Canada – Page 102 – a sibilant intake of breath

Euphoric

In my mind, the return to Vancouver has already become a mythic journey – far more exciting than the prospect of going anywhere else could be. It’s a return to arche, in both senses with which that word is impregnated.

On a seperate note, I am coming to realize that Mortal Engines may be the most interesting thing I have read entirely by chance since Ender’s Game. The translator, Michael Kandel, has been added to the list of people I hope to meet. I assume the author of the stories is already dead.

Vancouver visit: September 6-23rd

Happy Birthday Dad

Contrary to my expectations, it seems that I will be returning to Vancouver between the two years of my M.Phil after all: between the 6th and the 23rd of September. I am naturally very excited about the prospect of seeing my brothers and parents, as well as friends in Vancouver.

People who are likely to be around should leave a comment or send me an email and we can sort out times to meet. Having some kind of general gathering for friends of mine in North Van is also a very strong possibility.

An hour ago, I thought it would be summer 2007 before I saw Vancouver again. Now, I will be there in less than a month.

Tuna farming

The bitter joke among fisheries scientists is that the Japanese are engaged in a dual project of turning all available knowledge and energy to the farm-rearing of bluefin tuna while simultaneously expending all available effort to catch every wild example.

This month, they succeeded in one of those aims: Hidemi Kumai and his team at Kinki University managed to raise fry born in captivity to adult size and them have them breed successfully. Because of the complexity of their life cycle, it is a considerable achievement. (Source) These are valuable fish, with the record holder having sold for $180,000 in Tokyo. The three largest fishers of Bluefin tuna are the United States, Canada and Japan.

This is good news for those who enjoy bluefin tuna sashimi, though they should probably be hoping that the rearing process can be scaled up to commercial levels. According to the US National Academy of Sciences¹, present day stocks are only 20% of what existed in 1975. Some sources hold existing bluefin stocks to be just 3% of their 1960 level. Present stocks are only 12% of what the International Commission for the Conservation of Atlantic Tunas has designated as necessary to maintain the maximum sustainable yield for the resource. Within another fifty years, it is quite possible that wild bluefin tuna will no longer exist.

[1] National Academy of Sciences. National Research Council. An Assessment of Atlantic Bluefin Tuna. Washington DC National Academy Press, 1994.

Summer now ending: student loan applications

With September approaching, it is once again time to apply for student loans. Canadian student loans are paid half by the provincial government and half by the federal, and have a maximum value of about $12,000 a year. The nicest thing about them is that you do not need to begin paying them back until you are no longer a full-time student. As such, they reduce the disincentive to leave school early or avoid taking higher degrees, as might be created by bank loans that start gathering interest immediately.

The justification for having a student loan program is twofold. Firstly, it posits that there are societal benefits to education. In the cases of nurses, teachers, and the like, this is quite evidently so. Secondly, it constitutes part of the justification for income disparity, on the basis of the argument that everyone has an equal chance at getting an education. This plank is somewhat weaker, since there are a great many programs that $12,000 will not cover, and some people are naturally more likely to be concerned about taking on such debt than others. That said, it is almost certainly an improvement over having no such program.

Irksomely, because Oxford is not on the official British Columbian list of eligable schools, all the paperwork needs to be done by mail and fax. Since the normal application form isn’t even on their website as a PDF, I need to have it mailed to me, as well. Problematically for people in expensive places, they calculate things like the cost of living on the basis of prices in BC. Finally, as you would expect for a government document, the application instructions are 63 pages long. They are really hung up that the program start and end dates you supply exactly match any of those sent as confirmation by your school. Hopefully, Oxford term start and term end dates will work. I remember getting initially rejected last year because Wadham and the Department gave dates a couple of days apart.

Lecture in the Taylorian

The lecture today on Canada-US security and defence cooperation went well; it could even be a solid demonstration of the preferability of lecturing over research. I did talk overly quickly, burning through my forty-five minute presentation in just over half an hour, but the questions were good and I think I fielded them pretty well. The fear of going overtime can generate unwanted haste. I did manage to avoid a frequent error I’ve made in the past, namely that of getting lost in my own notes. It’s easier to avoid when you really know the material you’re covering, and the notes are for structure, rather than content.

A presentation on a topic like this is always a political act. On that basis, I think I struck the right note. I took the more truthful bits of the ‘staunch and eternal allies’ premise sometimes hammered upon by Canadian politicians under fire from the US and mixed it with some of the more essential elements of the ‘importance of legitimacy and international law’ scolding that with which we tend to fire back. All in all, I think it was reasonably balanced and candid. Wearing my NORAD pin – with Canadian and American flags on it – probably contributed positively to my ability to represent myself as someone who genuinely wants a friendly and constructive relationship between the two countries, and has considerable respect for both.

Lecturing itself was quite enjoyable, despite the associated anxiety. With a bit more practice and confidence, I think that I could get very good at this, indeed.

Privacy and power

Canada’s Privacy Commissioner has released an excellent report, highlighting some of the disturbing trends that he sees as ongoing. Rather than paraphrase, I will quote one of the best sections extensively:

It is my duty, in this Annual Report, to present a solemn and urgent warning to every Member of Parliament and Senator, and indeed to every Canadian:

The fundamental human right of privacy in Canada is under assault as never before. Unless the Government of Canada is quickly dissuaded from its present course by Parliamentary action and public insistence, we are on a path that may well lead to the permanent loss not only of privacy rights that we take for granted but also of important elements of freedom as we now know it.

We face this risk because of the implications, both individual and cumulative, of a series of initiatives that the Government has mounted or is actively moving toward. These initiatives are set against the backdrop of September 11, and anti-terrorism is their purported rationale. But the aspects that present the greatest threat to privacy either have nothing at all to do with anti-terrorism, or they present no credible promise of effectively enhancing security.

The Government is, quite simply, using September 11 as an excuse for new collections and uses of personal information about all of us Canadians that cannot be justified by the requirements of anti-terrorism and that, indeed, have no place in a free and democratic society.

I applaud both the Commissioner’s comments and his willingness to take such a firm and public stance. As I’ve said dozens of times now: terrorists are dangerous, but governments fundamentally much more so. They can cloak themselves in secrecy and are imbued with a level of power that permits them to do enormous harm, whether by accident or by design. Compared with the excesses and abuses committed by governments – Western democratic governments included – terrorism is a minor problem.

I recommend that all Canadians read the report in its entirety. I found the link via Bruce Schneier’s excellent security blog.

Present at the creation

The Globe and Mail – Canada’s big left-leaning national paper – has a surprisingly funny poll running today: “U.S. President George W. Bush turns 60 on Thursday and Prime Minister Harper will be in Washington to help him celebrate. What gift should the PM bring?”

Four fabulous British-made submarines [a reference to our submarine fleet: four diesel-powered subs better suited to re-fighting the Battle of the Atlantic than modern naval operations]
A belt buckle carved from softwood lumber [reference to a long running trade dispute where the US was ruled against both by NAFTA panels and the WTO, but refused to drop its illegal policy]
Don Cherry [colourful Canadian hockey commentator, infamous for wearing really bad suits]
Seal skin seat covers for Air Force One [those cute little harp seals are basically a license for Greenpeace to print money]
A copy of Stompin’ Tom’s Greatest Hits [not a musical personage I can ever recall hearing, but one of those things Easterners, or possibly an earlier generation, are likely to think of as very Canadian]
The Montreal Expos. Oh, wait….

My vote? I say go with the belt buckle. He will probably wear it while clearing brush. A running tally of the results is here.

Happy Canada Day

Having read a great deal of twentieth century history, I am naturally aware of the dangers of patriotism. Regardless, I think that it can serve a good social purpose when the character is aspirational rather than affirmational. Having an understanding of Canada as a respectable global citizen creates an understanding of interests that furthers that project. I would never claim that Canada has been unfaltering in the application of its ideals – shameful cases relating to the treatment of the First Nations and immigrants exist in close memory – but I would claim that pride rooted in Canadian ideals and in Canada insofar as it achieves those ideals is a good thing.

Last Canada Day, I was in Ottawa with my brother Sasha, my father, and several of my cousins. I remember being fairly exhausted from having spent the previous night at a party thrown by my very good friend Alison Benjamin, who was living in Toronto at the time. While in Ottawa, we played frisbee on the lawn in front of the Parliament buildings. Several times, the disc flew over the four-foot fence, and one of the police officers on the other side would return it to us. At several other times, we were interrupted by an intermittant thunderstorm, which punctuated the day. Thankfully, it did not emerge during the aggressively bilingual Canadian concert, followed, for us, by poutine eaten on the road in front of Parliament, after the fireworks.

Canada Day 2004, I spent traveling back from Italy, where I spent several weeks with Meghan, her sister, and her friend Tish.

The previous Canada Day was my most Canadian ever: I was paddling northward across Dodd Lake, in the rain, with Meghan. In a nearby canoe – the only people nearby for many kilometres – were my father and my brother Mica. This was during the course of the Powell Forest Canoe Circuit, a shorter and much less crowded alternative to the Bowron Lakes Circuit. It is also better provided for with petites grenouilles, though less well stocked with moose.

In any case, to the 33 million Canadians back home and all my fellow Canadians abroad: Vive Le Canada!

To those in Oxford, remember about the party tonight. I already have large amounts of beer and Tegan & Sara recordings at the ready.

Another scholarship rejection

It was the J. Armand Bombardier Internationalist Fellowship this time. They lose points for sending out rejections by email. “Dear Applicant…” It was always a long shot, with 678 applicants for 25 fellowships and what I am told is a strong preference for people aiming at French language related programs.

Now, there are only two small ones left, plus the departmental bursary: for which all of these rejections (Commonwealth, Chevening, ORS, Bombardier, etc) are actually an advantage. I have never actually received any scholarship for which an application was necessary: only automatic faculty and departmental scholarships and UBC and funding offers from grad schools other than Oxford.

Any friends out there who applied for this and don’t get an email in the next few hours, take heart. A cool $10,000 might be coming your way.

[Unrelated] Someone left a link to this optical illusion as a comment. It’s well worth a look.

Gay marriage back in the news

I wrote previously on an almost identical issue, but that which needs to be said generally needs to be said again.

Apparently Conservatice Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper wants to re-open the debate about gay marriage. At present, it is legal for same-sex couples to get married in Canada. This is a good thing for precisely the same reasons that it is good that couples of different races can get married: it is a simple requirement within a just and equitable society. The fact that homosexuality makes some people uncomfortable is no excuse whatsoever for discrimination. Likewise, the existence of certain traditions about what marriage has meant to some people must not preclude a societal definition that is blind to arbitrary factors. Particular churches can decide for themselves what kind of unions they want to bless and what kind of ceremonies they want to host, but under the law there must be equality and the protection of minority rights.

I am entirely confident that we will look back upon this issue in fifty years time the same way we look back on racially segregated schools today. That is to say, we will see it as a matter where governments took an astonishingly long time to accept a policy that is obviously a moral imperative. Canada’s legal history with regards to homosexuality is certainly not a sterling one. As recently as 1967, the Supreme Court of Canada ruled that Everett Klippert could be jailed as a ‘dangerous sexual offender’ simply on the grounds that he was likely to engage in consensual homosexual sex with adults. He was still in prison until 1971: two years after the Trudeau government decriminalized homosexuality. (See the CBC Timeline)

As regards the Harper government, this is indirectly a positive development. His only hope of getting a majority government in the next election is to prove that the Conservatives can be trusted with one. People are rightly distrustful, because of exactly the kind of political currents that have led to this announcement. Now, we just need the Liberals to clean themselves up quite a bit, get a strong new leader, and turn themselves back into the best option Canadians can hope for at the federal level.