Red Cedar
More apocalypse, less angst
lawbreakers!
my friend richard wrote this letter – the point about who the real lawbreakers are here being pretty obvious.
“We can disagree on the laws that are passed, and we often do, but the foundation of our society is that once a law is passed, that we agree to obey it. We do not get to obey the laws that we like and disobey the laws that we don’t like, and that is the central issue here.”
Gordon Campbell October 17th, 2005.
Dear Mr. Campbell,
I find it appalling that your Government so flipantly states that teachers should abide the law, when your Government continues to flaunt the law. The Supreme Court of BC found your Government broke the law with regards to class size limits on February 18th, 2005 with Justice Shaw presiding.
Your Government-appointed Arbitrator, Eric Rice’s “closed eyed” stripping of our collective agreement was also ruled against the law by the BC Supreme Court on January 22, 2004. The Judge presiding cited, such, “fundamental errors of law” as to make the whole bargaining
process a sham.
Your Government has such high esteem for the law that you choose to disregard International law. “The ILO ruled that the BC Liberal law declaring education an “essential service” should be repealed. The ruling also called on the government to open talks with the BCTF to negotiate an agreement and to refrain from imposing settlements in the future.”
Futhermore, on a more personal note Mr. Campbell, you have such personal high esteem for the law that you drove drunk and were convicted of a criminal offence on January 10th, 2003 in Hawaii. “Anyone who drives while impaired to the level he was should be ashamed and embarrassed and afraid.” District Judgel Reinette Cooper.
My Campbell, I ask your Government to do the just thing and repeal Bill 12, open meaningful and productive negotiations with the BCTF and start abiding the law.
Yours,
Richard Biel
the tao of motion
something clicked for me today when i was working with the kickboard during my lunch-hour swim – through a combination of meditating on the motion, and watching another swimmer – i actually *understood* the hip/leg motion i was aiming for physically rather than intellectually for a change. perhaps that doesn’t make a lot of sense – but there is a big difference between understanding what you are supposed to do, and actually being able to do it without too much thinking.
it was definitely a moment of effortless resistance – or something like wu wei anyhow…. very good, apparently meditation in motion extends beyond qi gong…. and my swimming is improving for it.
i haven’t been to the gym since last week owing to a two-day trip to nanaimo, thurs-fri, for union business, which was somewhat uneventful except that i was elected as a delegate to the bcfed convention at the end of november. should be interesting given the labour uprising that is being quelled by the fed as we speak – i have just heard that vince ready is now formally involved in mediating the teacher-government dispute… so we will see what comes of that.
despite the intermittent showers over the weekend, i managed to get in a hike with my friend steve on saturday morning that went a lot longer than intended (we bush-whacked along chapman creek and then tried to follow logging roads back to where the car was parked but ended up several km away from where we started owing to the fact we couldn’t find a way to cut across the open pit mine in between our starting place and us). got home in time for a short nap and shower and then trekked into vancouver to see the cat empire play at richards on richards.
now those of you who are familiar with the vancouver music scene will know that van is a city known for its unresponsive crowds – but there was none of that to be had on saturday night as the cat empire ripped up the stage with 2 and a half hours of hot dance tunes comprised from an amazing repetoire of genres. i knew this band would be good live, but i didn’t really know how good they would be – it was definitely worth the trip into the city – and the sold-out crowd was dancing like crazy people for the whole set. after the show, i went with the folks i was dancing with down to the lamplighter pub to see another couple of friends put on a short set and drink a couple of beers before ending up at giles and darcie’s place socializing with folks there.
sunday i woke up sore from my hips to my ankles from the combination of hike/dancing – hung out with the children of darcie and giles and then headed back to the sunshine coast to make a vegan gourmet feast for my friend david (tofu-leek savoury tart, roasted red pepper and carrot soup, bitter greens with red peppers roasted and marinated in balsamic vinegar and applesauce with vanilla soy-ice-cream and toasted walnuts for dessert) – in honour of it being the first time he has come to my new house. we had a very nice visit and it was a great excuse to do all sorts of fancy cooking like i never get to do anymore. i think i should have dinner parties again or something, i really like feeding people fancy food.
yesterday i stayed home from work because i was feeling tired and not so well (sore throatish) which seemed to indicate i might be coming down with something but really i think might have just been over-exhaustion. i ran a couple small errands, and made a few phone calls but mostly just hung out and watched movies and worked on the cross-stitch i have been doing for ages – i really think just doing nothing and eating gourmet left-overs was about the best thing i could have chosen to do – though i still felt super rundown this morning.
everything here has been pretty normal today except that one of my fellow-commuters asked me on something that has a remarkable resemblance to a date, but could be construed as just two people hanging out as well. i’m feeling pretty cautious about this one, he had a partner until very recently and she has just returned to her home country to go to school…. i don’t want to make any mis-steps in a community as small as ours – but i did agree to go check out the show he invited me to since i know the musician and i’m interested in the “new” venue in roberts creek (and quite frankly, i am usually flattered when people are interested in me, even when it’s not romantic).
can't you come up with a better argument than that?
it’s disingenuous for education minister shirley bond to suggest that because the teacher strike vote (of 90.5% in favour of defying bill 12 and staying out on strike) was only cast by 50% of the members, the result is not legitimate (and thus scabbing should be supported) – when she (and everyone) knows full well that the us president is elected with voter turn-outs of 50% and less, and canadian voter turn-out is only marginally better. by her logic, if the results of the bctf strike vote are not legitimate, than neither are the provincial and federal governments (and hey, i would concede labour legitimacy if it meant getting the corporate-lackey crowd out of the legislature).
general strike blues
after work yesterday, i took a stroll down to the trade and convention centre (which houses the liberal cabinet offices) and took part in a support demonstration for the bc teachers on strike. for those of you not up on bc politics – the union has been in negotiations for a new contract for over a year, and rather than negotiate, the provincial government decided to legislate their strike rights as illegal and impose a contract with a 0% wage increase for two years (they were legislated a 3-year 0% contract during their last round of negotiations). this is the same action the bc liberal government took against striking hospital employees in 2004 that lead the labour movement to the brink of a general strike.
the question remains whether we will go there again. certainly at the demo yesterday (which was several thousand strong, and included representatives from all the major labour unions in the province), the general strike chant could be heard at every available opportunity, though labour leaders are even more reticent this time to open their mouths to the topic than they were during the last major bout of class struggle just over a year ago. but the fact remains that as of tomorrow, the teacher’s union will start accruing fines (they will likely be fined for every day of the “illegal” walk-out in the same way the hospital employees union was), and without the tangible support of other unions, they will be forced back to work.
so what of a general strike? i honestly believe (as a good revolutionary and unionist) that the only way to make this government blink is through the general strike mechanism. because of the government’s ability legislate our actions illegal at every turn, they leave only one avenue open to show our displeasure with the way the government is treating public sector workers. if the past 6 years of labour “negotiations” in this province has shown us anything, it is that “playing nice” is something we just can’t afford to do anymore. we have one straightforward strength in our corner – which is the ability to withdraw our labour and our services, collectively, in support of a stronger public sector overall, and the teachers in particular.
is it easy to pull off? not at all – a general strike requires participation, motivation, and mobilization efforts – and puts every union equally at legal risk across the province. but let’s face it – we are 38% of the province’s workforce (those of us in unions) performing many of the most central services in our communities and making up the core of the province’s industrial base. even a one or two day walkout costs the economy in the millions of dollars – and more than that, it demonstrates that the citizentry has lost faith in the ability of the party to govern in a manner consistent with their social values.
having said all of that, i’m not so hopeful we will get the general strike we so desperately need, if only because the labour movement leadership is afraid of losing much more than it will gain. this is a real risk, but one that must be weighed agains the losses to date taken by unions across this province. there is more public support than expected for an “illegal” strike (67% of people strongly favour the teachers in this dispute), and despite the education minister’s claims to the contrary, the teachers are righteous in their militancy. this is indeed a moment for seizing, if we can agree to act together and push this government back. if we don’t, our losses as a movement into the future will be monumental.
“there is a big difference between breaking the law – and defying legislation designed to break you. we will not be broken.”….. jinny simms, bctf president
solidarity to that!
locker-room bodies
something that has struck me since returning to the gym is how much i missed seeing the bodies of other women up close and unclothed – and i don’t mean in a voyeristic, thrill-seeking kind of way.
you see, when they aren’t in magazines, women’s bodies are lumpy and scarred, and parts of them are bigger than mine, or smaller than mine, and they sometimes are a little lopsided, or out of proportion – sometimes they are pregnant, sometimes they are missing an eye, or even a limb… but in all they are the bodies we women inhabit every day, that propel us in the water or on the forest trails, that get us to work and back, that birth children, and that just exist… mostly in a world that idealizes bodies nothing like their own (despite all the feats of these lumpy, scarred, bigger, smaller, lopsided bodies that they posess).
it’s not a matter, for me, of looking at other women in derisive comparison (oh look – she’s fatter, older, more hobbled than me!) – but of looking around to appreciate real bodies for just what they are, and recognizing mine is not worse than most, nor better – and that magazine and movie bodies really are a cruel fiction.
i know, i know…. of course everyone knows this – but it’s easy to forget, walking around in the world of the clothed. i find that the daily interaction with women in the locker room makes me, on the whole, a lot easier with my own body – which is an added side benefit to working out in the first place.
and incidentally – i swam 22 laps today, plus 8 with the kickboard (working on my leg technique) – and the laps are getting just a little easier each time (i’m doing less of the easy backstroke, more crawling).
Red Cedar 