Why is she using these buzz words, regardless of her plan or response to the request for a public inquiry?
Why is she doing this to her province and country?
Why can’t she have her own mind and not repeat the latest slogans of our world?
By the way, why is she minimizing cancer as as potentially fatal chronic health condition?
As a proud New Brunswicker and as an old immigrant of 30-years who lived in three different Canadian provinces, her choice of words is a turn off for Bambi and it will be to many of the potential newcomers to our beautiful province.
People from birth countries filled with deadly or silly ideologies are allergic to the “systemic” collective stupidity of our times.
MANY of them, traditionally Liberal voters, moved from those parties that endorse political correctness to that extent. They just want to preserve both their sanity and their beautiful new country.
They want to work hard and earn a living.
They want to be/remain as free as possible.
They do not want to be at the mercy of the control of systemic silly ideologies.
Yes, racism exists and it will always exist. Yes, we need to address and prevent it.
However, to tell Bambi that all our systems are “ingrained” with “systemic racism“, she does not buy it, sorry.
She has been involved in several of our systems and she has not observed any cancer (only the cancer of political correctness or collective insanity of our times).
Today, Mr. Trudeau warned us about the high numbers of coronavirus cases. He even wisely psychologically prepared us a while ago for the necessity to cancel our large Chritsmas gatherings.
Why don’t we listen to him and to Dr. Tam? And to our local Premiers and their experts? Why don’t we listen to the increasing statistics here and there… and everywhere?
First of all, it would be wise not to resort to demonstrations and to sit-ins, especially in hot spots, regardless of the noble cause of the time.
Second, in this particular story unfolding in Ottawa, the demonstration in question is against the so-called “systemic” racism.
Without knowing all the details of this story, and again regardless of the good intentions of our youth wanting a better just world, Bambi feels like commenting on two particular points:
ONE: The following sentence by the demonstrators: ” The Crown’s cowardly decision not to appeal officially sanctions police violence and white supremacy against Black, Indigenous and People of Colour and people with disabilities in Ottawa.”
Isn’t this sentence perhaps a stereotype of its own? Please take the time to read it twice, as Bambi did. In all honesty, does it make sense to you?
Why are we once again emptying words from their sense and amalgamating all these beautiful folks together? Is this sentence a sort of a victimhood contest? Or jointly, the victimhood status is even holier… or the police is nastier? Bambi is asking, even if she is supposed to be included in the sentence, as a “deer of colour” .
SECOND: Bambi is concerned by the demands of the demonstrators because, in the longer term, it could result in an outcome comparable to one of Lebanon’s serious security problems: The existence of pockets of “no-law” zones where the Lebanese police and army are afraid to enter. When they do so, blood is shed.
Is this what these demonstrators want for their capital/country?
Taken from the CBC article above.
Specifically, in Bambi’s non-expert citizen opinion, demand # 1 combined to demand # 2 are not only unrealistic. Taken together, they are a formula for a national disaster.
No citizen with common sense likes to see the police slipping up or abusing it power. We all benefit from a well-reformed police service. We all win when there is harmony between the police and the public.
This being said, let’s not fool ourselves, our society is safer when it has police services.
This is why Bambi prefers our legitimate, far from perfect, police services to any other alternative(s) because its mission is to keep us safe. She is saying so based on a 17-year second life in tiny Lebanon out of which 15 years of her childhood and teenage years where spent in an ugly civil war.
In Bambi personal, non-expert citizen’s opinion, our PM did not set the wisest example to young Ottawa (and Canadian) citizens when he took the knee with the crowd. Ironically, in his picture that toured the world, one could see that he was being protected by police officers :)). Yet, despite the faux-pas, Bambi hopes to see Mr. Trudeau using both wisdom and compassion (i.e., as a father and former teacher) to help the demonstrators come to their senses?
To conclude this post, yes it is possible to demand improved police forces, but without throwing the baby with the bathwater!
The article begins with the following tweet from the organization in question (since then, it has been deleted under pressure of the remaining Québeckers with common sense).
The tweet above means the following: “There are many things that you can do as a young white, to recognize your privilege and fight against racism as a ally to racialized persons in Canada. Learn more about this”.
In that same tweet, under the girl’s picture, the words read as follows: “Being white, what should I know about white privilege? – jeunessejecoute.ca
Under this weird tweet, Dr. Bock Côté’s original French article includes a sentence that reads as follows: “Kids Help Phone uses the plight of teenagers to force an anti-white discourse.”
Like the author, Bambi finds this tweet not only racist and disgusting, but also incredibly sad. What ideologies are we brainwashing our young kids with? Who is funding this? Or no need for funding anymore, the brainwashing is too deep?
This being said (Bambi could not help it!), let’s go back to Dr. Bock-Côté’s article….
“The story begins on Twitter. I was snooping around on Tuesday when I came across a tweet from Kids Help Phone, the pan-Canadian organization that claims to offer a listening ear to anxious and distressed youth. It’s a noble mission, of course.
But Kids Help Phone took advantage of this tweet to push young “whites” to acknowledge their “white privilege” in a guilt-ridden fashion. The tweet led to the organization’s website, where there was a page featuring racialist slogans that recast anti-racism on white hatred, in addition to making the latter the highest form of love of humanity. Being white is wrong, it’s dirty. Do you get it?” [In Bambi’s mind, all this is meant to divide the American society further, likely to weaken it and even create a strife… a bit like the sad story of Lebanon during its ugly civil war. Americans must be smart enough to be lucid. Only lucidity can help counter evil forces].
“Shabby
I am rarely surprised by this kind of news. For a long time, I have studied the question of multiculturalism and political correctness in all their dimensions, and I see coming what we modestly call their excesses. But this time, I confess my surprise. I had never imagined that an organization meant to serve young people in distress without embarrassment would instrumentalize their woes in the most abject manner. I was disgusted. Taking advantage of a teenager’s distress to force him/her to swallow the woke potion and the political correctness is lousy.
I imagine the scene. A young man phones Kids Help Phone. He confesses his pain of living to the telephone operator, who stops him. – Are you white? – Yes. – You must recognize your white privilege! Just by the colour of your skin, you participate in systemic racism. Repent, become an ally of minorities! – Uh, but I’m really not well, I’m calling you because … – Shut up ! When you’re white, you shut up, if not you talk just to criticize yourself. Then the youngster hangs up.
On social media, the reaction was fierce to the point where Kids Help Phone deleted its tweet and removed the “white privilege” page from its site. Simple common sense? I’d rather bet on the fear or funk. Of course, I archived everything in screenshots. Above all, do not claim victory too quickly. Because many discovered at the same time that Télé-Québec is promoting propaganda and indoctrination videos intended for schools to “explain” to students the concepts of “white privilege” and “systemic racism”.
Let’s also not forget all the other courses that teach them to feel microaggressed. in all circumstances, leading to situations like the one we experienced at the University of Ottawa recently.
Tele-Québec
We then wonder why “young people” repeat these slogans. But because they are at the heart of the American ideological porridge that they are constantly given to consume! The political leader who will clearly assume the fight against political correctness and its repeated ideological aggressions will find wide support in an exasperated population [this is precisely why a classical liberal like Bambi found herself voting for Mr. Bernier at the last federal elections. Like Dr. Mathieu Bock-Côté and likely like a large silent minority, she is fed up]. I insist: he should not resist it passively, but fight it frankly. Québeckers have the right to demand that we stop funding those who spit on them out of their taxes.“.
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 :)).
“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].
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 ?.
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.
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.
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!
