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Grammar mistakes are theirs

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The Carleton University Student Association (CUSA) drops fundraising for Cystic Fibrosis because the disease is not diverse enough. No really. From the CFRA web site:

This is the wording of the Motion (grammatical mistakes are their’s)
“Motion to Drop Shinerama Fundraising Campaign from Orientation Week.
Whereas Orientation week strives to be inclusive as possible;
Whereas all orientees and volunteers should feel like their fundraising efforts will serve the their diverse communities;
And Whereas Cystic fibrosis has been recently revealed to only affect white people, and primarily men.
Be it resolved that: CUSA discontinue its support of this campaign
Be it further resolved that that the CUSA representatives on the incoming Orientation Supervisory Board work to select a new broad reaching charity for orientation week.”

The only person to vote against this motion was Nick Bergamini, interviewed this morning on CFRA. He said, and I agree, that this is reminiscent of how they banned the pro-life club back in 2006. Meanwhile, Queen’s University is deploying students to monitor private conversations on campus, and University of Calgary is prepared to expel some pro-life students who are planning a demonstration on campus.

So–let me get this straight–we have a bunch of students, who run the student unions, who can’t write, who are willing to ban fundraising for a disease on the basis that it affects white men, which, as it turns out is factually inaccurate. Words fail.

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Brigitte found the answer to the age-old question: What do they teach them in school? To worry about whether an illness is “diverse” enough, that’s what. Two generations of modern educators brought us to this. And people still save and make all sorts of financial sacrifices to send their kids to college. I wonder why.

And another thing: In one part of the world, girls get attacked for going to school (where I’m pretty sure they’re not learning about the proper PCness of various illnesses) whereas here they can’t be bothered to learn how to write simple sentences in their own language. Golly, what a mess.

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UPDATE, Wednesday afternoon: They are apparently about to repeal their decision.

Feminists need apply

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Stories like this one really get me.

KANDAHAR, Afghanistan — Afghan police have arrested 10 Taliban militants involved in an acid attack this month against 15 girls and teachers walking to school in southern Afghanistan, a provincial governor said Tuesday.

[…]

The attackers squirted the acid from water bottles onto three groups of students and teachers walking to school in Kandahar city on Nov. 12. Several girls suffered burns to the face and were hospitalized. One teenager couldn’t open her eyes days after the attack, which sparked condemnations from around the world.

Girls are attacked for going to school. Teachers are attacked for teaching girls. Because they are girls, and because in this retarded culture girls are only good for sweeping floors and generally uphold the family’s “honour” by not stepping out of the house unless covered from head to toe and accompanied by a male relative. Yet girls in the area continue to go to school anyway. These kids are more brave than any of us. The least we can do is add our voice to those demanding harsh punishment for the criminals who think nothing of burning their faces.

One of the attack’s victims, a teacher named Nuskaal who was burned through her burqa, called Tuesday for a harsh punishment for the attackers.

“If these people are found guilty, the government should throw the same acid on these criminals. After that they should be hanged,” said Nuskaal, who like many Afghans goes by one name.

President Hamid Karzai earlier this month called for a public execution of the perpetrators.

I say: Anything that would help stop those attacks works for me. You?

Repeal s. 13

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WOW!!!

Section 13, the controversial hate speech provision in the Canadian Human Rights Act, should be repealed, according to an independent review by University of Windsor law professor Richard Moon.

“The use of censorship by the government should be confined to a narrow category of extreme expression — that which threatens, advocates or justifies violence against the members of an identifiable group, even if the violence that is supported or threatened is not imminent,” Prof. Moon writes in the review, released today, five months after it was commissioned by the Canadian Human Rights Commission.

“Less extreme forms of discriminatory expression, although harmful, cannot simply be censored out of public discourse… Censorship of expression that stereotypes or defames the members of an identifiable group is not a practical option and so we must, as a community, develop other ways to respond to this expression,” Prof. Moon writes.

Music to my ears

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Not often you pick up a paper and flip casually through to read something like this:

Like Dostoyevsky’s Raskolnikov, one act of killing requires more acts of killing to legitimize itself. This has been the real agenda behind the enigmatic enthusiasm for stem-cell research and the furious criticism of bans on late-term, or “partial-birth,” abortion.

One act of abortion is killing, but two or more–now that’s “choice.” (From the Saturday National Post.)

Fight FOCA

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There’s a web site that’s sprung up to fight the Freedom of Choice Act. I wasn’t really aware of what FOCA would do–it’s a promise the President-elect made to Planned Parenthood.

The Freedom of Choice Act (FOCA) would eliminate every restriction on abortion nationwide.

  • FOCA will do away with state laws on parental involvement, on partial birth abortion, and on all other protections.
  • FOCA will compel taxpayer funding of abortions.
  • FOCA will force faith-based hospitals and healthcare facilities to perform abortions.

Sounds like an incursion into state jurisdiction to me.

Obama’s choice

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President-elect Barack Obama picked the executive director of EMILY’s List to be his White House communications director. This is what they’re celebrating these days:

[youtube:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e7vhXpLNijk]

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Rebecca says: You beat me to it.

To be fair to Obama, though, this isn’t a surprise. He has already waffled on foreign policy (keeping Gates, a Bush appointee) and seems to be preparing to run Clinton’s third term in office, despite making a fetish out of change. He has never for a moment, though, pretended to be anything other than rabidly pro-abortion. I don’t like this, but it was predictable. Next promise he will likely keep: to pass the “Freedom of Choice” act ASAP.

It’s going to be a long four years.

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Andrea adds: I have talked to many pro-lifers who supported Obama. When I tell them I couldn’t support him for the abortion issue alone, they said one of a couple of things, which were all interesting to me. One person said she thought he was “grappling with the ethical issues;” another didn’t believe me when I spoke about his record. Another said you have to weigh with the damage of the past eight years. Still another said, fine, but McCain didn’t care about abortion really–which is incidentally the only explanation I find even remotely compelling. That’s probably true. But then, would McCain go out of his way to find and hire people like those working at Emily’s List?

Eeeek! Blood!!!

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Oh dear. A kerfuffle. Turkeys slaughtered while the governor yaks on. Is this a major faux-pas, or, as Mark Steyn called it, “a great teaching moment”? I admit I don’t think it’s so great a backdrop for a media availability. But the reactions of horror from sophisticated urbanites who blanch at the mere idea of blood (what do they do these people, eat animals that aren’t dead yet?) make me giggle. And I’m a latte-drinking urbanite myself.

I think I’ll be on Sarah’s side this time again (what, you’re surprised?). Here’s the video. Warning: it’s a bit gross.

[youtube:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k8DTSPzU0RI]

On the road

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I’m in Washington DC, on the tail end of a most interesting conference. Today I have the day off. I went jogging on the Mall, tried to circle Capitol Hill but you can’t–they have it all fenced off to get ready for the inauguration.

You may be expecting some weighty analysis–the tone and tenure of DC post-election, perhaps what is going on in politics–what was my conference about? But No. It is my day off. So did you known you can get The Onion in news boxes on the street here?

Here’s my favourite headline of the day. It’s a fashion item because I’m about to go shopping:

Sweater-Vest Worn As Well As Could Be Expected”

(More later–I actually do have some interesting thoughts to share from pro-life folks I’ve met while down here.)

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