Who Will Replace Duckett

I won't miss Duckett as head of Alberta Health - the man guided AH down a path where it has gradually crumbled while he has built up the edifice of the "superboard" under Liepert's direction.

There's not much to miss about a man who has overseen the degeneration of Alberta Health into needing critical care.

Unfortunately, I don't think Stelmach and company are going to do anything much about it. Duckett was the obvious fall-guy in recent weeks, and the 'cookie incident' is little more than the pretext to terminate him.

With Dr. Sherman evicted from the PC caucus for blowing the whistle on the incompetent management in AH, and by inference in the Minister's office and the Premier's offices as well, Duckett ousted, I'm sure that "Steady Eddie" thinks he's got things settled down and can go back to dismantling Alberta Health in peace.

Albertans should take note that the instigators of the fiasco we face today haven't paid a price for what they've done. Liepert is still in cabinet, and in spite of cuts made a couple of years ago to supposedly focus resources in key areas, Alberta Health is still in a pretty nasty crisis state, with emergency room waiting times getting longer and longer; and it gets harder and harder to find a family doctor in Alberta.

As much as Duckett's departure won't be met with many tears, I don't expect to see any real improvements in the near future - not until we have a party in power that understands the value of investing in public health.

It's Called Shooting The Messenger

Not smart, Mr. Stelmach. This morning's lecture telling Albertans to "settle down" on the health care issues, followed by what you did to the messenger in your own caucus.

Dr. Sherman is not the problem - the problem exists right smack in the midst of the government you are responsible for, Mr. Stelmach.

Things weren't in great shape before Mr. Liepert became the minister responsible, but they have taken a distinct turn for the worse since he created his "superboard". Although Gene Zwozdesky is more moderate than Liepert, the fact is that things have continued to deteriorate.

In firing Dr. Sherman, you have shown Albertans that you are more willing to shoot the messenger than to take actual actions to resolve problems. Chastising Albertans for their very real concerns about access to health care tells us you are very, very out of touch with the lives of real Albertans.

Mr. Stelmach, you have neither the vision or wisdom of Peter Lougheed, nor do you possess the baffling charisma of Ralph Klein. How many votes have you just alienated?

Tim Bloedow On Transgender Day of Remembrance ... Wrong Yet Again

Over at "No Apologies", we find the erstwhile Tim Bloedow spouting off about the wrongness of yesterday's Transgender Day of Remembrance.

Given where the article was posted and the author, I didn't exactly have high expectations for either accuracy or reason - Bloedow still managed to come in below the already low bar of my expectations.

Maybe some of these adults are predatory beasts who want to groom and desensitize youth and children to be their victims. Perhaps they are simply fools. But what a tragedy that on any day, let alone Universal Children’s Day, another group of sex activists wants to celebrate their confusion and a perversion that many say is a threat to children.

I'm sure that the choice of November 20 was a deliberate snub to Children's Day, Tim. More likely, it happened to intersect with someone's calendar, and it's not like International Children's Day is exactly a top draw in everybody's consciousness - frankly this writer wasn't even aware of its existence.

As for confusion and perversion, we'll come back to giving those assumptions the walloping they so richly deserve in a few words...

In Canada this “transgender” movement is now being championed by a piece of federal legislation, Bill C-389, that would put protections against discrimination for “transgendered” people into the Canadian Human Rights Act and into the Criminal Code. Yet another example of normalizing, protecting and affirming something destructive and repugnant.

Really, Mr. Bloedow? Would you care to enumerate precisely how being transgender is destructive? Can you cite peer reviewed studies that actually substantiate those kinds of claims? Somehow I doubt it.

As for being 'repugnant', well, that's your own value judgment Tim - your welcome to it - it's all yours. But, being trans is a little like sex - if you don't like it, you don't have to partake.

Some men who feel that they are women want to be able to use female bathrooms, but women walk in and see a man in their bathroom and file complaints or call the police. They don’t know if the guy is a sick pervert who wants to rape them, or a harmless “transsexual.” Of much greater concern, then, is the prospect of people’s little girls facing such an experience in a public bathroom.

Let's get one thing clear, Mr. Bloedow, Bill C-389 doesn't change the rules where bathrooms are concerned. Transgender people have been using the bathroom appropriate to their presented gender for decades now. Guess what? Nothing bad has happened to others in the same bathroom - in fact I don't think there is a single documented case of a transwoman playing predator in the bathrooms anywhere. As I pointed out back here, the kinds of predators you are really worried about aren't transgender, nor do they typically dress up as their prey.

Ironically, most transwomen are quite unremarkable - and don't attract attention at all. Unfortunately, because of ignorant fearmongers like yourself Mr. Bloedow, it is those who are in the middle of their transitions who face the greatest dangers when using bathrooms outside of their residences.

Homosexualists and other sex activists play down these concerns despite the heavy preoccupation with sex that they demonstrate and the lack of restraint exemplified in the sex activist sub-culture with filthy websites and demands that prostitution be decriminalized and that public sex be tolerated. Who is going to trust the spokesmen for this Movement when it comes to the security of our children in public bathrooms?

Wow, let's try stringing together a raft of unrelated topics, shall we? First of all, Mr. Bloedow, if you want to play that little game, let's consider another facet of the world. Why should anyone take the guidance of so-called "Christian" religious leaders seriously on matters of sexual morality when churches have acted to conceal and protect the sexual predators who are in the clergy?

More seriously, you've got more lurid imaginings in your mind about other people's sexuality than the people you are condemning often do. Get your mind out of the gutter and out of other people's sex lives. Nobody's bothering you about yours - much less what they imagine of your sex life.

As indicated in my initial comments above, those who think they are “transgendered” are also tragic victims. They are not transgendered. They are confused. They are lost. They need the guidance and help from real men and real women. They need protection, including by the law, from those who would sexually, emotionally, psychologically and spiritually abuse them by affirming them in their confusion.

I don't normally use foul language on this blog, but I'm going to make an exception.

Fuck You, Tim Bloedow. You arrogant little ass.

That statement, all by itself, makes it abundantly clear that you are among the most ill-informed, ignorant human beings on the planet when it comes to the issues you are writing about. How dare you dismiss the lived experiences of so many human beings!

Contrary to your arrogant pronouncements, transsexuals are NOT in the least bit confused (nor are other transgender people). To put this in perspective, I refer you to the following words in the DSM IV:

Insistence by a person with Gender Identity Disorder that he or she is of the other sex is not considered a delusion, because what is invariably meant is that the person feels like a member of the other sex rather than truly believes that he or she is a member of the other sex.

Is that not clear enough for you? Or are you incapable of understanding that other people who have actually studied and tried to comprehend transgender/transsexual people have reasoned far beyond your pithy little sound-bite claims?

If there is anything abusive in this world, Mr. Bloedow, it is the constant need for transpeople to call your BS out for what the ill-informed, bigotry that it truly is. You might very well represent the best possible reason for Bill C-389 yet - aside from the physical abuse and murders that transsexuals face in their daily lives that inspired TDOR in the first place.

Dear Pope Ratzinger: WTF?

How utterly, ideologically blinded can you possibly be?

Pope Benedict XVI says in a new book that condoms can be justified for male prostitutes seeking to stop HIV, a stunning turnaround for a church that has long opposed condoms and a pontiff who has blamed them for making the AIDS crisis worse.

Okay ... that's sort of a step in the right direction - at least the Pope seems to be acknowledging that condoms do have an effect on the spread of HIV. However, to limit the use of condoms to male prostitutes is stunningly short sighted.

Condoms have the same effect for women, but it would seem that under this Pope, women are not considered important enough to protect from STIs. Does this man think that women do not get infected by STIs? Or is it just that fertilizing an egg is so much more important than the risk of a life-shortening disease like HIV/AIDS? Has he not clued in yet that the vast majority of Catholics in developed countries ignore him entirely on the subject of birth control? Not to mention the moral vacuity of his insistence that women must always take the risk of not just pregnancy but also of STIs? (I would argue that it is an immoral act to demand that someone take such risks without their full knowledge and consent regarding the consequences)

The double standards and misogyny that are so clearly embedded in this Pope's theology are disappointing to see in this day and age.

Transgender Day of Remembrance

Today is the 12th Transgender Day of Remembrance.

TDOR exists to remind us of the violence that so many transgender people face in their day to day lives - the price paid for being true to themselves in a world where being transgender is seen as threatening.

The TDOR 2010 update has revealed a total of 179 cases of reported killings of trans people from November 20th 2009 to November 19h 2010. The update shows reports of murdered or killed trans people in 19 countries in the last year, with the majority from Brazil (91), Guatemala (15), Mexico (14, and the USA (14).

Cases have been reported from all six major World regions: Africa, Asia, Central and South America, Europe, North America, and Oceania. As in the previous years, most reported cases were from Central and South America, which account for 80 % of the globally reported homicides of trans people since January 2008. In 2008, 97 killings were reported in 13 Central and South American countries, in 2009, 136 killings in 15 Central and South American Countries, and in 2010 so far 122 killings in 12 Central and South American Countries. The starkest increase in reports is also to be found in Central and South America, e.g. in Brazil (2008: 59, 2009: 68, January-November 2010: 74), Guatemala (2008: 1, 2009: 13, January-November 2010: 14) and Mexico (2008: 4, 2009: 11, January-November 2010: 12). The data also show an alarming increase in reported murders in Turkey in the previous years (2008: 2, 2009: 5, January to November 2010: 6).

... and people wonder why Bill C-389 is important?

Is violence and murder not reason enough?

When Will He Learn?

So ... it seems that Ezra Levant has lost yet another libel suit against him.

You would think that after so many libel suits where he has either lost outright, or settled out of court (e.g. the Ghitter case), he might have learned to express himself in more reasonable terms. Some people never do learn, though.

H/T: BigCityLib

Baying At The Moon

I see that Chuck McVety has opened his yap on Bill C-389.

“As adults, we can handle these things,” Mr. McVety said. “But my daughter turned 13 on Saturday, and I don’t want some guy showering beside her at the local swimming pool.”

The worst-case scenario, he said, would be if someone like convicted killer Russell Williams, who photographed himself dressing in women’s lingerie, could demand protection under human-rights legislation after being found in a gender-restricted space. “That would absolutely horrific.”

That was entirely predictable from the alarmists like McVety. First of all, I don't know of a single case where a violent rapist like Williams has been transgender - if someone would care to show me evidence of such a case, I'd like to see it. Williams was a violent murderer whose behaviour is closer to that of a rapist than it is to any transsexuals I have ever known.

As Bill Siksay points out, McVety is being a twit:

“I think this is Mr. McVety being his alarmist best, once again, when it comes to an issue of human rights, equal rights, for minorities in Canada,” he said. “There is nothing in this bill that will change our understanding of appropriate behaviour in public washrooms or in gendered spaces.”

Anyone who believes they have been a victim of voyeurism or inappropriate sexual contact in a public space can report the matter to the people who manage that space, or to the police, Mr. Siksay said.

Bingo. The fact is that transgender people who use a gender appropriate washroom aren't likely to do anything untoward. Like everyone else, transgender people use the washroom for basic bodily functions. You're more likely to find stray politicians soliciting in the men's room than a crossdressing predator in the ladies room.

Think about it for a minute - sexual predators are all about power and violence. Chances of such a person being willing to make themselves appear feminine in order to get to their prey is just about zero - that would make them their own prey, and the cognitive dissonance that would induce would be crushing to the very drive that makes them predators.