Pet Peeves: those things we really hate

[smiley_cow]

My uncle posted another rant. Though he left out Christmas this time and just complained about Immigrants:

Attention World.... Are you a pedophile, rapist, or murderer.. do you feel it is unsafe to perform these acts where you currently live? Then by all means come to Canadia, you will get a slap on the wrist and then be able to be back in business within a few months!!! Oh, you don't work you say... no problem, our system will give you free food and shelter and even make sure you have all opportunities handed to you. What you don't want your children learning about our religion in school, no worries we will make sure we don't practice our religious beliefs so yours can be followed. What you can't work on Sundays..no problem we will fill the Sunday shifts for you... Welcome to Canadia, the Country of opportunity and Freedom...IF YOU ARE NOT A CANADIAN THAT IS!!!

[DonRetrasado]

I hate that law that says I can't be a pedophile, rapist or murderer unless I'm an immigrant.

[Euclidthegreek]

This all seems like fairly reasonable-- well, not reasonable, but at least expected from someone who I assume is conservative, not the best educated, and somewhat crotchety*-- until it gets to here:

What you can't work on Sundays..no problem we will fill the Sunday shifts for you... Welcome to Canadia, the Country of opportunity and Freedom...IF YOU ARE NOT A CANADIAN THAT IS!!!

Wait what? Isn't the Sunday day of rest a very Christian, white, Anglo-saxon/French, Western, and thus Candian concept? As I understand it, people in many jobs in all spectra of wages and education levels don't work on Sundays regardless of their religious beliefs (generally the only ones that do are related to hospitality or retail). Working on Sundays is also becoming more rather than less common**, despite all the actions of immigrants. Does your uncle not believe in weekends?

*I hope this is not taken as a slight. "Conservative" is in no way intended as a derogatory term.
**As I understand it, shops and many eating-places were closed on Sundays in the past

[smiley_cow]

There's actually a lot of things that confused me in that post. I mean most of it was ill-informed but some was really off. Like the fact that in Canadia you actually are allowed to teach religious beliefs in the classroom. There's publicly funded Catholic schools and any school can take a vote among the parents and if a certain percentage* vote in favour of it schools are allowed to incorporate whatever religion was voted on into the school. I think that's a reference to American laws which makes me think that at least part of this rant was at one point copy pasted from a similar American rant.

Also he's not even a conservative, and he regularly criticizes our current Conservative government.** I think he just hates immigrants.

But yeah, I have no idea who's refusing to work on Sundays.

*I think 75% but I'll have to double check
**Sometimes more fairly than other times.

[Euclidthegreek]

But yeah, I have no idea who's refusing to work on Sundays.

Those damn Christians. Observing the holy sabbath is an affront to God. They ought to back to the Middle East where they came from*.

*They're probably terrorists, too.**
**And communists. All this stuff about caring for the poor sounds awfully red to me.

In a related story (related to religion in US Schools), American presidential candidate Rick Perry recently said, "For Washington to tell a local school district that you cannot have a prayer and a time of prayer in that school is, I think, offensive to most Americans," as part of a speech denouncing President Obama's judicial nominees. Interestingly, prayer in American schools was banned in 1962 in Engel v. Vitale; none of the judges who made that decision are on the court now.

[DonRetrasado]

I don't think prayer in schools is such a bad thing, so long as it's not mandatory. There's a couple prayer spaces on my campus and they're for everyone, not just Christians or whatever.

[Euclidthegreek]

Nonmandatory prayer in American public schools is ok (religious clubs can exist, and I've heard of schools at least trying to add optional bible-study classes). But any mass, required religious activity is not permitted.

[DonRetrasado]

I getcha. Rick Perry seems kind of insane anyway.

[sotic]

A lot of people seem to be attributing Rick Perry with the ridiculous quote "If English was good enough for Jesus Christ, then it is good enough for Texas children." But he never actually said that. I'm not sure anyone's ever actually said that. All the sites that aren't tumblr or twitter attribute the quote to Texas gov. Miriam Ferguson, around 1930, but according to her Wikipedia article with two well-formed references, it's also been attributed to other people, probably falsely.

Misinformation bugs me.

[Edminster]

No, but he did say:

[T]here's something wrong in this country when gays can serve openly in the military but our kids can't openly celebrate Christmas or pray in school.
As President, I'll end Obama's war on religion. And I'll fight against liberal attacks on our religious heritage.

[Lethal Interjection]

No, but he did say:

[T]here's something wrong in this country when gays can serve openly in the military but our kids can't openly celebrate Christmas or pray in school.
As President, I'll end Obama's war on religion. And I'll fight against liberal attacks on our religious heritage.

There has been a lot of response to that video. I had a cousin link to a "this ad should be kicked off YouTube for reasons of it being a hate speech". To which I responded that I disagree with both the video and the suggestion that it should be banned (for that reason or others).

[DonRetrasado]

Yeah, I'm not too fond of hate speech laws. I think the most just thing Youtube can do is enable comments so that Rick Perry gets to hear what people are saying about him.

[smiley_cow]

I don't think youtube taking down videos for hate speech is so much to do with hate speech laws as it is youtube has a right to control the kind of things people are using their website to say. I'm all for free speech, but I also think that websites should be allowed to control the content on their own pages. I know I'd be pretty miffed if I had a website and other people were using it to promote violence.

That being said, while I think what Perry said was stupid, I don't think I'd place insinuating that gay people shouldn't serve openly in the military in the same category as people who are actively encouraging violence against marginalized groups.

[Oldrac the Chitinous]

I'll marginalize you in a minute.

[DonRetrasado]

I don't think youtube taking down videos for hate speech is so much to do with hate speech laws as it is youtube has a right to control the kind of things people are using their website to say. I'm all for free speech, but I also think that websites should be allowed to control the content on their own pages. I know I'd be pretty miffed if I had a website and other people were using it to promote violence.

Well, Youtube actually has terms of service:

You further agree that you will not submit to the Service any Content or other material that is contrary to the YouTube Community Guidelines, currently found at http://ca.youtube.com/t/community_guidelines, which may be updated from time to time, or contrary to applicable local, national, and international laws and regulations.

So, yeah, it could be made the case that Youtube videos made in America are subject to American hate speech laws. But if you look at the community guidelines:

We encourage free speech and defend everyone's right to express unpopular points of view. But we don't permit hate speech (speech which attacks or demeans a group based on race or ethnic origin, religion, disability, gender, age, veteran status, and sexual orientation/gender identity).

So, you're right, they do control their own content (although "hate speech" is defined significantly vague that they can apply it however they want). I'm sure they've already seen the video and decided to leave it up, probably because it was uploaded by a prominent American politician in the first place. Plus if you search "jews" on Youtube the first video you get is an anti-semitic rant called "fuck the jews" which is still online*.

I've talked to people about censorship and hate crime laws a lot, and the one thing I always go after is "how do you reconcile the idea of free speech with the idea that unpopular opinions should be censored?" And I get a lot of different responses, but the general gist that most people say is that "free speech should have exceptions". I have never believed that, but hey, I believe everyone can say what they want. A lot of people say that it's dangerous having a nut rave about the jews because it might influence how their children think and they'll grow up to hate the jews. Well, I didn't learn to not hate gays or jews or blacks or whatever from my parents or the television or whatever media you can think of that can be actively censored, I learned it from my church, which practiced hella tolerance all the time, and my open-minded hippie school education, where I was forced to learn alongside a ton of people who were, on the surface, very different from me. I'm not saying that everyone's gonna naturally end up like me in the same situation, but I do think teaching kids not to hate each other and to be open-minded, and not letting them get segregated or ghettoised** goes a long way, probably more than censorship or arbitrary laws.

Now, your first response to that is probably something like, "what the fuck did that have to do with anything?"***

*Okay, it's actually funnyman Doug Stanhope talking about being taken out of context. I actually caught this special randomly on the Comedy Network one night and found it goddamn hilarious. I also appreciate someone who is able to talk so candidly about substance abuse.
**That is, not letting kids get away with spending time only with people who are of the same background. Not keeping them out of "de ghetto".
***It's a "pet peeve"! So I don't have to delete my nonsensical rant 'cause it's just barely relevant!