Stephen Roney's Blog, page 183

Written from the Unceded Traditional Territories of the Bourbons

 

Attended a Zoom seminar today in which each speaker began by “acknowledging that they were on the unceded traditional territories of the X.” Fill in the blank with the fashionable modern term for this or that Indian cultural group.

I presume they all meant well, none of them being themselves visibly aboriginal, but this is a dangerous precedent.

First of all, in most parts of Canada, in Ontario and the Prairies, the “First Nations” have in fact ceded all claim to the land. Where it has not been ceded by treaty, a series of different tribal groups must always be mentioned—because all of them lived in the general vicinity, within perhaps a few hundred kilometers or so, and none of them had uncontested ownership. Almost every area native groups passed through was a “no-man’s-land,” in permanent territorial dispute. And the list of tribes who hunted through the area is necessarily incomplete. We only know who has been passing through since the first European settlement.

Which almost necessarily means that no such group can establish a claim to possession prior to that of the first Europeans.

The concept of native land ownership violates, in any case, the concept of property rights. God made the land; accordingly, it belongs to no one person more than any other. It is there for al las needed, like the air or the water. An individual properly owns only the effort, the labour, he or she has put into the land. If it is inseparable from the land itself, this establishes a claim on the land. This is why we have “squatter’s rights”: if you do not use it, someone else has the right to.

This doctrine then applies to all the land in Canada, beyond those smaller parcels near villages where Indians might have practiced agriculture—roughly what are now their reserves. By common law, they never had ownership. “Aboriginal rights” have been invented as a convenient legal fiction to draw Indians into the social contract—to ensure their acceptance of Canadian sovereignty.

The silliest was someone in Montreal saying they were on the unceded territory of the Mohawks. The Mohawks who live near Montreal today came from Upstate New York to learn of Christianity from the French. They never even claimed the territory around Montreal. The French are actually historically more indigenous than any other existing group to the lands stretching from the Saguenay down to Windsor—where the majority of the Canadian population resides. The Iroquois wiped out all the other groups within recorded history. So why are the French not mentioned as having local “traditional territories”? Why not the Spanish, who claimed these lands under the Treaty of Tordesillas? Unlike the various Indian groups, Spain has never renounced this claim. The Treaty of Tordesillas has never been abrogated, and it has been cited in the 20th century by Chile, Indonesia, and Argentina to justify their own land claims.

But the real problem with all this is that it implies that there are at least two distinct classes of Canadians, with different rights. This is incompatible with the doctrine of human equality and human rights on which Canada is predicated. If special rights to aboriginals, why not to, say, those of French or English ancestry, or of European ancestry? The logic is the same: their ancestors were here first. In fact, this notion of prior creation or prior residence is exactly the doctrine on which ruling classes have been established in other nations in the past.

The concept of aboriginal land rights is the concept of a landed aristocracy. It is what most of our ancestors came to Canada to escape.

'Od's Blog: Catholic comments on the passing parade.

Who Follows America?

 

It is my impression that America is going down the tubes. She may have more vitality in her, but she is looking increasingly decadent. Abortion and the death of the family look like civilization-killers. Who might replace her as civilization’s vanguard?

Not Europe; Western Europe is further down the road to decay than America is. Perhaps Central and Eastern Europe; but they are fastened to a dying animal.

East Asia without China seems to lack the heft. Japan seems to have lost its energy. And I expect China, given its present regime, to collapse before the US does.

India looks like a candidate. But I wonder if Hinduism can offer sufficient moral direction and backbone. It seems a bit of a morass. 

I have hopes for CANZUK; but at this point, it would require a cultural U-turn of the four countries; some kind of cultural renaissance. I would not realistically expect it anywhere else; I should not expect it here, simply because I want it to happen. Seems like wishful thinking. Also, in population terms, CANZUK is still a lightweight.

Here’s another thought. 

Historically, when an empire declines and falls, the new power seems to emerge from just outside its zone of influence—from the barbarian fringe. Here it is able to develop independent systems, immune to the collapse, while soaking up what was best from the former power. So America replaced England. So Macedonia replaced the Greek city states, so Rome replaced Macedonia, so Manchuria conquered China, so the Arabs took Persia, and the Turks Byzantium.

On that principle, perhaps we should expect great things from Latin America. It seems the one part of the world that most closely fits that historical bill: just outside America’s zone of control. In principle, it shares the US’s commitment to liberal democracy and human equality. It shares America’s and Europe’s Judeo-Christian moral traditions. So taking over the reins would not be a cultural stretch. It has the necessary demographic strength. It has been held back until now by corruption and bad governments, but that seems to be improving. Such corruption and misgovernment cannot be inevitably embedded in the culture, since parent Spain has gotten past it. As has Romance and Catholic France. And both Spain and France have previously shown the strength to dominate the world.

'Od's Blog: Catholic comments on the passing parade.

Look! Up in the Sky!

 

Jupiter

He took a little child, and set him in the midst of them. Taking him in his arms, he said to them, "Whoever receives one such little child in my name, receives me, and whoever receives me, doesn't receive me, but him who sent me." ( -- Mark 9: 36-7) 

Friend Xerxes has mocked the proponents of Intelligent Design for believing in “an invisible God up in the sky.” 

Only atheists believe in this God.

The Christian God is not in the sky, but in the Kingdom of Heaven. Where is the Kingdom of Heaven? “Within you,” or “Among you.” At the end of time, it will appear as a city, New Jerusalem. He is not invisible; he is incarnate as Jesus. Even in the Old Testament, he appeared as a burning bush, a pillar of smoke, a pillar of fire, a hand. Moses was not permitted to see his face. In the New Testament, he appears as a dove. Jesus says in the gospel reading, he appears to us at all times: as children, as the poor and those in need. As the shekhinah, he is apparent in all things.

'Od's Blog: Catholic comments on the passing parade.

Hearing Voices and Casting out Demons

 

John said to him, "Teacher, we saw someone who doesn't follow us casting out demons in your name; and we forbade him, because he doesn't follow us." 39 But Jesus said, "Don't forbid him, for there is no one who will do a mighty work in my name, and be able quickly to speak evil of me. 40 For whoever is not against us is on our side.

 Mark 9: 38-40

This first part of today’s mass reading suggests that anyone is capable of casting out demons and qualified to exorcise—even a non-Christian—so long as it is done in the name of Christ.

This does not seem to be the common understanding in the Catholic Church. A formal Catholic exorcism requires special permission from a bishop, is done only by a designated exorcist in each diocese, and often requires a lengthy bureaucratic process designed to find some reason not to do it. By canon law, the Church will not sanction an exorcism until and unless something uncanny happens, that seems to rule out any physical cause.

This is not logical. Demons are intelligent beings. Why would a demon make their presence obvious in order to get exorcised?

One suspects the Church is primarily concerned here with bad publicity—about being accused of being “unscientific.”

Yet from the point of view of someone hearing demonic voices, it makes much sense to try being exorcised. At worst, it will not work; but, unlike the various psychiatric treatments, exorcism is entirely non-invasive and has no side-effects. And it does not require avoiding any other treatment.

The good news is that we need not rely on the Church for exorcism. The Bible itself says that anyone can exorcise. All that is strictly necessary is to call upon the name of Jesus Christ. 

Origen writes:

For it is not by incantations that Christians seem to prevail (over evil spirits), but by the name of Jesus, accompanied by the announcement of the narratives which relate to him; for the repetition of these has frequently been the means of driving demons out of men, especially when those who repeated them did so in a sound and genuinely believing spirit. Such power, indeed, does the name of Jesus possess over evil spirits, that there have been instances where it was effectual, when it was pronounced even by bad men…

'Od's Blog: Catholic comments on the passing parade.

Mensa Poetry Prize

 

Delighted to announce that my poem "On the Night We Held the Moon for Ransom" has been unanimously selected as the winner of this year's Mensa International Poetry Competition.

'Od's Blog: Catholic comments on the passing parade.

Kovrig and Spavor Leave a Chinese Box

 

Canadians Michael Kovrig and Michael Spavor have been released from Chinese imprisonment, and are home.

Something is happening with China.

After denying the Kovrig and Spavor cases had anything to do with the Meng Wanzhou case, but were following Chinese due process, the CCP released them and put on a plane to Canada the very hour Meng was put on a plane back to China.

At her release, Meng Wangzhou admitted guilt and praised the Canadian justice system in a public statement at her release.

Both these facts are remarkable. They constitute a significant loss of face for China. China is admitting guilt, and praising Canada. Face is of paramount importance in China. 

In other, possibly related recent news:

Australia, the UK, and the US announced a new defense pact, including deadly new weaponry for Australia.

China started auctioning off its oil reserves. They announced this publicly.

Chinese real estate giant Evergrande is close to default.

Oil reserves are held in case of war. China has little domestic production, and its oil supply lines are highly vulnerable. If it is indeed selling off its oil reserves, it is telegraphing the fact that it has no intent to invade Taiwan, as it has been threatening. It might just be saying so, in order to lull everyone into lowering their defenses. But if so, this in itself is a reversal of China’s recent policy, which was to rattle every possible sabre.

The US may be winning the Cold War with China the same way it was won with the Soviet Union. China may have realized that they have now provoked an arms race; and the US has more resources, and is going to bankrupt them if they continue. Accordingly, they are swiftly pulling horns in. They may specifically fear Canada joining the AUKUS pact, as many Canadians have been lobbying for. 

But the key may also be the impending collapse of Evergrande. China may be in dire economic trouble. I think it was rattling sabres in the first place to distract its population from the economic problems they saw coming; and perhaps too, they hoped to keep things going by grabbing Hong Kong, then Taiwanese, assets. 

The CCP now calculates that they need to bail out Evergrande or face a likely general collapse of the Chinese economy. Leading to public unrest that could end in revolution. The Chinese have everything invested in real estate. And perhaps they really do not have the money or assets to do this.

As a result, they may actually need the money from the oil. At the same time, a flood of cheap oil may help the economy in the short term to counter collapse.

At the same time, they cannot afford to provoke any economic or investment boycotts by other countries. The sabres must be put away.

The suddenness of these events, along with recent domestic crackdowns like the banning of foreign tutoring, video gaming, and boy bands makes them look desperate.

'Od's Blog: Catholic comments on the passing parade.

And a Child Shall Lead Them

 

The Emperor's New Clothes

They came to Capernaum and, once inside the house, 

he began to ask them,

“What were you arguing about on the way?” 

But they remained silent.

They had been discussing among themselves on the way

who was the greatest. 

Then he sat down, called the Twelve, and said to them,

“If anyone wishes to be first,

he shall be the last of all and the servant of all.” 

Taking a child, he placed it in their midst,

and putting his arms around it, he said to them,

“Whoever receives one child such as this in my name, receives me;

and whoever receives me,

receives not me but the One who sent me.”—Mark 9: 30-37

The gospel reading at last Sunday’s mass sounds like an endorsement of the Romantic notion that childhood is a state of blessedness to which we must aspire.

Matthew 18:1-5 is similar:

At that time the disciples came to Jesus and asked, “Who, then, is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven?”

He called a little child to him, and placed the child among them. And he said: “Truly I tell you, unless you change and become like little children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven. Therefore, whoever takes the lowly position of this child is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven. And whoever welcomes one such child in my name welcomes me.

Yet if the ideal is to be a little child, there is no reason for this life, with its sufferings, or for creation. God could have had us all born into heaven.

Everyone who has had children, or who has been one, knows that children are not moral paragons. They can lie; they can be greedy; they can be cruel to small animals.

But, as Father Flanagan, the founder of Boys’ Town, observed, "no boy ever wants to be bad.” Children can do bad things. However, no child has yet become vicious. They have not committed themselves to any vice; they are too young to have formed such a habit. To entertain and sustain a vice is, over time, to turn away from virtue in principle. That is how the sheep becomes a goat. That is when denial begins, and we turn away from truth itself.

Which is to say, we turn away from God.

We turn away from God, towards what? Towards self—that is, to satisfying our selfish urges. In this sense, we become big—our selves become big. To reverse this is to become again small, like children.

'Od's Blog: Catholic comments on the passing parade.

Off the Deep End

 

Despite some improper attempts to shout down Trudeau at campaign stops, and even a little gravel throwing, I was mildly pleasantly surprised by the relative lack of acrimony in the recent Canadian election, at least compared to recent elections in the US and UK.

But now Maclean’s has sullied its reputation by publishing a late hit piece on the People’s Party of Canada: “The PPC got more than 800,000 votes, and that should worry all of us.”

I’m not sure it should worry the people who voted for the People’s Party, should it? I guess, chillingly, the 800,000 fellow Canadians who voted PPC are now not part of “us.”

Author Pam Palmater refers to the PPC as a “threat to public safety.” This promotes hatred towards a group of fellow citizens.

It would be different if the PPC advocated violence, like Antifa or Black Lives Matter. But the PPC is a political party. As leader Maxime Bernier said when he was arrested in Manitoba, “my only weapons are my words.”

Palmater refers to the PPC as “far right” and “populist,” and is alarmed at how quickly it is growing. 

These concerns are contradictory. If it is indeed growing quickly, it is no longer “far right.” Being “extreme” does not make you wrong; that is the ad populum fallacy. Gandhi, Mandela, Einstein, Socrates, or Jesus were extreme in their milieu. But beyond that, there is no absolute standard of “right” and “left”: positions considered right wing in Canada would be left wing in the US. The standard is how distant a party or faction’s views are from the majority opinion. Since the PPC garnered a larger share of the popular vote than the Greens, you cannot call them far right unless you also refer to the Greens as far left. Nobody does.  It sounds foolish.

In fact, when polled on the issues, the average Canadian’s political views are usually closer to the PPC’s than the other political parties: on immigration, for example. Palmater admits this by calling them “populist.” You cannot be both populist and far right.

Every political party in a democracy of course claims to be populist, to be for the common people. By declaring the PPC populist, Palmater is saying she believes the rest are lying, and is, further, endorsing their right to lie to the public. Of course they do not have the public’s interests at heart. That’s for suckers.

Palmater goes on to lie about the PPC in detail. She says it “includes those who were rejected by the Conservative party,” and cites Derek Sloan—who is not a member of the PPC. She says it harbours those who have “gained some degree of notoriety from racist rhetoric,” and cites Bill Capes. Capes had put up some jokes on his Twitter feed a few years ago that, while they sound merely good-natured, could have offended. He has apologized. Demonstrably, he had gained no notoriety for the tweets―or they would have been turned up in the PPC’s vetting process. 

Palmater point out with concern that hate crimes grew in Canada last year. This is no doubt meant to imply that the PPC has something to do with this. Why is the PPC any more responsible than the Anti-Defamation League? It is the left that is fomenting race hatred in Canada.

Palmater claims that “Canada produces more far-right [sic] online content per web user than any other country.” If true, that shows the need for the PPC: it has a legitimate constituency in Canada, that is otherwise not being represented electorally. Besides having the right to be represented, it is dangerous to the public peace to suppress the views and voice of one’s fellow citizens. Yet that is exactly what Palmater demands.

Palmater cites examples of the PPC’s intolerable far right views: the PPC “promises to maximize freedom of expression …; cut funding to universities if they silence those espousing hateful [i.e. dissident] views; cut funding for CBC; cut funding for foreign aide [sic]; and lower the number of immigrants and stop the flow of refugees into Canada.”

In other words, Palmater is opposed to freedom of speech, wants government control of the media, and wants unrestricted immigration into Canada.

I can see legitimate reasons why many of her fellow citizens might disagree. There is a reason why freedom of speech is guaranteed in our constitution, and in the UN’s Universal Declaration of Human Rights. There is a reason why nations have borders. And the PPC nowhere calls for an end to accepting refugees; Palmater only imagines this, or lies.

No doubt aware of how reasonable the PPC platform might sound, Palmater explains that “beneath the surface of these promises are deeply embedded racist views against non-white people.” In other words, she can read minds, and wants to root out and prosecute thought crimes.

She does cite “their plan to repeal multiculturalism laws and cut funding for multiculturalism with a view to forcing integration into Canadian society and culture.” This is “racist” only if you think culture is racially determined and those of other races cannot be expected ever to integrate. That is a profoundly racist claim, although an increasingly common one on the left. No doubt they must be kept in ghettos, and not allowed to vote.

She concludes by warning against “Proud Boys and other white supremacist groups.” This would be more compelling if the Proud Boys were white supremacists, and if they had anything to do with the PPC. 

Not to put too fine a point on it, Palmater and Maclean’s are dangerously insane. There’s a lot of that going around.

'Od's Blog: Catholic comments on the passing parade.

Why Has Nobody Noticed How Disastrously Trudeau Has Handled Canadian Foreign Relations?

 

'Od's Blog: Catholic comments on the passing parade.

The Morning After

 

The results are in for the Canadian federal election, and nothing has changed. Nobody won. There is something profound and existential in that. Canada is the land where nothing changes, and nobody wins.

I hear speculation about this or that party leader losing their job. I doubt that. 

Justin Trudeau is not going to lose his job, because he is still prime minister, and he bought that party back from the dead in 2015, after a string of unsuccessful leaders. The Liberal Party is now “Team Trudeau”; they are entirely invested in him. 

Some say Erin O’Toole should lose his job, because he got a result no better than Andrew Scheer in 2019, and Scheer lost his job. But if changing the leader did not lead to a better result, why do it again? It makes more sense to try something new—like giving the guy a second chance, and Canadians time to get to know him. Last Tory leadership contest, nobody much seemed to want the job; most of the obvious candidates declined to run. So I doubt there is a lot of pressure from possible rivals to dump him.

Jagmeet Singh is not going to lose his job—the NDP is happiest when they are losing, and they tend to stick with leaders so long as they do not threaten, like Tom Mulcair, to win an election. That would be selling out.

Yves-Francois Blanchet surely does not deserve to lose his job. Like Trudeau, he pulled his party back from the brink a few years ago. It is now very much his party. And politicians with his talent are not easy to find.

Maxime Bernier is not going to lose his job, because he is better known and more popular than his party. Without him, it does not exist.

Annamie Paul will probably lose her job, but she was going to lose her job before the election was called. She has even suggested she does not want the job. 

So there is unlikely to be any political excitement as a result of this election either. The Green Party will choose a new leader, and at 3% and falling, nobody will care.

Canadian politics looks like it is in a deadlock. This has happened before. I’m an old fart; the last time I remember a mood like this was in 1963-67, when it seemed as though the Pearson Liberals and the Diefenbaker Conservatives could not get beyond exchanging minorities. That logjam was broken by the emergence from the wings of the exciting new figure of Trudeau.

But the Tories have already tried a leadership change, and the Liberals have already used up the “exciting new figure of Trudeau” gambit. This time, the one possible source of a reshuffle and new deal is Bernier and the PPC. They are offering something new. While they elected nobody, they expanded their support exponentially. 

Next time, with nothing changing elsewhere, and everyone that much more frustrated with the status quo, they may become the most important factor.

'Od's Blog: Catholic comments on the passing parade.