The decline of Canada continues

Last year Al Jazeera English ran an opinion piece explaining Canada's deepening ties with Israel and it would seem Stephen Harper is now switching his pro-Israeli policies into the domestic arena.

The Canadian Parliamentary Committee to Combat Anti-Semitism (CPCCA) has come to the conclusion that criticising Israel is a new form of anti-Semitism even going as far as to say that criticism of Israeli policy in greater amounts than criticism of other countries is an anti-Semite. Policy specialisation is racism if the Right doesn't like the policy you focus on.

The members of the committee must be praised for the insightfulness, they managed to work out the motives and ideas of those who campaign against Israel's occupation of Palestinian land and other crimes without even talking to them. I suppose all the pro-Israeli groups they spoke to filled them in. Better that way, not to waste the campaigners' time.

This, in a way, can be seen as a positive sign. As a short headline on Exiledonline.com pointed out regarding the Israeli outlawing of supporting the boycott it must actually be hitting profits if the Knesset is being forced to acknowledge the opposition and publicly oppose it. With so many things regarding Israel's crimes we see the mainstream media try to ignore it completely (as they did with reporting the boycott law).

It is somewhat trite to mention this specific Gandhi quote these days but still

First they ignore you, then they laugh at you, then they fight you, then you win.

does have a ring of truth. One of the most powerful prerogatives of the powerful is the ability to ignore those below, their complaints and their aspiration. When they actually have to start addressing issues those below them are putting forth then those issues are having some effect.

If organised opposition to Israel and elsewhere wasn't having an effect then there would be no need to start aggressively expanding the idea that criticising Israel is anti-Semitism. Rhetorically this been attempted for years already with Jews such as Chomsky and Finkelstein who criticise Israel being labelled as "self hating Jews" (what a farce). Whether the notion of self hating Jews will be legislated for is yet to be seen in Canada. They will likely just be marginalised "for their own good." No true Jew opposes Israel.

In a war the time you advancing without meeting opposition can be the most dangerous because at that time you don't know where the enemy is. That the Israel lobby is resisting popular organising and boycott so hard suggests it is having an effect.

Royal Wedding day purge.

Around 50 facebook pages and accounts of UK activist groups have been purged. The timing of this on the day of the royal wedding and just days before May Day is deeply suspicious.

Lists of the purged accounts can be found here and here.

Monarchy isn't about freedom

If I'd been blogging a few months back I'd have probably highlighted that civil liberties experts in the UK believe the Royal wedding will be used as template for stifling protest as "austerity measures" begin to bite. Here is a summary of how counter terrorism laws are being used to protect the elite from any acts of dissent on their special day, all without a credible terror threat.

Nonetheless even with all this policing and denying of civil liberties I would not be surprised if a small group of "anarchists" do something bad that the media can focus on to demonise the growing protest movement and legitimise calls for further police powers.

The negative effects of the Royal Wedding don't just fall on the UK though, several nations within the Common still retain the Queen as their head of state including Canada and Australia. Australia, for the privilege of maintaining a hereditary dictator, albeit a relatively toothless one, as their head of state must trade away their right to free speech it appears. The awesome Chaser boys have been forbidden by the Royals to commentate on the royal wedding because

The broadcast agreement under which the ABC takes the wedding telecast forbids its use in "any drama, comedy, satirical or similar entertainment program or content."

Dissent isn't tolerated even if its on the other side of the world.

Twitter censoring wikileaks hash tag?

This was indirectly linked by Wikileaks on twitter but its worth repeating. Basically theres a fairly compelling argument that twitter, for political reasons, is not showing wikileaks as a trending topic.

Freedom of speech only matters if it is related to regimes that are the enemy of America, such as Iran, it would seem.

UK Police shut down prominent opponent.

Fit Watch used to provide criticism and oversight over FITs (Forward Intelligence Teams) essentially watching the watchers by taking photographs of the police taking photographs of people at protests and suchlike. So as is the way of things they were shut down. The police were able to do so without a court order or anything else.

Dissent and opposition to what the police wants is naughty so just don't do it ok?

German group points out website blocking is wholly ineffective.

When dealing with child porn at least which is the wedge strategy being used across the western world to make such censorship seem acceptable. The key point they make is so obvious as to be a "why didn't I think of that" moment. Simply put by blocking child porn sites the authorities are not dealing with them and shutting them down. In contrast simply contacting webhosts caused all the child porn sites they found to be shut down within hours.

The summary and report can be found here and is worth looking at. They destroy pretty much every excuse for site blocking that exists with short to the point arguments.


thanks jonny