The Golden Compass: Are You Serious?

The Christians are in an uproar, so you know it must be good, right?

People have asked me, well in advance of the premiere of “The Golden Compass” what all the fuss is about.  The Hollywood hype-machine certainly was working overtime to make this a blockbuster.  When I took my kids to the “Bee Movie” the trailer for “The Golden Compass” was 3 times the length of any other trailer on the movie - in fact it may have been the longest I have ever seen.

While the Christian community has been screaming “blasphemy!”, Hollywood, the cast, the writer and the directors have tried to frame the movie as “thought-provoking” and “encourages people to think for themselves”, while framing the bad guys very thinly as the Catholic church, and child-abusers to boot.

Me?  I don’t know.  I’m inclined to let things stand on their own merits for the most part.  I admit, I haven’t seen the movie, but I do look at reviewers’ thoughts beyond “Focus on the Family“, thank you very much.

But here’s what I know.  In Canada.com’s review of the movie (not exactly a pawn of the religious right), we read,

Mrs. Coulter [Nicole Kidman's character] may be rich, beautiful and obsessed by children, but she’s not nice.

She hurts children by stripping them of their daemons — animal spirits that walk alongside all humans, keep us company and speak the truth in our hearts.

The daemons are the best part of Golden Compass because they’re easily understood symbols of goodness and purity — unless you’re talking about the golden monkey on Coulter’s arm, who looks like a leftover from the Wicked Witch of the West’s flying simian army.

First: timely, the main bad guy is a woman with the last name of Coulter.  Coincidence?

Second:  a main prop of the movie is that all children have a bestial spirit called a “daemon” who speaks TRUTH to them?  And the bad guys are trying to separate the children from their “daemon”?

You’ve got to be kidding!  It does not take a rocket scientist to put two and two together.  Western culture, even post-Christian culture recognizes the concepts of spirits and demons.  The traditional viewpoint is that generally, it is a bad thing to encounter, or regularly associate with demons.  The traditional viewpoint is also that demons, if they tell the truth at all, it is only to manipulate us into evil.  To base an entire movie (or trilogy) plot around the premise that spirit demons are good and all children should listen to them as “truth”?

Whether or not you are a Christian, that should scare the crap out of you.  I do not want my kids watching a movie that teaches them to listen to spirits, because they tell the truth.  Nosirree.

Ask any parent - most kids’ first inclination is to do wrong anyway.  Who wants to endorse that?  The point of being a parent is you want your children to learn how to behave from you, not from some spirit guide in their head.

Pirate Fairness

If I had to rate the Harper government’s performance so far, I’d have to give it an A since it has managed to do more good for Canada than 8 years of Mulroney rule and certainly more good than 12 years of Chretien-Martin rule. There are occasional examples though of when our current government will actually do harm to the freedom and liberties of Canadians Incidentally, they are usually associated with now-Industry Minister Jim Prentice.

Such is the case with the new music copyright and piracy legislation that the government is in the process of introducing. Now, before I go any further, let me say that I completely understand and agree with the argument that Canada’s copyright legislation is currently too lax, and that this country, thanks to Pierre Trudeau and his beloved philosopher-kings in the Supreme Court, is endorsing theft. But, as the old childhood lesson goes, two wrongs don’t make a right.

The fact of the matter is that if you’re downloading movies or music for free online without the explicit permission of the owner(s), you are committing theft. The argument that the money just goes to overpaid music execs who abuse their meal ticket artists is irrelevant. Below I will get into why I have little respect for the music suits as well, but that does not mean that I am free to engage in vigilante justice. Otherwise, people could rightfully justify (also in their own minds) taking gas from the pumps without paying (”it just pays for oil barons to build another mansion”). In fact, you could basically steal anything since there’s an infinite number of excuses out there that we could all use to justify the unauthorized use/possession of a product under the law. So, in that sense the entertainment industry is correct in pushing the government to give legislative teeth to the companies’ claim on their products.

That said, I think in this case a revision of our laws will actually cost the music industry in particular more than it will gain — and that’s certainly not a bad thing either! Music companies have, for decades now, abused the fact that they hold the power to make or break artists with just a word. Twice, in the late 70s, and more recently in the late 90s, this power has been challenged by the free market spirit of competition. Both times, record sales have declined. The former case had CDs and MTV, among other forces to thank for bringing it to a close. However, almost a decade later, the internet phenomenon has seriously wounded the way that music companies do business and demonstrated that it is an obsolete model that is on its way out.

So what do these companies propose as a solution? Rather than adopt to the emerging realities, these companies go to the governments of the world and demand compensation through new taxes and laws that presume guilt from every single buyer. The new legislation that Minister Prentice is proposing will actually bite the hand that feeds the music industry: people like me who actually buy their music will be forced to pay a new tax on sites like iTunes to compensate the company for our neighbours who chose to get their music by theft. Wonderfully fair, isn’t it?

So, will the music industry actually right any wrongs through this methodology? Hardly! Already, the music industry’s reputation is in decline among music buyers for having the audacity of proposing that the government force Canadians to pay their bills for them. Remember too that this is a group of companies that HATES to give consumers what they want until there is absolutely no other choice: we still find CDs full of filler songs and at prices only moderately lower, post-Napster, than they were before; the selection on iTunes is still dull since companies are reluctant to allow users to purchase individual songs; artists are still being scammed and, in older cases, unable to maintain control of their creations (I’ll note here that while this is technically legal, it demonstrates that our property laws really need revisions as well!).

In short, the music industry as we know it is dying but it’s trying to drag the rest of us down into the ground with it. Too bad the government is actively going to help it. To show just how misguided these attempts are though, might I suggest you merely go down to Buffalo and purchase a US iTunes card — the store has better selection, and there won’t be a squeaky wheel tax levied on the purchase!

Earth Worshipers & The Bali Summit

Does anyone else find it ironic that a group which has been saying for years that man-made pollution is going to cook the Earth like a Christmas goose soon choses the warmest day so far this winter (a nice, balmy -3 degrees by the way!) to demonstrate across the country against the Harper government?

Meanwhile, the irony was well met on Bourque last week as that site’s administrator noted that thousands of delegates decided to meet in a Bali resort to curb emissions…but as a consequence of Bali’s remoteness, every single negotiator and diplomat now there had to fly in by jet.

Such is the world these days; a stunning circus for the Martians and Vulcans watching us from outerspace. Unfortunately, those of us bound to the ground have to put up with the Gaia cultists and Jihadis as they both attempt to wrestle control of our societies from the pack of shallow secularists who have been running the joint since the end of the Second World War.

Unfortunately, as much as we might all like to laugh at the fact that today’s Toronto protest only turned out only mere hundreds, the impact that the Earth worshipers will exercise on us in the future will only continue to grow as my generation - the one of Captain Planet propaganda and *Gaia needs saving* video games - reaches its prime. Woe to any group which dares stand in the way of the latest state religion to usurp control in Canada, since unlike the Secularists, this group doesn’t even pay lip service to tolerance and diversity!

How Rudy and Hillary Can Win - They Must First Lose

According to Dick Morris Hillary Clinton and Rudy Giuliani can’t be too strong too early - otherwise they’ll make themselves the focus. Rather the two front-runners must lose in the early few primaries in order to shift the focus to their opponents weaknesses:

There is only one way for Hillary to shift the focus onto Obama or John Edwards: lose. By losing in Iowa and New Hampshire, she makes the key question not her veracity but Obama’s or Edwards’s ability to win. Democrats are going to be reluctant to nominate someone they know so little about as Obama and will wonder if the nation is ready for an African-American candidate (it is) or for a man who has been senator for 104 weeks before running for president (it’s not). They will also wonder about nominating Edwards, who lost twice in 2004. When the question becomes viability, not credibility, Hillary is in a league of her own with her ability to bring new female voters to the polls.

The question that has dominated the GOP contest is, “Should we nominate someone as liberal as Rudy on social issues?” The answer among the stalwarts is obviously no. As long as the social conservatives are divided among four candidates, Rudy has a shot. But when they rally behind one man (probably Huckabee) conservatives outnumber moderates in Republican primaries, particularly if the independents are drawn into the Democratic primary by Hillary’s new vulnerability.

But by losing, Rudy shifts the focus. Republicans will ask, “Is America ready to elect a Mormon?” (unfortunately not) and, “Are we ready to go with Romney or Huckabee who have no experience in foreign or military affairs?” Once again, Rudy will profit from the shift in focus his defeat in the early contests will trigger.

Curtailing Free Speech to “protect Canadian multiculturalism”

I was introduced to the writings of Alan Borovoy by Ted Morton (of all people), and my admiration continues to grow (h/t).

Kathy has said everything that needs to be said on this particular “human rights” complaint. And, really, I shouldn’t be so nice to Borovoy. He’s attacking symptoms rather than the disease, namely that any program of multiculturalism will inevitably need the big bad state to protect it from mean-spirited people exercising their right to free speech:

“We feel that it is imperative to challenge Maclean’s biased portrayal of Muslims in order to protect Canadian multiculturalism and tolerance.”

Yup, you read that right. Hello Multiculturalism, Goodbye Free Speech.

Straight From the Liberal Fear Factory…

The Liberals are talking a great deal these days about the Harper government using negative “U.S. style” attack ads, and black paint with which to smear Stephane Dion. So, what does the party of *Canadian optimism* and “progressive politics” show when it’s online mouthpiece hosts a video contest? A bunch of U.S.-style, dark attack ads…oh, but they’re lame, that makes them different!!!

I scanned all of the ones on the page tonight. Only one seemed legitimately effective; despite me not agreeing with the correlation (and the fact that a certain German businessman just shot down his own attacks on a certain former PM today…), the cinematography and theme was very, very well done. I guess you eventually have to hit the ball after so many swings & misses…

Statutory Holidays, Church/State Separation and YOU

I don’t normally cross-post, but I thought this might be interesting to some readers over here as well.

I’ve been reading Penelope Trunk for about 6 months and her insight into both life and work are fascinating.

A few days ago she teed off on Christmas in the workplace.  I’m just guessing, but I think she’s Jewish, from her comments and references to Hannukah.  Not that that means anything other than that she doesn’t feel any particular affinity with Christmas.  But it is important to set that context.

It took me a minute to get over her calls for the removal of Christmas as a Statutory holiday, on the grounds of the multicultural nature of the workplace in America.   At first I was kind of offended, with all the secularist calls that have been getting louder in recent years.  But after reflection,  I thought her ideas actually have a significant amount of merit.  I think that establishing a fixed number of floating holidays for each employee is a really good idea, especially in view of how the statutory holidays are structured in the States.

It is my understanding, for example, that Americans get Christmas Day off, but not Boxing Day.  They also get Good Friday off, but not Easter Monday.  But they get two days off for Thanksgiving, whereas Canadians only get one.

Now, I think having two days for Christmas rather than Thanksgiving makes more sense, as it means more time with the kids to play with toys, but that’s me.  In terms of religious holidays, I would much rather take the Friday and Monday off for Easter than Christmas, because really as far as Christianity goes, Easter is a much more significant holiday.  (I could also get into the reality that Jesus was crucified not on Friday, but on Thursday, but that is a whole other issue.)

Still, I think for everyone, it makes more sense to simply establish a mandated, say, 12 floating holidays per year for every employee.  It might even make more sense to just do away with statutory holidays altogether and replace it with a mandated minimum vacation for everyone.  I believe the current minimum is 2 weeks vacation a year - change the government reg to remove the requirement for statutory holidays, but mandate a minimum of 4 weeks’ vacation a year, 2 weeks of which are ineligible for carryover.  This would then mean that people would have to take a minimum of 2 weeks a year holidays, meeting health and safety questions, but people could bank the rest.

From what I have seen about vacations and stress reductions, it makes more sense to do things this way anyways.  What the current stat holiday model does is encourage employees to take “long weekends” all over the calendar, which accomplish exactly zero in terms of stress reduction.  From what I have read, a person receives no benefit in terms of their health or stress levels until they have been away from their work for more than a week.  In other words, a week-long vacation nets you zero.  A 9 day vacation only begins to benefit you.

So, for health reasons, and also for diversity reasons, this seems like a good idea.  Now, what am I missing?  Why is there not broader support for such an idea?  I can see all the major parties getting behind it… unless there is another reason why stat holidays are there.

Bagpipes are Destroying the Earth! More Eco-Idiocy…

Recently it was beer fridges and now bagpipes are on the eco-idiots hit list!

THEY were once outlawed for being used as seditious weapons of war. Now, bagpipes have been blasted as an environmental menace.

Over-intensive logging means that the African wood used to make Scotland’s national instrument faces being wiped out.

Conservation groups are letting out skirls of protest, urging musicians and instrument manufacturers to make sure their pipes come from eco-friendly sources.

“I don’t think Santa Clause would do that!”

Tales from the Canadian Bayou.

“If anything, we need MORE Harper”

When like totally smart covert Liberals attack:

Well it’s been over a year and Harper is nowhere near majority government territory in the polls. He has done things that upset a great deal of Canadians on climate change…

KPK has sterling sources for these views:

There are rumblings in the media…[!]

Craig responds with the sort of, you know, facts that drive run-of-the-mill Liberals insane:

Why would a person is is personally polling 15-20% higher than the party that he is leading step down??? Harper is more popular than the CPC so CLEARLY he isn’t to blame for the failure to break through to majority territory. If anything we need MORE Harper.

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