Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
I sense I am not going to make many friends (except Botticcelli - he may be my only one after this) with this post but I need to get this off my chest...
From the "confused about which country they're living in" file...
OK, so I wasn't exactly surprised that some people in Canada were going to march on Saturday in support of the anti-gun marches in the U.S.
I've seen people in Ottawa (and I assumed other Canadian cities) march for the Ferguson, Missouri issue, Trayvon Martin, "I can't breathe" and a bunch of other things including opposition to Trump's travel ban...
Heck, St. John's NL of all places even has a Black Lives Matter movement!
But anyway, I was just shocked at the size of the crowd - especially in Ottawa. Admittedly it was a nice day, but it numbered not in the hundreds as I expected, but in the thousands for sure.
So on a chilly but sunny early spring day, you can mobilize several thousand Ottawans to protest against the lack of effective gun control in the United States.
Anyway, if this demographic (massively non-aboriginal, reflecting the city overall) mobilized for missing and murdered aboriginal women and girls in recent years... I missed it.
If they've marched about Canada's horrible record on child poverty (we are next-to-last in the OECD I think), I've also missed that too.
Hey, they don't even march for gun violence in their own city, which is now reaching record levels. In a tragic irony, the latest shooting in Ottawa happened in broad daylight about 1 km as the crow flies from Parliament Hill, presumably just as the crowd of demonstrators (oh-so-concerned about gun control in the country to the south) were dispersing.
Hopefully they didn't trip on the yellow police crime scene tape on their way home.
Welcome to 2018, where I guess the social media accounts of Kim Kardashian and other U.S. celebrities and media peeps decide what you have to care about!
No problem with this post from my viewpoint A/J.
I have become somewhat disillusioned about the protest movements in Canada in general. We have so many serious domestic and higher priority issues that should be dealt with through organized protests before some of the inane stuff that seems to galvanize action on the part of the chattering classes.
I disagree with the notion that B.C takes all the risk and the R.O.C loses nothing. If an environmental catastrophe happened, which could theoretically happen now as there is already a pipeline transporting Bitumen to the coast to Burnaby refineries/terminals right now, Canada would be impacted. Just as if nothing happens, all of Canada benefits economically including B.C. Of course B.C would bear the brunt but we would all be impacted. We have to get our mind out of these silo's whereby we aren't connected, if we don't than maybe we have no business being connected. I think the question I had before to anyone from B.C is - is there anything that can be done that would satisfy the Province. If not than i'm afraid it will get nasty. From what I've seen from Protesters and from posts in here it is an unequivocal NO.
Has there been any traction in improving the processes in place to minimize/mitigate impact with this new pipeline. What if the pipeline has better environmental protections than the existing one? What if technology can be used to manage increased tanker traffic through the Burrard Straight.
This project from what I know is under Federal jurisdiction. If it is successfully derailed than I agree with Bru -it'll be a blow to our Federation and i'm afraid the notion of a Canada where there is any centralized C & C over what goes on from a national perspective for items that are of national domain will be severely diminished. We'll just be a collection of Provinces where decentralized power trumps everything. I won't have a lot of faith in our future as a nation if that happens.
The mess won't be lapping at your shores, is what I mean.
I doubt people in Ontario's cottage country will be bemoaning the fact that their shoreline is not swimmable because of the bitumen on Salt Spring Island.
Nor will people be standing in Hyde Park looking down on what was once a nice beach, like we will with Stanley Park.
I understand fully how the economic effects will reverberate across Canada. I just don't believe that risking our West Coast is worth it.
You do have a lot of what if's. That alone makes me see that you have more in common with the thoughts of us BC'er's. We have them too.
Personally I don't believe this issue is enough to destroy Canada.
I sense I am not going to make many friends (except Botticcelli - he may be my only one after this) with this post but I need to get this off my chest...
From the "confused about which country they're living in" file...
OK, so I wasn't exactly surprised that some people in Canada were going to march on Saturday in support of the anti-gun marches in the U.S.
I've seen people in Ottawa (and I assumed other Canadian cities) march for the Ferguson, Missouri issue, Trayvon Martin, "I can't breathe" and a bunch of other things including opposition to Trump's travel ban...
Heck, St. John's NL of all places even has a Black Lives Matter movement!
But anyway, I was just shocked at the size of the crowd - especially in Ottawa. Admittedly it was a nice day, but it numbered not in the hundreds as I expected, but in the thousands for sure.
So on a chilly but sunny early spring day, you can mobilize several thousand Ottawans to protest against the lack of effective gun control in the United States.
Anyway, if this demographic (massively non-aboriginal, reflecting the city overall) mobilized for missing and murdered aboriginal women and girls in recent years... I missed it.
If they've marched about Canada's horrible record on child poverty (we are next-to-last in the OECD I think), I've also missed that too.
Hey, they don't even march for gun violence in their own city, which is now reaching record levels. In a tragic irony, the latest shooting in Ottawa happened in broad daylight about 1 km as the crow flies from Parliament Hill, presumably just as the crowd of demonstrators (oh-so-concerned about gun control in the country to the south) were dispersing.
Hopefully they didn't trip on the yellow police crime scene tape on their way home.
Welcome to 2018, where I guess the social media accounts of Kim Kardashian and other U.S. celebrities and media peeps decide what you have to care about!
Haven't seen much of that in Vancouver, but I don't dispute that some seem confused as to what country they live in.
I use to blame the media back in the day. Canadians who thought the FBI had offices here for instance. Now I blame social media like you.
Missed that, but it seems that this wasn't a confused group as to what country they are in. They protested outside of the US consulate and they were according to the article, Americans who live in Vancouver being part of the protest.
It also mentions that the protest included references to gun violence here in Vancouver.
"The gun violence epidemic in America touches both Americans and Canadians living in Vancouver. Anyone who travels to the U.S. or has family and friends in the U.S. could be impacted by gun violence in America, and many already have been,” said organizer Bodil Geyer, an American living in Vancouver."
We see protests in front of other consulates directed at those countries as well and I don't think those people are confused.
What I consider misdirected are protests about a US issue, that doesn't exist in Canada, or has any spill over into or especially Vancouver. Like the Black Lives Matter people in Vancouver talking about how the police have shot and killed many blacks and were targeting the VPD. Sorry, wrong city, wrong police force.
but I don't dispute that some seem confused as to what country they live in.
I use to blame the media back in the day. Canadians who thought the FBI had offices here for instance. Now I blame social media like you.
In my youth I once dated a well-educated lady who lived in Ottawa (but originally from the Golden Horseshoe) area and one time we were with a bunch of people discussing the Quebec referendum - which was a hot issue at the time.
A major side issue to all of this in the Ottawa-Gatineau (Hull at the time) region is and was the people from the Quebec side who work in Ontario.
Anyway, she and her friends were going on about how Canada wouldn't be issuing "green cards" to residents of an independent Quebec so they could still work in Ottawa.
The discussion got totally sidetracked when I told them that Canada didn't issue green cards and that the process and requirements for working in Canada were totally different.
They argued with me until they were blue in the fact that Canada issued green cards.
Also, if you know lawyers they will tell you from time to time people in Canadian courts will talk of "pleading the 5th" - which of course refers to the 5th Amendment to the Constitution of the United States of America and has no legal bearing in Canada.
In my youth I once dated a well-educated lady who lived in Ottawa (but originally from the Golden Horseshoe) area and one time we were with a bunch of people discussing the Quebec referendum - which was a hot issue at the time.
A major side issue to all of this in the Ottawa-Gatineau (Hull at the time) region is and was the people from the Quebec side who work in Ontario.
Anyway, she and her friends were going on about how Canada wouldn't be issuing "green cards" to residents of an independent Quebec so they could still work in Ottawa.
The discussion got totally sidetracked when I told them that Canada didn't issue green cards and that the process and requirements for working in Canada were totally different.
They argued with me until they were blue in the fact that Canada issued green cards.
Also, if you know lawyers they will tell you from time to time people in Canadian courts will talk of "pleading the 5th" - which of course refers to the 5th Amendment to the Constitution of the United States of America and has no legal bearing in Canada.
Sadly, it's not new. I have similar stories ...people referring the " the Surgeon General ".
Sadly, it's not new. I have similar stories ...people referring the " the Surgeon General ".
I don't necessarily see awareness of this and other U.S. stuff as a bad thing. It's healthy to be aware that other places do things differently. It helps you to not be the type of person who says "whaddaya mean you don't know Chick-Fil-A? EVERYONE in the world knows Chick-Fil-A! How can you not know Chick-Fil-A????"
But when it starts to supplant basic homegrown knowledge...
I don't necessarily see awareness of this and other U.S. stuff as a bad thing. It's healthy to be aware that other places do things differently. It helps you to not be the type of person who says "whaddaya mean you don't know Chick-Fil-A? EVERYONE in the world knows Chick-Fil-A! How can you not know Chick-Fil-A????"
But when it starts to supplant basic homegrown knowledge...
Or supplants actual concerns Canadians should have. On that note, there are a lot of protests that pertain to Canada.
I don't necessarily see awareness of this and other U.S. stuff as a bad thing. It's healthy to be aware that other places do things differently. It helps you to not be the type of person who says "whaddaya mean you don't know Chick-Fil-A? EVERYONE in the world knows Chick-Fil-A! How can you not know Chick-Fil-A????"
But when it starts to supplant basic homegrown knowledge...
Sometimes I creep (I believe that's the word according to my nieces) on Facebook and saw posts by people in this area who were pro Trump (apparently because they were against abortion) but didn't know that Canada has no abortion laws and that the Conservatives weren't touching that subject. They were the same people who posted weird speculations about Obama being the anti-Christ. There is a strange group of people attending a particular American style church who don't know what country they are in. They are also anti immigration and worried about Mexicans.
Do I laugh or do I cry?
Please register to post and access all features of our very popular forum. It is free and quick. Over $68,000 in prizes has already been given out to active posters on our forum. Additional giveaways are planned.
Detailed information about all U.S. cities, counties, and zip codes on our site: City-data.com.
Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
