It’s Christmas. As everyone knows, this is a time for family, thoughtful reflection and major blowout sales.
ProWomanProLife doesn’t want to miss out on the joys of the season, and so, we are offering a Two For One People for the Ethical Treatment of People T-shirt sale. Buy one, get one free until December 17! Yes, free! Wow.
All you need to do is enter our discount code “Christmas” at checkout.
Join us in remembering this Christmas, that people are people too.
After one meeting (albeit a lengthy one) this article was forwarded to me three times.
It’s Diane Francis of the Financial Post declaring we should all officially adopt China’s One Child Policy.
I think it’s satire. From what I know of Diane Francis, she’s not an idiot. But this is the sort of drastic and unattainable policy that some would think completely normal and/or useful in combatting “climate change.”
Paragraphs like this one lead me to believe this is a ruse:
The fix is simple. It’s dramatic. And yet the world’s leaders don’t even have this on their agenda in Copenhagen. Instead there will be photo ops, posturing, optics, blah-blah-blah about climate science and climate fraud, announcements of giant wind farms, then cap-and-trade subsidies.
You bet they don’t have it on their agenda at Copenhagen… And maybe we need a few more articles like this to highlight how the climate change file is a crazy one.
Anyway, vote now: satire or not? I say it is.
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Andrea adds: I stand corrected. Apparently, Ms. Francis is, with a straight face, advocating for the totalitarian impulses of Communist China to be applied To. The. Planet (insert echo voice here).
And apparently, I must get rid of my optimistic tendencies–this impulse that would have me see the best in everyone. Misguided! Oi ve.
It’s a state, and now it’s a movie about abortion, too. Read about it here, and watch the trailer, here.
The news article describes how some feel it is a pro-life movie. I’d say that’s probably true, because it’s usually pro-lifers who want to draw attention to the pro-abortion status quo we live in and promote debate. But there’s always the question of how that is done, and whether it is an intellectually honest film or not… and I can’t tell that from the trailer. (As a side note, I’ve always quite liked the Cranberries and now I learn Dolores O’Riordan, lead singer, is critical of abortion. Good news. We need more movie stars, singers, and generally famous people to stand up and act as role models, thereby empowering more young women to also say–hey, I’m against abortion.)
[youtube:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CedDUqKNm-Q]
I’ve been toodling about my apartment listening to Roger Scruton discuss beauty and art, modern architecture. (This after I cleaned to the art of Boney M’s Christmas album. Yes, art.) If you have time, you may enjoy this too.
I think there’s some import for the way we think about kids and pregnancy, by the way. Not 100 per cent sure what that import is, but something about babies not having much utility–therefore we don’t value them much these days?
(Youtube posts this in six ten minute segments.)
Say, this is my second bus-related post in two days. I’m on a roll! And so are these mothers, who successfully lobbied for strollers to be allowed on Ottawa’s busses.
Honestly, I think if you are a mother taking your kids on the public bus system, you should get all the help you can. I can move my single self travelling elegantly with one small purse either off the bus, or to the back, or what have you. It’s tough enough as a mom to ensure you have everything (extra diapers, change of clothes for baby, snacks, games, books, wetnaps, what else?) forget about being told your child has to be removed and the stroller folded up. That’s the same as telling a mother with a child not to take the bus, in my opinion; a policy put forward by someone who has not hung out with a small child in a very long time.
So good on these moms for making a stand.
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Véronique adds: I was going to write a post about why strollers need to be so big these days when I realized that not only had Andrea beat me to the post but I was even behind our commenter Suzanne.
So Suzanne, since you ask, let me tell you why strollers have to be so big nowadays. It’s both simple and complicated, obvious and convoluted. While things have been getting better since I had my first child 13 years ago, we do not live in a child-friendly world yet. And so when going places with young children, one must be as self-sufficient as possible, carrying diapers, wipes, change of clothes, snacks, baby seat for the restaurant, toys, beverages, bottle warmer and so on. Not only that but once you have packed all these essentials, you still need to have room for the stuff you are purchasing, e.g. groceries etc. Because no matter how much you struggle, you will be lucky if you get more than disapproving glances from passerbys. Finally, the big swivel wheels are necessary not only to navigate through rough terrain such as sidewalks and steps, but also for one-hand manoeuverability. Because when you struggle to get two kids, a stroller and the groceries through a narrow door, you will be lucky if your fellow citizens don’t bodycheck you to get ahead, let alone holding the door for you. As for helping you, they didn’t slam the door in your face, what are you complaining about? In these circumstances, the stroller becomes an extension of your home where you can safely change, feed and rest the baby without expecting help from anyone.
Interestingly enough, shopping malls and restaurants in the suburbs — where people are largely dependant on cars to eat, sleep and breathe — are relatively child friendly. But when you venture downtown, as I often do, and try to eat in non-chain restaurants while shopping in boutiques, you need to be self-sufficient. I was shopping on Bank street in Old Ottawa South a month ago and couldn’t even get in the breastfeeding clothing store with the stroller because of the steps. Then I went to eat at the Thai restaurant where not only didn’t they have a children’s menu or a high chair, but they couldn’t even accommodate my 3 year-old son when I asked for a small bowl of rice with some chicken. “You’re a thai restaurant, you have rice?” “Yes.” “You have chicken?” “Yes.” “Can you bring rice with chicken?” “No.” So next time, I’ll be shopping with my baby carrier — in case I need to leave the stroller at the door; my collapsible booster seat — in case they don’t have a high chair; my baby and toddler’s meals — in case there is nothing on the menu for them. And so on. I’m carrying all my gear in a gas-guzzler but the requirement for self-sufficiency wouldn’t change if I had to take the bus.
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Andrea adds: For proof that Véronique is absolutely correct, see the comments on the CBC story I linked to. (The CBC! These are ostensibly the compassionate lefties!) The vast majority are crusty childless folks complaining about how now that these mothers have won this battle their sense of entitlement will only grow. Excuse me? I was actually alarmed as I scrolled through those comments. Do I truly live in a city where people complain because some young mom is struggling to get somewhere on the bus? Don’t you think if she could possibly afford it she’d prefer to take a car? I find the comments absolutely, mind numbingly callous.
I’ve been known to complain about OC Transpo, in particular during the eternal driver strike in minus 50 weather last winter. Today, however, was a bright moment, which I’ll share with you. Tonight as I boarded the bus, the driver was very polite, very kind, and said hello to every passenger getting on in crowded rush hour traffic (and there were many of us).
I’m sitting there staring out the window into the dark December night when I hear a robust tenor voice start singing, loudly, “What child is this who laid to rest in Mary’s lap is sleeping”–you know the Christmas carol to the tune of Greensleeves. Concluding with a strong finish: “this, this is Christ the King” resonating throughout the bus…I was smiling and was quite sure he was done. But no.
Only in Ottawa would a bus driver carry forward with the exact same Christmas song, this time in French.
Made my evening, that.
Because Linda Gibbons will spend it in jail. Lifesite News is asking people to help encourage her by sending a Christmas card. I’m going to do that.
Linda prayerfully and quietly witnesses in front of Ontario abortion clinics, in violation of an unjust “bubble zone” law.
I wasn’t around when the bubble zone laws were created. I believe they are unnecessary today and are an infringement on our freedoms. I have further heard that Linda Gibbons herself is a peaceful lady. (We might be less inclined to sympathize with an angry protestor, shouting women who go for abortions down. That wouldn’t change the facts of the case–that these laws are not just–but in any event, I’ve heard Linda is a sympathetic lady.)
So send her a card if you can. There’s rules (see link) on what she can and cannot receive in jail. What a world we live in.
Thanks to a reader, my attention was drawn to this Onion sketch.
But let’s face it: The real victims are the vegetables. No one ever asked them if they chose to be thrown on women’s bodies like that.
Anyhoo: buy a t-shirt?
“Euthanasia is about killing, not the ‘right to die with dignity’“. So true. A piece by Ottawa’s own Brian Lilley.
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Brigitte likes this paragraph:
What Lalonde’s bill proposes to do is allow active euthanasia which requires a planned and purposeful act such as a doctor giving a patient a lethal injection. In the United States lethal injection has been challenged in court as a cruel and unusual punishment for death row inmates, here in Canada we have banned the death penalty as inhumane, too fraught with mistakes. Now Parliament is considering allowing the sick to be given what we find unacceptable for criminals.
Exiting the Dead Sea Scrolls exhibit at the Royal Ontario Museum in the “legacy” section:
Many ideas found in the Dead Sea Scrolls are still relevant today.”
If you don’t find that at least a tiny bit funny, then just move along to the next post (and/or civilization).