Pie Palace

“Sitting in the dark,” is associated with poverty, losers, and psychopaths. Which is why I don’t get Earth Hour. In case you haven’t heard of it, the idea is that people should turn off their lights for one hour at 8:30 on March 27 to show that they support action on climate change. The “support action on climate change” part makes sense. I get that. I support that.

But I don’t get the “turn off their lights” part.

If we’re trying to convince Canada’s population that we should do something about climate change, we aren’t going to win any converts by telling them they have to reduce their quality of life. People associate lighting with being modern. In our society, you only sit in the dark if there’s something wrong with you. If we want to actually do something, we should try to show how easy it is to live green. We should point out that we waste a crap-load of energy on inefficiency. We should point out that our energy consumption has risen by 10% between 1990 and 2003¹, but our standard of living hasn’t changed (while our real incomes have fallen).

If I got to design a replacement for Earth Hour, it would go something like this: A bunch of my fellow hippies would gather on Parliament Hill on Saturday morning with batteries and generators. We’d build a stage, and invite a bunch of acts to come out an play. Come 8:30 we’d start the show. It would be powered by generators running on non-food sourced biomass (such as agricultural waste) and batteries charged from renewable sources. Everyone who could produce a valid bus transfer, or a piece of ID with an address within two kilometers of the event would get a free drink. Everyone who brought their own drink container would get $1 off booze ($2 if the container still had the skanky remains of their morning coffee). Anyone who drove would have to stare into Fat Cat’s unblinking eye for ten minutes.

And now for a numbers rant: the bizarre part about Earth Hour is that lighting really is the least of our problems. In 2003, Canada produced 10,477,207 terajoules (TJ) of energy from green house gas emitting sources. 15.3% of that was converted to electricity.² In 2003, we used 63,000 TJ of electricity for lighting. That’s 3.9% of our total green-house-gas emitting electricity use, or .6% of our total energy use.

1. According to public data, we consumed 7,539 kilograms of oil-equivalent fuel in 1990 and 8,278 in 2003. (back)
2. Calculated by adding together the GHG emitting sources and dividing by total: (134019+337441+1138645)/10477207. This clearly doesn’t cover non-GHG emitting energy sources such as hydro, nuclear, and renewable energy. Those sources do, indirectly, emit GHGs, of course, but that makes the calculation harder. (back)

To be “winning”, for once. I started refreshing the anti-prorogation Facebook group’s web page. Every few seconds, when I refresh, another few people have joined the group. It’s gone from less than twenty thousand when I saw it on Monday, to 98,840 now. Yeah, it’s just a Facebook group. But it feels nice to be part of something verging on a majority.

The Centretown News is running a story about a municipal party being assembled here in O-town. David Chernushenko is the only member of the coalition who is speaking publicly.

I’m glad to see that David is getting back into politics. Longtime PiePalace readers will remember that I volunteered with his various election campaigns when he was running for the Green Party in Ottawa-Centre. He reeks of credibility and honesty. He’s one of the few people I’ve met who should be in politics.

Having said that, I don’t want to see parties pushing into City Hall. Party politics acts to homogenize elected representatives. Party members must vote according to the party line, and private members’ bills rarely pass. At best, politicians must work within their parties to push ideas forward. At worst, parties are petty fiefdoms that only represent the views and priorities of a small elite.

I wish David the best of luck. He would be a welcome addition to City Council.

Today is the day that Ottawa city council votes on whether atheist bus ads should be allowed on OC Transpo’s property. For those who haven’t been following this tempest in a teapot, the ads feature the sacrelicious message “There probably is no god, so relax and enjoy life,” and the alleged controversy comes from OC Transpo staff disallowing the ads. Ironically, the religious leaders interviewed on CBC and in the Citizen don’t seem to care about the ads.

So why should they be allowed?

First, this is a freedom of speech issue. Bus ads promoting various philosophies have appeared on OC Transpo property for as long as I’ve been in Ottawa. In 2004 we had the Alpha Campaign, trying to convince wayward christians to return to the fold (while offering backhanded insults to athiests). More recently there have been ads for SupremeMaster.net, a weirdly amorphous (if seemingly harmless) eastern-inspired cryptoreligion. Our bus company must not be allowed to prevent specific philosophies from entering public discourse.¹

Second, the ads are not offensive. The ads have seemingly been disallowed because the statement “there probably is no god” is offensive to some group. We’re never told who that group is. Nor has anyone publicly grieved. It’s as if OC Transpo is holding a protest, but forgot to tell anyone to show up.

Third, the ads are affirming. Atheists don’t have much of a support group – we don’t have an annual athiest party; we don’t get together to talk about how important our values are; nor do we hijack political parties. As such, atheists don’t get to see each other very much. It’s pretty easy to feel like the only one of your kind. Add to that the overt religious references in our society², and it’s pretty easy to start feeling like you’re all alone. Just hearing about the atheist bus ads in London made me feel good – not because I really like the ads, but because I’m reminded that other people share my philosophy, and that I’m not alone.

Here’s hoping that City Council does the right thing.

1. Do you really want an organization that can’t manage to negotiate with its own employees to act as an arbiter on the marketplace of ideas? (back)
2. • semi-mandatory prayer in schools,
   • religion on TV,
   • pervading evangelical Christianity since 9/11,
   • occasional attempts at conversion
   (back)

Years ago, I contributed policy to the Green Party of Canada on media. In it, I stated (words to the effect of) “media is a business like no other, it has a responsibility to be profitable, but more importantly, it has the responsibility to hold our public offices to account.” The policy items were my rough attempt to discourage the rise of large media conglomerates, and to support regional media outlets.

Yesterday, one of CTV shut down evening newscasts in Ottawa, and did similar things in Barrie, London, and Victoria. In doing so, they have cost Ottawa yet another media outlet, and yet another avenue for paid journalists to keep our politicians, bureaucrats, and corporations honest. Coincidentally, kottke.org has linked to a story describing how the cuts to Baltimore’s daily newspaper has made the police force less accountable:

Half-truths, obfuscations and apparent deceit — these are the wages of a world in which newspapers, their staffs eviscerated, no longer battle at the frontiers of public information. And in a city where officials routinely plead with citizens to trust the police, where witnesses have for years been vulnerable to retaliatory violence, we now have a once-proud department’s officers hiding behind anonymity that is not only arguably illegal under existing public information laws, but hypocritical as well.

And this isn’t just an American problem. As the Dziekanski enquiry is proving, Canadian police reports can sometimes differ dramatically from reality. Without an engaged, and well funded press, there will be no one to hold these officers to account.

What solutions do we have? A CRTC-mandated carriage fee for cable broadcasters? Preferential tax treatment for smaller news organization? Increased funding to public broadcasters? There are solutions, but we, as an electorate have to wake up to the fact these cuts don’t just cost jobs, they are a danger to our public institutions.

Four hours, dear reader. Four hours. That’s how much time is devoted to policy discussion at the upcoming Green Party convention. Doesn’t seem worth the effort of dragging myself 1400(ish) kilometers to Pictou.

Sent to Paul Dewar, MP for Ottawa Centre.:

Dear Mr. Dewar,

As a constituent of your ward, I ask you to vote tonight to end the bus strike. It has cost my financially (over $400 in taxi fare and car rental), it has lowered my productivity (I now work 1-2 hours a day less, because I must car pool), and it has cost me emotionally (it is difficult to visit my elderly grandmother). As unpleasant as these problems are, I can afford to spend my way around them. I feel very, very sorry for those who can’t. This strike is hitting the least privileged in our society hardest.

The strike has an ongoing emotional and economic cost to Ottawa’s citizens. Please vote to end it.

e

As much as I support the union’s right to strike, and the members’ right to fair compensation, I have to say that this strike is hitting the city too hard. If the union wants to put pressure on the city, work to rule, park buses around city hall, stop collecting bus fair, just leave the poor out of it.

Alright, dear reader, I finally did it. I broke down and started reading Barack Obama’s “Dreams from My Father – A Story of Race and Inheritance”. I can sum the first five chapters up in a word: awesome. The introduction is kinda… well… not awesome, but hey, that’s fair. I didn’t buy the book to read the introduction.

In case anyone is reading along, I’ll break this into a chapter-by-chapter review.

Words Looked Up

Apocryphal (p. 8 ) – Not canonical. Hence: Of doubtful authority; equivocal; mythic; fictitious; spurious; false.
Divestment Campaign (p. 105) – Campaign to convince an institution to sell off investments in a given region or company (definition via wiseGeek. The divestment campaign that Obama refers to seems to be the divestment from South Africa campaign, that children of the 70s may be vaguely aware of.

Now lets get to the chapter-by-chapter goodness.

Preface to the 2004 Edition

Overall: This is the most boring piece of writing I’ve seen since I wrote my thesis. In this, Obama rambles on about his achievements, how “some friends persuaded me to run for office” (really? honestly? it was their idea? riiiiiiight)¹, blah, blah, blah. Although I commend Obama for not mentioning September 11 for a sum total of three pages. That must have been tough.

Moral: Skip the introduction to the introduction. There’s a stirring bit on page x (around paragraph 3, for the lazy). But really, the intro-to-the-intro is terrible.

Original Introduction

page xiv – Come on! Nobody should use an ellipsis in a published book. This is a bad sign.

page xvii – This feels like I’m reading Frodo’s diary at the start of Lord of the Rings. Obama says how little he’s done, that he hasn’t really been involved in the important bits of history, but he’s still written 400 pages about himself. He’s either being disingenuous, or I’m in for a long 400 pages.

Chapter 1 – 5

Forget the page-by-page thing.

The first five chapters cover Obama from age 0-18ish, and the family history of his mom’s side of the family. Now, I’d expect that to be boring, but it comes across like some kind of epic documentary about the USA from the Depression to the 80s. Not just any epic, a good epic, that hits all the right notes (American Gothic in the Depression, whites experiencing second-hand racism for befriending blacks in Texas, the idyllic land of Hawaii, the hopefulness of the 60s), and has a pretty impressive cast of characters.

The important bit isn’t the Boy’s Own Adventure in Indonesia (noseless beggars! pet crocodiles! mud surfing!), but Obama’s weird relationship with race. You see, he’s enrolled in a prestigious school in Hawaii, and he’s pretty much a social outcast because he’s black. As he grows up, gains a bit of freedom, and other black kids are enrolled in the school, he finds that he has a hard time identifying with them. Why? Because their thing is that they’re being oppressed by whitey. Meanwhile, Obama has a wonderfully supportive (white) mother, grandmother, and grandfather, and it’s hard to feel oppressed when you’re chief cheerleaders are supposed to be wearing the jackboots. So, not surprisingly, Obama doesn’t feel like he fits in: whites treat him differently, but he has a hard time relating to his black peers.

Just at the end of Chapter 5, Obama is rudely awakened out of existential angst. He goes through a laundry list of grandmothers (yes, it’s weird, but it works) – his white grandmother who has hit the glass ceiling at her job, and spent the past 20 years going nowhere; his Indonesian step-grandmother who was smacked down by the colonizing Dutch; his black paternal grandmother who would have spent her life as a maid, if she’d moved to the States. Obama realizes that his race doesn’t define his identity, instead he realizes that it’s just a starting point, and that he can choose his own destiny.

This is going to sound lame, but I am really, really enjoying this book. Obama’s one helluva writer, and, on top of that, it feels like he captures the spirit of the US between the Depression and the 80s. This project stopped feeling like homework around page 15.

PS: Barack Obama’s dad sounds like a bit of a dick.

PPS: The whole Spider-Man/Obama thing sucked.

1. Of course, I haven’t actually gotten to that bit in the book, so they may have actually done that. (back)

Update: I spent most of the week being sick as hell. This is delayed one week.

Like most of the world, I think Barack Obama is awesome (viz: this video). But I don’t know much about him. So I picked up his autobiography and I’m intending to read it in January. If you’re interested in reading Dreams from My Father: A Story of Race and Inheritance, here’s my blogging/reading schedule:

• January 11 – Introduction and Chapter 1 to 4.
  
• January 18 – Chapter 5 to 10.
  
• January 25 – Chapter 11 to 15.
  
• February 1 – Chapter 16 to, uh, the epilogue.

Which is a pretty easy schedule: a mere 110 pages a week. If you feel like it, grab a copy of the book and read along with me. If you don’t, just crib my comments and pretend you’ve read it yourself!

And Happy Festivus!

I’m an atheist¹ but I really do enjoy the Christmas season. It has everything I love: snow, time off, parties, a reason to see friends, and an excuse for binge drinking. Given the length of the Ontario winter, I’ve always thought that we should have Christmas sometime in late January, but I’m rarely consulted on these matters.

Here’s the first (and possibly last) Annual Pie Palace Gift List

Canadian Electorate

Over the past year, Canadians have stayed away from the polls in droves, and expressed consternation when opposition parties did their job and opposed poorly considered legislation.

• What they want: A Prime Minister like Barack Obama.
• What they deserve: A remedial civics lesson, explaining why voting is important, and the role of the opposition.
• What they will get: A Prime Minister like George Bush (namely Stephen Harper).

Iraqi Shoe Thrower

Muntadar al-Zaidi threw his shoes at George Bush, yelling “This is for the widows and orphans and all those killed in Iraq.” An event already immortalized across the intertubes by numerous animated gifs and at least one (crappy) flash game.

• What he wants: Stability in Iraq. (presumably)
• What he deserves: Stability in Iraq, and a new pair of shoes.
• What he will get: A long jail term, likely with abuse. (It looks like the abuse has already started)

Green Party Candidate Jen Hunter

Poor Jen. She ran as Green Party candidate in Ottawa-Centre during the 2008 federal election, getting 9.9% of the vote. If she’d gotten an extra 38 votes, she would have gotten 10%, and Elections Canada would have refunded 50% of her campaign expenses to the party.

• What she wants: A seat in Parliament.
• What she deserves: 39 more votes.
• What she will get: A new iPhone, and possibly a scarf.

OC Transpo’s Bus Drivers

Poor bus drivers. They just want their 7% raise over three years, and a contract that will allow them to set their own hours. Is that too much to ask?²

• What they want: A 7% raise, byzantine scheduling rules that favour drivers with seniority, and a pony for every driver.
• What they deserve: Better public relations.
• What they will get: Back to work legislation.

Stephan Harper

This year has been a bit of a roller coaster for the leader of Canada’s least disliked party. Breaking his own law and calling an election early, getting dissed by the Parliamentary auditor he appointed, almost losing the House when his poorly planned fiscal update backfired, and doing anything necessary to hold onto power.

• What he wants: A majority. And a pony.
• What he deserves: Visits from the Ghost of Christmas Past, the Ghost of Christmas Present, and the Ghost of Christmas Future.
• What he will get: A visit from the Ghost of Joe Clarke.

This post is a tardy addition to A&J’s Ottawa Blogger Virtual Christmas Party.

Image credit: AP and AbstractionReaction. Used without permission.

1. Agnostic, to be exact. But “agnostic” sound too noncommittal for my taste. It would probably be more accurate to say that I’m committedly unconvinced of the existence of any higher powers. (back)
2. I’m not sure how I feel about the strike. The union is doing a terrible job at getting their side of the story out. As a bus rider, I want the drivers to be treated fairly, and service to resume – but it’s hard to tell if the drivers’ demands are fair, when I can’t find out what they are. (back)