing on a postage stamp. Whoever choreographed that really needs lessons on special requirements in dance or at the least special aesthetics in dance!
Not to rag on South Sudan to much longer but you look at the stage size at the German Pavilion, not very big, but they had less dancers and they used the space well. A lesson for the future perhaps but I can say, I wont be back because of how uncomfortable I felt watching the dancers on a postage stamp. Oh, and the facilities were FAR to small for a pavilion to be well put on. That’s another part about the pavilion that really stunk, it was so darn small.

Last but not least is the live music. This can really put a pavilion over the top and its something that the British Pavilion does well. They don’t used “Canned” music! Its like going to a concert and worth the couple of bucks for the night out, and a variety of kinds of music two, two bands at any time….a piper and Friday night a rock bank…what the what! That’s a damn fine Pavilion, hell that’s a killer concert and dinner experience that they could put on year round….or at least a few times a year!
My mom and I both commented on two pavilions this year that really missed the mark. First the Spanish pavilion. Never mind the crappy food we had that made me sick and all tasted horrible or the tiny cultural display that looked like an afterthought, focus on the show. Beautiful young ladies dancing very lively with castanets, well-practiced and dressed in traditional clothing that took you away to a Spanish dance party….but canned music. So, they basically phoned in part of the entertainment by not having live music.  No one bothered to see if they could find a flamenco guitar player or band in the city? It really put a damper on things.
The German pavilion gets a wee bit of a pass on this one. They had a live band ready to go and entertained before the dances, but the atmosphere changed on a dime and they went from Umpa band to ROCK AN DROLL German style. I actually have a hard time getting that damn German toon out of my head! While the band sat idly by they put on a rock show with more lively dancers and some crowd participation (of which I am not a huge fan, and did not join in, but they made it look fun) the whole thing was more modern and much more entertaining than the strange OLD Person sing song that cut the show in half. It could have been smoother but screw it…its rock and they won the world cup…so they are going to milk that for a while!