The following was posted on Facebook. I reprint it here in its entirety.

An Open Letter to English-Canadians, who might be feeling that Quebeckers have taken leave of their senses.

by Daniel Weinstock on Tuesday, May 22, 2012 at 1:09am

An open letter to my English-Canadian friends. Please circulate in your networks as you see fit.

You may have heard that there has been some turmoil in Quebec in recent weeks. There have been demonstrations in the streets of Montreal every night for almost a month now, and a massive demonstration will be happening tomorrow, which I will be attending, along with my wife, Elizabeth Elbourne, and my eldest daughter Emma.

Reading the Anglo-Canadian press, it strikes me that you have been getting a very fragmented and biased picture of what is going on. Given the gulf that has already emerged between Quebec and the rest of Canada in the wake of the 2011 election, it is important that the issues under discussion here at least be represented clearly. You may decide at the end of the day that we are crazy, but at least you should reach that decision on the basis of the facts, rather than of the distortions that have been served up by the G&M and other outlets.

First, the matter of the tuition hikes, which touched off this mess. The rest of the country seems to have reached the conclusion that the students are spoiled, selfish brats, who would still be paying the lowest tuition fees even if the whole of the proposed increase went through.

The first thing to say is that this is an odd conception of selfishness. Students have been sticking with the strikes even knowing that they may suffer deleterious consequences, both financial and academic. They have been marching every night despite the threat of beatings, tear-gas, rubber bullets, and arrests. It is, of course, easier for the right-wing media to dismiss them if they can be portrayed as selfish kids to whom no -one has ever said "no". But there is clearly an issue of principle here.

OK, then. But maybe the principle is the wrong one. Free tuition may just be a pie-in-the sky idea that mature people give up on when they put away childish things. And besides, why should other people pay for the students' "free" tuition? There is no such thing as "free" education. Someone, somewhere, has to pay. And the students, the criticism continues, are simply refusing to pay their "fair share".

Why is that criticism simplistic? Because the students' claim has never been that they should not pay for education. The question is whether they should do so up front, before they have income, or later, as taxpayers in a progressive taxation scheme. Another question has to do with the degree to which Universities should be funded by everyone, or primarily by those who attend them. So the issue of how to fund Universities justly is complicated. We have to figure out at what point in people's lives they should be paying for their education, and we also have to figure out how much of the bill should be footed by those who do not attend, but who benefit from a University-educated work force of doctors, lawyers, etc. The students' answer to this question may not be the best, but then it does not strike me that the government's is all that thought out either.

And at least the students have been trying to make ARGUMENTS and to engage the government and the rest of society in debate, whereas the government's attitude, other than to invoke the in-this-context-meaningless "everyone pays their faire share" argument like a mantra, has been to say "Shut up, and obey".

What strikes the balance in the students' favour in the Quebec context is that the ideal of no up-front financial hurdles to University access is enshrined in some of the most foundational documents of Quebec's Quiet Revolution, in particular the Parent Commission Report, which wrested control of schools from the Church and created the modern Quebec education system, a cornerstone of the kind of society that many Quebeckers see themselves as aspiring to. Now, it could be that that ideal is no longer viable, or that we may no longer want to subscribe to it. But moving away from it, as Charest's measures have done, at least requires a debate, analogous to the debate that would have to be had if the Feds proposed to scrap the Canada Health Act. It is clearly not just an administrative measure. It is political through and through. Indeed it strikes at fundamental questions about the kind of society we want to live in. If this isn't the sort of thing that requires democratic debate, I don't know what is.

The government has met the very reasonable request that this issue, and broader issues of University governance, be at least addressed in some suitably open and democratic manner with silence, then derision, then injunctions, and now, with the most odious "law" that I have seen voted by the Quebec National Assembly in my adult memory. It places the right of all Quebec citizens to assemble, but also to talk and discuss about these issues, under severe limitations. It includes that most odious of categories: crimes of omission, as in, you can get fined for omitting to attempt to prevent someone from taking part in an act judged illegal by the law. In principle, the simple wearing of the by-now iconic red square can be subject to a fine. The government has also made the student leaders absurdly and ruinously responsible for any action that is ostensibly carried out under the banners of their organizations. The students groups can be fined $125000 whenever someone claiming to be "part" of the movement throws a rock through a window. And so on. It is truly a thing to behold.

The government is clearly aware that this "law" would not withstand a millisecond of Charter scrutiny. It actually expires in July 2013, well before challenges could actually wind their way through the Courts. The intention is thus clearly just to bring down the hammer on this particular movement by using methods that the government knows to be contrary to basic liberal-democratic rule-of-law principles. The cynicism is jaw-dropping. It is beneath contempt for the government to play fast and loose with our civil rights and liberties in order to deal with the results of its own abject failure to govern.

So that is why tomorrow I will be taking a walk in downtown Montreal with (hopefully!) hundreds of thousands of my fellow citizens. Again, you are all free to disagree, but at least don't let it be because of the completely distorted picture of what is going on here that you have been getting from media outlets, including some from which we might have expected more.

Daniel

#GGI, Quebec, student protest.

If they were serious about reducing abortion rates…

A quarter of a century ago I attended protest rallies to stop the then Conservative government of Canada from bringing forward legislation to take away women’s rights to decide what to do with their own bodies.

Today, there are protests against the current Conservative government of Canada’s effort to bring forward legislation to take away women’s rights to decide what to do with their own bodies.

For those opposed to abortion, prohibition won't stop it — that will just lead to more dead or mutilated women like there were before it was legalized. If you really want to stop abortions, work to prevent the unwanted pregnancies that cause them.

So, what’s the single biggest factor in rates of unwanted pregnancy? Women who are living in poverty. If you’re opposed to abortions (or pro-choice, for that matter) — the best thing to do is to work to end women's poverty.

See also:

• Calgary Pro-Choice Coalition
• The Abortion Monologues
• Radical Handmaids

abortion, pro-choice, M312, no debate.

Vote strategically, or vote your conscience?

With the way the Alberta provincial election seems to be shaping up, I’ve heard a lot of folks talking about possibly voting strategically for the Progressive Conservative Party in their ridings out of desperation to avoid having the Wildrose Party win. People are struggling with whether to vote for the candidates most likely to block the candidates they dread, or to vote for the candidate that would best represent them.

I’ll avoid, for the moment, discussing here the broken nature of our electoral system that leads to such choices…

Voting Your Conscience

It’s never a mistake to vote your conscience — to vote for the candidate who best represents your values — even if you expect them to “not have a chance”. Even if they don't win, showing support for those candidates shows which positions have support and does a couple things:

1. It shows those elected which types of voters they need to appeal to more.
   
   When the Alberta Greens saw significant increases in percentage of vote (even though we didn’t win seats from those votes) there was a corresponding increase in some of the green policies being adopted by the provincial government — a prime example being the grizzly bear hunt ban. Subsequently, when the Alberta Greens were taken over and shut down (the takeover was led by a fellow who is now a Wildrose candidate, make of that what you will), there was a corresponding backtracking on those policies — in this example, the grizzly hunt ban was lifted.
   
   Even parties that don’t win can affect policies because the winning party wants to get some of those votes in the subsequent election.
   
   
2. People who vote mostly vote for who they think can win. A party that receives increasing votes in an election stands a much better chance in the next election because more people will think they have a chance of winning. It’s not good that so many people vote that way, but it’s reality.
   
   So, we’re not just voting for this election, but for future elections, too, where there will hopefully be better chances of people we support winning.

Strategic Voting

All that said, there are times where a “hold your nose” strategic vote may be your best choice.

I once (just once) voted for a federal Progressive Conservative candidate, Joe Clark, in order to prevent the election of a Reform/Alliance candidate. Clark was definitely on the “Red Tory” side of that party (before it was taken over by Reform/Alliance), and even served as parade marshall for the Calgary Pride Parade one year — so it wasn’t an utterly heinous choice.

So, what should one do?

In the end, both the strategic and conscience votes have an impact — so neither can be dismissed out of hand as invalid choices in our current system. It’s up to you, as an individual citizen, to make the hard decision which of the possible outcomes is the better focus for your vote.

Even when it doesn’t seem like it, when the media and leading parties try to marginalize diverse opinions, all of our votes do actually make a difference.

vote, abvote, Alberta election, strategic vote, vote your conscience.

Wildrose Alliance Party would set back social advances in Alberta

A survey of party leaders conducted by the Rocky Mountain Civil Liberties Association last year has some troubling quotes from Wildrose Alliance Party leader Danielle Smith:

The Wildrose is committed to enshrining property rights in an Alberta Constitution, and views the protection of property rights the most fundamental role of government.

So, property rights trump social responsibility, human rights, the environment, health, education, democracy?

And, yes, in spite of recent denials and obfuscations, she is on the record in favour of “conscience rights”:

the Wildrose will ensure conscience rights for marriage commissioners and health professionals.

wra, wrp, abvote, Alberta election, Wildrose, Wildrose Party, Danielle Smith, conscience rights, property rights.

Calgary Activist Network — back from the dead

Back in January I started doing a bunch of work to rebuild the Calgary Activist Network website. The network had largely wound down in the mid-2000s, leaving just a single page of links to a few other online resources.

Now the calendar of events is back up and running and I’ve posted over 60 events in the past couple weeks.

The new feature I’m most proud of is the ability to subscribe to the calendar of events using calendar applications on your computer or phone. With that, you don’t have to remember to visit the website, but can instead just look at your calendar to see what’s coming up.

At this point, it’s just me posting events to the site, but I hope to get other folks adding listings soon. (There’s still a little bit of back-end code I need to put together to get that workable — and understandable by non-geeks.)

Currently, to add an event to the site, people can send an announcement to the Calgary activism announcements email list (which has been running in one form or another since 1999). Please use plain text in those emails, and no attachments (no posters, pictures, Word documents, etc.).

The updated Activist Network site should make it easier for me to get announcements out to the email list, for those who prefer email.

There are a couple of other spots available where announcements are going out. On Facebook, there is the Calgary Social Change page. On Twitter it’s @CalSC.

Western Interventionism in Activism

There’s a basic question activists should ask before taking an action in support of people outside our own communities: What do the people affected want to do?

What we heard directly from Sudanese activists, at the time Calgary-based Talisman Energy was exploiting that country’s oil, was “get your company out of our country.” So, that’s what we worked to do. What we heard from South African activists during apartheid there was “cut South African business off.” So, we boycotted and promoted sanctions.

If we’re going to do anything “for”, “about”, or — much better — with the people of, Uganda, the direction of our efforts needs to come from the people there who are working for positive social change in their communities. If they decide there are ways that we in “the west” can be useful in making a difference, then great — let’s do that. But if they decide that they need to handle whatever they’re doing without our involvement, it’ll not be our place to interfere or presume to “know better.” They’re not ignorant, primitive, simple-minded, backward, or in any other way less than us (it’s probably the other way around, assuming they haven’t spent their lives being bombarded to the same extent as us with U.S.-dominated western media).

While visiting Europe, in response to the question “What do you think of western civilization?” Gandhi is reported to have said “I think it would be a good idea.” Yep.

activism, intervention, Kony 2012, Uganda.

On Voting

I'm not voting against anything. I'm voting for what I see as the best opportunity to make things better in my community and the world.

I'm not voting to have "my side" win. I'm voting for us all to come together and work out our problems, challenges and opportunities, in open collaboration.

I'm not voting to have my voice heard. I'm voting because I want all voices to be heard - including the majority who are silenced by our current systems.

I'm not voting for this election. I'm voting for the long-term.

Keeping track of government & civic events in Calgary

After a too-long absence due to a mix of holidays, sickness, life stresses and burn-out, I’ve started loading up the Calgary Democracy calendar with relevant events again, especially meetings of our municipal government.

Stay up-to-date automatically

Near the top of the calendar page, there are a couple links you can use to add the calendar to your calendar application (on your computer, smartphone, or other networked device). If you subscribe to the calendar, you’ll automatically get updates without having to go back and check the website.

For example, I use this on my smartphone, which means I just need to go to my phone’s calendar to see when the next City Council meeting is.

The City’s challenging information

The City currently posts information about upcoming “Boards, Commissions and Committees” through a fairly minimalist calendar page. They don’t provide any way to take a feed of that data so it can be auto-loaded into your calendar, or shared on other websites.

Consequently, I’m currently manually copying and pasting (and cleaning up and reformatting) the listings from that website to create calendar entries in the Calgary Democracy calendar.

The agendas and minutes for those meetings are kept on a completely separate website (actually, 2 separate websites — one for archives of pre-October 31, 2010 meetings, and one for meetings since then). Their calendar site doesn’t yet link to the agenda & minutes site, and the latter only links to the former indirectly.

Agendas are often posted only a few days before a meeting, so it’s challenging for me to update the Calgary Democracy calendar with them.

Unfortunately, the full package of information being made available for the Councillors at the meetings is not yet being made available to the public (that I can find). So, we’re still missing a lot of crucial information about what is being discussed on our behalf.

yyc data, yyc cc, Calgary, Calgary City Council, calendar, events, schedule, open data.

Why ending fluoridation of our water is a good thing

Thankfully, Calgary City Council is looking at finally ending the fluoridation of our water supply.

Why is water fluoridation inappropriate?

The state has the (controversial) right to restrict access to certain consumed items (e.g., narcotics, prescription drugs, food additives, alcohol for minors, unpasteurized milk, etc.). It should not, however, have the right to impose the consumption of anything on anyone (with the possible exception of where an individual would otherwise be “a danger to society” such as forcing anti-psychotic drugs on extremely violent mentally ill individuals).

Putting fluoride in our water is a deliberate act of forcing involuntary consumption of that fluoride onto people. Some of the proponents of fluoridation will say “you don’t have to drink the water, then”. That’s true, if a person is wealthy. That is entirely wrong for the large percentage of low-income households in Calgary, as well as the growing homeless population. Do we really want a society where the rich are the only people who get to say no to what the government wants to put in their bodies?

To use an extreme example to illustrate my point: There are people who’s health and well-being would significantly benefit from receiving antidepressants they aren’t currently getting. Should we therefore put antidepressants in the water supply to ensure they get those drugs? Of course not. So, why are there people who think it’s a good idea to put fluoride in the water to benefit the fraction of the population who might benefit from it who aren’t otherwise able to get that fluoride?

Surely, in this “modern age” we can come up with far more targeted and efficient ways of providing fluoride access to those who might benefit from it but can’t otherwise secure it of their own means?

Should we just let this “little” issue slide?

On Twitter, Ron McMahon said “Fluoridation is a dead issue Calgarians have REPEATEDLY voted to keep this.” Well, before the imposition of fluoridation, following a plebiscite a couple decades ago, the pro-fluoride lobby lost many plebiscites where Calgarians repeatedly voted to block it.

So, by the logic McMahon suggests, we should have never brought in fluoridation in the first place. That logic might be taken to imply that we should never change our minds as a society — a notion with which I respectfully disagree in the strongest possible terms.

Zac Ryan, again on Twitter, suggested that ending fluoridation isn’t worth it because “there are bigger issues to tackle.” By that measure, we should just ignore anything that isn’t a big issue. Potholes? We’ve got bigger issues. Off-leash dog parks? We’ve got bigger issues. Home break-ins? We’ve got bigger issues.

It is the job and duty of our City Council and City Administration to sweat those “smaller issues” along with the “bigger issues.” It’s not either-or.

YYCcc, fluoridation.

Data Visualization video

I watched a very cool (and relevant to local open data efforts) video on web-based data visualizations. It’s from Apple’s developer conference earlier this year and covers recent (and some experimental) web standards for doing dynamic, interactive, data visualizations, including on arbitrary shapes like maps.

Unfortunately, you have to login with a (free) Apple ID (and possibly register for a free developer account) on Apple’s Developer portal, and then get linked in to iTunes (which is free, but you need it installed and I don’t think they have a version available for open source platforms) to get access to this video. But, for data geeks — especially those interested in the possibilities of Open Data — this is probably worth it.

The license restriction on the video doesn’t seem to restrict me showing it to others on my laptop, so maybe we can get folks together for a group viewing some time (it’s about 45 minutes).

Technologies Covered

• Javascript and dynamic loading of data from XML and JSON sources.
• CSS effects (including touching on the newer animation effects).
• HTML5.
• HTML5 Canvas: Dynamic graphical drawing in HTML.
• SVG: Scalable Vector Graphics.
• Inkscape: Open source vector drawing tool (generates SVG).
• Raphaël: Javascript library for dynamic vector graphic handling.
• WebGL: Experimental dynamic 3D rendering in web code.

Getting the Video

If you are keen to see it now, and willing to jump through a bunch of hoops, here’s how you get to the video. This is all free, but a bit of a pain if you’re not already registered with Apple’s developer programs:

At every step of this, login, or create a login, if you need to:

1. Go to Apple’s Developer videos page for WWDC 2010.
2. Choose between the HD (big) or SD (small) video format, and select the appropriate “View in iTunes” link.
3. Once the “WWDC 2010 Sessions” page is open in iTunes, select the “Internet and Web” section (last one in the list)
4. The video is for “Session 509 - Creating Info Graphics with Standard Web Technologies”. Click the “Get” button to download it.
5. Once it’s done downloading, you can watch it in iTunes (it’ll probably be in the “iTunes U” section in your iTunes player), or open it with another video player.

If someone figures out an easier way to get at the video, please let me know!

#yycdata.