“#Keep talking about Beirut”: Thanks to Ms. Nadine Labaki & Ms. Cate Blanchett for urging us to keep demanding the truth!
Author: Bambi
Rebel News: “Dominion Voting shares office with far-left George Soros linked group”
Whether you are allergic to populist Mr. Trump or not, whether you like/dislike the unscrupulous Soros of our world or not, you may want to watch this video by Mr. Keean Bexte, journalist with Rebel News (story updated: https://www.rebelnews.com/dominion_voting_shares_office_with_far_left_george_soros_linked_group).
If this is not a coincidence, it is rather worrisome regardless of the elections outcomes in any democratic country, not just the USA, and at least according to Bambi’s non-expert citizen’s opinion.
To conclude this post on a lighter note, perhaps this or similar “companies” could become even richer by helping Lebanese politicians who enjoy recycling themselves endlessly since the end of civil war. Mind you, recycling is usually ecological (except in corrupt politics :)).
Dr. Mathieu Bock-Côté: Steven Guilbeault against freedom of expression? [Steven Guilbeault contre la liberté d’expression?]
Below is a quick translation of Dr. Mathieu Bock-Côté’s article published today in the Journal de Montréal:
https://www.journaldemontreal.com/2020/11/17/steven-guilbeault-contre-la-liberte-dexpression
“The freedom of expression feud made its way into “Tout le monde en parle” [it means Everybody’s Talking and it is a Radio-Canada TV show] Sunday night.
Asked to comment on the debate surrounding the censorship of La petite vie [a very funny and famous old TV show], Steven Guilbeault [[https://pm.gc.ca/en/cabinet/honourable-steven-guilbeault] went there with this startling statement: “Our right ends where someone else’s hurt begins.”
Injury
This statement is serious and I have to ask him a few questions to invite him to clarify his thinking. Otherwise we will have to find that he has just submitted to the “tyranny of the susceptible.”
Let’s start: if a man feels hurt by a critical speech about his religion, is he entitled to ask that the one holding him be silenced?
If he feels hurt by the use of a word in an academic context, can he demand the dismissal of a professor?
If he doesn’t like a show from 25 years ago, can he ask to be taken off the air?
Surprise question: if I feel hurt by the delusional discourse of the activists of the systemic racism lobby against the Québec people, am I entitled to ask them to finally stop? If not, am I to conclude that some communities have a greater right not to be harmed than others?
Communities
The issue of freedom of expression is not complicated. Apart from defamation and the call for violence, nothing should be prohibited [Bambi will allow herself to add here that she fully agrees. Indeed, if you wish, you can insult her small size, her ethnolinguistic background, her religion and the religion of all those she is related to and there are many of them!]. This does not prevent being polite and respecting the rules of decency. No one in Québec is claiming the right to insult blacks, for example.
But pronouncing the title of a book should never be considered indecent or an insult, no matter what the hypersensitive may say.
Stop pretending that the issue is elsewhere.
And no “community” should have the right to impose its definition of blasphemy on the whole of society” [Bambi agrees, contrary to Ms. Ségolène Royal’s words in France yesterday].
Should we cry or laugh to some ideas of our world?
This VERY short video produced by Dr. Gad Saad from Concordia University (Montreal, Québec) explains the story much better than Bambi would have done:
In all honesty, despite any good intention of the American politician in question and regardless of your own skin hue, does this idea make any sense to you?
If so, please write a comment on this blog for Bambi to explain your point of view ?.
Why are we calling for the politicization of medicine?
Medicine is all about serving ALL patients with dignity and compassion.
Why are we asking the American Medical Association to recognize Black Lives Matter (BLM)?
In Bambi’s non-expert citizen opinion, especially following her second life in a country torn by civil war, medicine should be free of ideologies, particularly the ones which are radical and into racialization!
Medicine should be above politics, period.
This is a danger game. This is a potentially racist game even.
For healthcare providers, ALL lives should matter, regardless of a so-called skin colour of a patient. This includes black lives as well as all lives.
What is kindness?
Ms. Roula Douglas is a Lebanese-Canadian journalist with l’Orient Le Jour, an author, a mentor (as a university professor and as a leader through the Global Thinkers Forum), a PhD candidate, a spouse, a mother, a daughter, a sister, and… simply a friend.
The Global Thinkers Forum (http://www.globalthinkersforum.org/) recently celebrated the World Kindness Day, which took place on November 13, 2020 (Bambi missed it. OUPS, she hopes she happened to be kind to her amazing spouse on that day ?!)
This organization published a report entitled “Leading with kindness in crisis and beyond“. It also highlighted the World Kindness Day by tweeting insights from interviews with leaders all over the world (based on that report).
Well, as a kind sister to Bambi, Ms. Roula Douglas accepted to share her insights about kindness with you through this blog. Merci Roula!
Before sharing her beautiful words, Bambi will remind us of two facts: First, Ms. Douglas knows the value of words well. She knows that words are acts. She is known for using the right word at the right time in her novels, articles, and social media. Second, if there is a country in the world who is suffering from multiple crises now, it is tiny Lebanon. Kindness takes all its meaning in times of survival and/or sorrow. Kindness is an act of of both love and respect. Kindness to each other. Kindness to oneself too. Kindness for the sake of kindness… just like love for the sake of love.
Without further due, here are Ms. Douglas’s own words, as taken from Page 41 of the report mentioned above:
“Kindness is wanting others to feel better about themselves, their day, life. It is treating them with compassion, warmth, understanding, and respect. For me, it is kindness that defines us as humans“, Roula A. Douglas, Journalist & Author, Lebanon.
Is there anything more moving than Tenor Amine Hachem’s voice singing “Li Beirut” (sub-titled in English)?
Bambi discovered Mr. Hachem’s voice on the radio she listens to whilst working (he sings in English and Italian too). She hopes you will enjoy this beautiful song as much as she did (minus the tears it brought to her eyes).
Toward the end of the song, you can see some old pictures of the charming Beirut.
Well, perhaps Bambi is homesick now (first forthcoming Christmas where she will not be “jumping” to Beirut to see her family)? This may explain why she saw two people in those pictures who made her think of her own parents in their younger years 🙂 (miss you mom and dad… Hope to see you and see everyone as soon as possible in 2021!).
To be serious now, this song of Feyruz, was composed during the ugliest days of the Lebanese civil war (1975-1990). Beirut was totally destroyed at the time.
It is sad yet cathartic to listen to that same old song in 2020, knowing that its meaning remains full for Beirutis.
Yes, it has been almost 100 days since that surrealistic explosion which destroyed Beirut to the extent of a15-year-stupid war… but in just 15 seconds.
Thank you Mr. Hachem et al. for this beautiful performance!
Isn’t it sad how our small town tolerates 400 demonstrators, many from outside, but not one local citizen who thinks differently?
Bambi would like to comment an article and a comment published by our Dear New Wark Times.
First, thank your Mr. Wark for reporting on how “Sackville Councillor raises questions about RCMP quarterly reports and opinion surveys“.
Second, Bambi is not surprised to read about the “general level of satisfaction with RCMP in New Brunswick” and thanks to this article for pointing for areas of improvement.
As far as Bambi is concerned, she is grateful to our police officers whose daily job consists of keeping us safe and sound.
Third, and this is what is the most shocking news to Bambi (again, thank you Mr. Wark for posting the comment). Yes, for a second, she thought she was perhaps in Iran, Saudi Arabia, or “Hezbollistan” when she read the following comment by someone she suspects she knows the identity of (although she has never met her in real life yet, she was delighted when she kindly commented on her blog in the past, thank you):
“A few times hysterical people online have had the RCMP ‘sent’ to my house to speak to me…. I have nothing bad to say about the local police. They are polite and courteous to me.. that’s more than I can say for a lot of badly behaved members of the overpaid chattering class around here… and no I don’t make a habit of phoning the police because of my hurt feelings.” (comment on the Warktimes by Kata List Productions).
Can you imagine? Sending the police to someone’s house because of her different opinions that she expresses online?!
What world our we living in?
Is this the Canada we want?
Bambi is sorry to learn what Kata List Productions had to go through :(.
Instead of challenging our own opinions with new perspectives.
We could have easily told ourselves: We do not agree with her.
We can even decide not read her comments or blogs.
We may even disagree and keep reading, even if we do not agree.
We may even learn that she is right on some issues, even if they are to the right.
Just to give an example not related to right or left, Bambi saw once a video posted by Kata List Productions that she had all the reasons of the world to consider shocking at the time.
It was about the Beirut surrealistic explosion of August 4th, 2020. As a reminder, 6000+ persons were injured, 200+ lost their lives, over 300,000 houses damaged, etc. Her own niece, brother-in-law, and childhood friend were injured (the latter cannot take the stairs yet). Her parents’ apartment was destroyed and dad’s shop also badly damaged.
Yet, the video tried to argue that the BBC images from Beirut hospitals were fake and the whole story did not exist (conspiracy of some sort that did not make any sense given the shocking reality in Beirut).
Anyhow, Bambi watched that video just for fun and told herself: Well that person talking in it should perhaps chat with Rania (Bambi’s sister) who visited three hospitals to find her badly injured spouse (whilst her daughter was being taken to yet another hospital by a stranger).
She looked into the faces of surely over 1500 injured citizens at one single hospital— bloody faces— to try to recognize her husband.
So, yes, those images that toured the world were real, even if they appeared surreal.
All this to say, so what?
People are free to think what they want about whatever topic they wish. They are free to believe stories or not.
Whom are we to judge that we are the only ones to hold the truth to the point of sending RCMP to people’s private homes?
Perhaps Kata List Productions fully endorses that video. Perhaps not. Whatever. Bambi did not mind (her feelings were not hurt!).
To conclude this post on a lighter note, Bambi did not have a visit of the RCMP… yet ?, but she agrees: they are “polite and courteous“!
Mr. Nasrallah jubilates over “Trump’s humiliating downfall”. What does he have to say about his own country’s tragic downfall?
First, we learned yesterday that Mr. Nasrallah, the head of the Hezbollah was so happy over “Trump’s humiliating downfall“, to use his own words (OK, this even if almost half of the American population voted for Mr. Trump :)):
https://www.reuters.com/article/usa-election-lebanon-hezbollah-int-idUSKBN27R2UT
Many people, in the USA and around the world, were happy like Mr. Nasrallah. They were genuinely fed-up of Mr. Trump’s politics or pathetic personality traits.
Unlike Mr. Nasrallah though, they do not military control their country or its fate of war and peace.
Unlike him, they do not constitute a state within a state (the latter is is in a free fall now). They do not suffer from American sanctions whilst keeping to serve the interests of another country.
In other terms, they put their own state first.
Bambi wonders what Mr. Nasrallah thinks of the 80% devaluation of the Lebanese currency?
What does he think about the exodus of Lebanon’s brains?
What does he think about the Beirut port explosion that destroyed half, if not more, of his city?
As per the Reuters article below, “Hundreds of disillusioned doctors leave Lebanon, in blow to healthcare“. We can read the story of a few of them, including a pathologist returning to the United States with his family.
As the article describes, this is huge loss to teaching hospitals, as these physicians teach at Lebanese universities in addition to practising medicine:
When will Mr. Nasrallah stop playing with or talking the language of war?
When will he put his own country first, before serving Iran?
When will he show consideration toward his fellow citizens who are deprived of everything (i.e., lives, a government, access to their savings, housing especially post-surrealistic explosions, power, other governmental services like effective garbage processing, medication, decent healthcare, quality of life)?
When will he have enough humility to look in the mirror to see his own reflection, before judging the image of other politicians in other foreign countries?
Mind you, not any country.
A country he regularly calls for its death, like the Iranian regime chants (“death to America“).
Why can’t he turn this chant into “life to Lebanon” instead?!
Contrary to the USA which sees one administration leaving and another one replacing it (the beauty of democracy, even when imperfect!), the tragedy of Lebanon is the following:
Unlike Mr. Trump, Mr. Nasrallah is not potentially changeable after four years.
Unless the Iranian regime changes, he seems to be there forever (there was a reason why the US has been aggressive toward Iran and his group/allies).
In other terms, even if this man retires (from terror, politics, or… life) today, other mini future Hezbollah leading clones will fast replace Mr. Nasrallah.
This is the toxic ideology and reality behind Mr. Nasrallah’s group.
Lebanon deserves much better than this warrior mindset… and hegemony.
Lebanon deserves dignity, democracy, prosperity, and peace.
November 11: Thank you…
Citizens criticize our town (Sackville, New Brunswick) for many good reasons. However, today, Bambi would like to pause and thank the Town of Sackville for having remembered to honour our veterans with beautiful banners on the streets (many weeks ahead of November 11)!
In our current sad times where we seem to constantly put down our history, heritage, and values, such a gesture of thank you to our veterans is even more appreciated.
To conclude this post, below you can find: (1). A picture of a painting Bambi took last year in nearby Amherst, Nova Scotia (taken from last year’s post). It moves her heart every time she drives by it; and (2) an older post about Remembrance Day in Sackville from last year (2019… yes, pre-pandemic times).
