Thursday, June 28, 2012
Food: A Genetic Dictatorship?
This guy is awesome! I think he makes a whole lot of sense! I remembered him from the documentary Food Inc. and a friend of mine just went to his farm for a visit. She uploaded some pics on fb and I said, "Hey that looks like the Food Inc farmer!" I guess he's written a book now called "This Ain't Right" and is becoming pretty well known. This is a good thing!
Two things he says in this clip that strike me is how we have allowed ourselves to become so disconnected and ignorant about something as intimate as the food we put inside ourselves every day. And the end when he's talking about the pig as a pile of protoplasmic inanimate structure to be manipulated by whatever creative design humans can foist upon it, (for example combining its genes with salmon to create bigger, more cost-efficient salmon that will be introduced into the wild and kill all the others), will probably view people with the same type of disdain, disrespect and controlling-type mentality. In short, view people as paying consumers OF that Frankenfood.
Bertrand Russel in his 1953 book, "The Impact of Science on Society" said, "Diet, injections and injunctions will combine from a very early age, to produce the sort of character the authorities consider desirable."
Probably the biggest food bullies of them all, Monsanto, unabashedly said that it is their GOAL to take over the food biosphere of the planet. One of the things they are a little bit known for, (and should be better known), is bovine growth hormone produced by Monsanto to inject into cows to make them produce more milk and thereby more money. This growth hormone was investigated by many countries and disallowed because of dangers. Luckily Canada was one. But in the U.S. kids are reaching puberty at 8, boys are growing playoff beards along with their Dads, and a whole pile of other scary things linked to this hormone are obviously happening but people don't know why. Fox News was going to produce a story on this hormone in milk and a high-priced, Monsanto-hired lawyer sent them a letter stating that there would be dire consequences if the story was aired. The station chief shut it down. This is why Fox News is, well, Fox News.
Then there's the Monsanto Frankencorn that grows its own pesticides. About 85% of the corn in the States is this stuff that is linked to organ failure, sterility, caused lab animals' stomachs to explode... but it's a good cash crop! The corn farmers don't eat the corn they grow. NONE of them! Well not the Monsanto crap anyway. That is all I need to know. Pancreatic cancer, mercury poisoning, brain damage... Because of FRUCTOSE, sugar we get from corn and is in almost everything nowadays, it is estimated that Americans eat 5X the upper limit of allowable mercury.
Why the fructose? It goes back to 1977 when sugar tariffs pushed up the cost of imported sugar so corn syrup fructose became and attractively cheap alternative to the food and beverage manufacturers. As always, it's about the money.
Asparatame is reportedly made from the feces of genetically engineered ecoli bacteria that is fed toxic waste! Now I don't know if that's true but I've had a lot of people tell me to eat shit and die. Maybe I am doing just that! Maybe we ALL are!
Apparently Nazis added sodium fluoride to the water supplies of the labour camps during wartime to make the prisoner population more docile and easier to control. Also it caused sterility. They used one part per million. In some products sold nowadays there are 900 parts per million of the same stuff! And it's legal.
2 cups of flour could have a U.S. F.D.A. allowable 375 insect fragments and 5 rodent hair/feces fragments.
It sure looks like SOMEbody is trying to make us more docile, easy to deal with, and possibly kill us with the food we eat! I've noticed since coming back to Canada that my reflux and stomach constancy has deteriorated. I thought it was just the kinds of foods I've been eating here compared to Korea. Maybe it's the additives IN those foods.
"Chemically treated produce, highly processed foods, and refined ingredients like white flour and sugar cause sickness and disease as well as a host of minor ailments such as digestive issues and lack of energy." Miami Herald
But I'm not all that worried. In fact I think my diet could best be called the opposite of what's supposed to be good for me. I eat eggs and high colesterol butter or margarine all the time. I have plenty of salty snacks on hand at all times in case I feel my blood pressure dropping dangerously low to around what science tells us is normality. Pasta is my friend Atkins-be-damned! I once saw a friend of mine eat an entire loaf of bread. No jam, peanut butter, butter, just the bread. He is a doctor now. The bread did HIM no harm and I don't think it hurts me at all either even though I eat a LOT. Oil, bring it on! It keeps my coat nice and shiny.
I follow one easy rule at the grocery store: get what's the cheapest. It may be cheap because it is the unhealthily mass produced junk the corporations poison us with, or it may be cheap because the carefully produced, vitimin enriched, low-cal, high fibre, dietary, cholesterol-free, penis enlarging, trans fat friendly, heart-helping, lipophobia-easing, polyunsaturated, hydrogenated, soybean-based, Bulgarian Shepherd approved food requires a little higher sticker price for all that goodness. Not to mention labelling.
Whether food becomes cheaper or more expensive when science starts messing with it is a little too hard for me to ascertain at this time. So I'll take my chances that I am losing years off my life eating what I want. Those years will come off the end of my life when the quality thereof is not so high.
I read some interesting stuff about food in the National Post "Junk Science" week recently. It just made things even more confusing. One of the interesting things written about was the "good bacteria" in yogurt called bacillus Bulgaricus that allegedly prevents mental illness, sexual dysfunction, tuberculosis and scores of other problems including death by heart disease. A lot of this started from a study done by a Russian scientist named Elie Metchnikoff who said that Bulgarian herdsmen, and other yogurt drinkers, lived longer and were free from colon diseases. Even though the health benefits were found to be non-existent, with the help of the media, (and Danone fresh yogurt business), yogurt became all the rage.
It went a bit out of style but has made a recent comeback during this war on fat that has all kinds of political, social, philanthropic, media, corporate, government regulator, surgeon general and celebrity support. I guess a guy named Ancel Keys did a study comparing, again, Bulgarian herdsmen with American businessmen. Overlooking obvious variables such as smoking and stress, Keys concluded that it was high levels of cholesterol that led to so many businessmen dying of sudden heart attacks. So don't quit your job on Wall Street where you rip out your hair and smoke 2 packs every day because of the stress, just have some yogurt and you'll be fine.
You all remember the saturated fat and cholesteral concern that resulted. And you must remember the thousands of products and promotions like "Heart Smart", "Heart Check" and the like. At one point a U.S. government committee had some hearings on diet and killer diseases they included testimony that 98.9% of the world's nutrition researchers believed that there was a connection between blood cholesterol levels and heart disease. Well, in Feb. 2010 there were results published from some better science from 21 lengthy studies using almost 350,000 subjects that concluded no association between saturated fat consumption and risk of heart disease.
The development of this fear-based marketing, and how to create a scientific consensus is fascinating reading! During all of this eggs went from good to bad so many times it's impossible to keep track. Whole milk swung back and forth like the Grim Reaper's scythe too. Margarine was heart-healthy and then artery-clogging. Butter too. Salt once considered essential to human existence is now white death in a shaker.
Polyunsaturated oil was actually considered a health food and Harvard nutritionist Frederick Stare agreed with the Keys "research" and advised swallowing three tablespoons of it every day as medication. But after so many studies TRYING to link saturated fat and heart disease failed, he reversed his position and co-authored a book denouncing the cholesterol scare.
The corporate action during this time may be even MORE fun to learn about. The American Medical Association saw a way to get in on the junk science. They supported the movement away from saturated fats but ONLY under, (costly), medical supervision. And long after it became apparent that the cholesterol scare was not based in good science, the AHA actually SOLD the right to use its "Heart Check" symbols to food companies. They got $2500 from Kelloggs for each of its products that sported the symbol including the heart-strengthening Fruity Marshmallow Krispies, and $200,000 to Florida citrus fruit producers for EXCLUSIVE rights to use it. Like only Florida oranges fought heart disease. California oranges were artery cloggers! The AHA got 3.5 MILLION bucks from ConAgra, like Monsanto, one of those companies that nobody knows about but you are probably going to eat one of its products today. You may be eating one NOW! Then in 2000 they introduced a "Heart Healthy" diet that got them an estimated 15 million in endorsements.
Nowadays there's supposed to be a child obesity epidemic. I see a lot of the same tactics being employed here. There's money to be made! The big target seems to be sugary drinks. In New York City they proposed to ban the sale of any sweetened drink in servings bigger than 16 ounces in places like movie theaters, fast food restaurants, sports arenas etc. I smell a rat. Anybody knows that buying more smaller containers will cost more.
Other cities are proposing taxes, like Richmond, California, of one cent per ounce on big drinks. For the good of the kids, of course!
How about one PUSH-UP per ounce? It seems to me that all of this illustrates that people will go pretty far out of their way to avoid two things: 1) lowering stress by maybe sacrificing some work/money and 2) exercise. Kids play more video games than they used to. Parents BUY more. Kids aren't allowed to go outside unless they have a full set of armour on. Even then they could get kidnapped or killed. Kids aren't less active than they used to be, they are KEPT less active. This has more to do with the obesity than what they're drinking. At least that's what I reckon.
So in the end, what do we really know about what we eat? Probably less than we THINK we might know. CERTAINLY less than we are told. I think I'll just eat and drink what I want and what is cheap. If somebody tells me I shouldn't be eating/drinking it because it's bad for my health, I'll just wait ten or fifteen years until science/economics reverses the modern trends and say, "Hey remember that egg I was eating 10 years ago? I TOLD you it was good for me!"
Friday, February 03, 2012
The following is an article I wrote in 2005 after hearing that our Prime Minister was entering into trade talks with China. I am posting it here so as to add it as a link in a new post on my new blog. http://blowntosmithereens.blogspot.com
The new post is inspired by another visit to China by our Prime Minister.
Harsh language and opinion warning.
“The Phoenix is dying, some say dead.
‘Dead without issue’ is what one message read.
But that has been repressed. Officially denied.
I think myself the man who sent it lied.”
And attached to the message was the following:
Hu? We want to increase trade with Hu? Danger! Danger Paul Martin! Danger!
The whole world has unanimously, (though inexplicably), decreed that China will be the next economic superpower and since money is so much more important than anything else, all other countries are falling all over each other trying to see who can give China the economic ass-sucking of a lifetime. It appears that Canada is in the lead. I’m so proud!
But just whose ass are we sucking here? What do we really know about China? What the hell does Paul Martin know? Here’s what he knows: “President Hu smiled and shook my hand. China is wonderful! I think I’ll risk everything and do a whole lot of trading with them.” Moron! Anybody who lives in Vancouver or Toronto knows better than to trade with the Chinese unless it is absolutely necessary. And I’m talking REALLY lived. Not led the life of a sheltered-from-reality politician. The following is why two seemingly unrelated things like trade and human rights violations not only ARE related, but they are the very reason why China is about the worst trading partner Canada could possibly choose. We should not only avoid doubling trade, but we should stop the already existing relationship until China does something about the horrible state of affairs in their country. Unfortunately, if China was to, say, raise the income level of the average person to somewhere within sight of the poverty level in an attempt to quell the existing state of nothing less than national slavery, they wouldn’t be quite so attractive a trading partner, would they?
The first thing we have to understand is that trade, business, MONEY, is not a pastime, game, interest, casual pursuit, job, hobby or anything else so humdrum to the Chinese. IT IS WAR! This cannot be overstated. This is not overstated. It is not hyperbole or metaphor. War has always been about the conquest of land and people and the acquisition of wealth. Since conventional warfare is vastly unpopular worldwide, (just ask America, the most hated nation on the earth), China has chosen the next best way to acquire land, conquer people and get more than enough money to fill a room and roll around naked in: business.
When talking about war and China, one cannot escape mention of Sun Tzu. It has become fashionable to quote The Art of War in books, TV shows, even general conversation. Here are some fashionable quotes that will help us understand better the fact that once we start the Chinese war/business snowball rolling towards Canada, it’ll be a moon-sized city crusher in no time.
The first, and most important factor in considering military conditions, according to Sun Tzu, is the moral law. This actually sounds nice, but we have to understand that the Chinese idea of morality is completely different from our own. Tzu defines the moral law as that which “causes the people to be in complete accord with their ruler, so that they will follow him regardless of their lives, undismayed by any danger”. Call it brainwashing, mind control, Big Brother, whatever, there is absolutely nothing moral about it. Are all Chinese people of one accord in the pursuit of wealth heedless of life, or danger? Check.
Sun Tzu writes, “All warfare is based on deception.” Is Chinese business based on deception? Check. And the Chinese will tell you so unless they are doing business with you.
Last one, I promise. “Many calculations lead to victory, few to defeat.” Is the Chinese business plan to economically annex Canada coldly calculated? CHECK! But as a testament to the skillful Chinese deception, (rule #2), nobody in Canada knows it yet!
So how do we educate Canadians as to what’s going on? The first step is knowing our enemy. Who is the “ruler” who the Chinese are in one accord with? Right now the president of China is Hu Jintao but he’s just a representative of the real ruler of China. I’m referring to the Chinese Communist Party, of course.
How is it that Chinese communism has prospered while all others have failed? Is it simply that the Chinese are too arrogant and stubborn to change that even when something better comes along they cling to what they have? There IS something to be said for that argument. 85.2% of Chinese people are illiterate but will they make themselves an alphabet? Nooooo! I admit, Chinese letters are cool, but get an alphabet for God’s sake! But then, I guess it’s easier to keep uneducated people “in one accord” with the ruler, isn’t it? Yes, I said uneducated people. It flies in the face of all our Chinese stereotypes to think of them as an uneducated people because everyone in Canada or America has had Chinese kids in the same schools with them and invariably they are obliterating the bell curves and making us normal students look bad. But that’s only because when you get to a country that has a lot of something you can’t get in your own country, you take advantage of it.
For that matter, why are there so many Chinese people who are so good at so many things? Is it just because there are 1.2 billion of them to choose from? I think that’s part of it, but I think it’s mostly because of that one accord thing. The goal in everything is money. Education for the kids means money. Becoming a better acrobat means money. Swimming faster, whacking the ping-pong ball harder, diving with less splash means money. Heedless of life or danger, Chinese parents heroically beat hell out of their kids in the single-minded attempt to achieve the common goal. It’s going to take a lot of money to buy Canada.
But getting back to the question of why the CCP is still in power, it’s pretty much the same reason why kids study or practice for a parent snapping a belt while hovering menacingly over them. Wouldn’t you obey a parent like that? How about if your parent chopped off the heads of two of your siblings and held the bloody axe to your neck and told you to work. Would you then? That’s a little more like how the CCP stays in power.
I don’t want to throw too many stats at you because the Chinese are so secretive about things like how many people they’ve killed today, but it’s generally accepted that between 65 and 80 million people have died at the hands of the CCP since they came to power in 1949. That’s more than Hitler killed. If they had only tried a bit harder they could have made 2 million people a year. And who knows, actual stats might even be that high.
Between 1950 and 1952 the CCP eliminated all village leaders throughout China, stealing massive wealth and replacing them all with CCP representatives. They actually admit to killing, by their calculations, 2.4 million people during what the CCP euphemistically called its “Land Reform” program. The real total is closer to 5 million.
Between 1959 and 1961 the CCP decided that China needed more steel so they forced all the farmers to help all the other citizens in the production of the steel. Crops were abandoned and rotted in the fields. This was called the “Great Leap Forward” but really it was just a nice catchphrase for “national labour camp”. It was a huge success. They produced lots of steel and thinned the population by about 30 million through starvation. Who knows which of the two pleased the CCP more?
From 1966 to 1976 Mao Zedung started his “Cultural Revolution”. The aim was to eliminate traditional Chinese culture and beliefs and start anew. Does this, (Pol), ring any, (Pot), bells, (Cambodia), historically? In Cambodia there are stories of people being killed for speaking a foreign language or wearing glasses during the time of Pol Pot. During the Chinese Cultural Revolution there was comparable chaos. Since it was harder to convince the older people of China to abandon tradition, children from middle school to university age formed the Red Guard. The purpose of the Red Guard was to be revolutionary and to stop all non-revolutionary behaviour in adults. Killing solidified your revolutionary status. Kids beat and even killed elders, teachers, relatives, even parents. Or sometimes they would turn them in to authorities who beat, tortured, publicly humiliated or killed them. Things became so Lord of the Flies insane that they actually deteriorated into rampant cannibalism. This is not a million years ago. I was alive while this was happening!
June 4th, 1989. Tiananmen Square. Between 600 and 3000 peaceful protestors were shot or crushed beneath tank tracks. Most were unarmed students. NOW how do you like that guy in the famous picture standing in front of the tank? The CCP has never admitted to any wrongdoing, much less apologized for Tiananmen Square.
1999. Yes, 1999! That’s 6 years ago folks. CCP chairman Jiang Zemin, (remember him?), became jealous of the popularity of Falun Gong and ordered it eradicated. Falun Gong is a terrorist group right? It’s an organization plotting against the CCP, right? Not even close. It’s a type of breathing exercise like Tai Chi that aims to refine the body and mind through breathing and meditating. When the number of its practitioners was deemed to have exceeded the number of CCP members, Jiang Zemin outlawed it. 3 million were sent to prison or forced labour camps and there have been about 30,000 reported cases of torture and abuse in custody. Why? The CCP didn’t like the way some people were BREATHING!
In 2002 Dr. Wan Yanhai was detained. The charge was “revealing state secrets”. What, you ask, might he have done? He was trying to control the outbreak of AIDS in Hunan Province where hundreds of thousands of rural villagers had been infected through faulty blood collection practices in CCP government-backed clinics. I suppose this was another CCP attempt at population control and shame on Dr. Wan for revealing it! The same thing happened a little while later with the news of SARS being repressed in China until it had become an epidemic.
In 2003 Zhang Bin was beaten to death in a “reeducation-through-labour” camp. There are an estimated 250,000 people in these labour camps at any given time in China.
The government of China has tried to reform. In 2005 they released the White Paper outlining how good they’ve been. No doubt to ease people’s fears about the upcoming Olympics in China. They have, for example, tried to control population in less objectionable ways. In all areas of China there are local officials, (all members of the CCP), who are in charge of family planning. Forced abortions and sterilizations are commonly used by these officials, whose paychecks are based on performance. If someone tries to flee a forced abortion or sterilization, his/her family members are held hostage and beaten until the person returns. So far zero deaths have been reported! But in a country that mandates an 80%/20% ratio of good news to bad in all media, it’ll be a while before anything leaks out. A guy named Chen Guang Cheng tried to protest forced abortion and sterilization and he is now under house arrest. No phone, no computer, regular beatings by police, you know, REFORM!
But they repealed the crime of counterrevolution! You remember the one that lead to the Red Guard, the beatings and killings and many a delicious meal during the Cultural Revolution period? Yeah, repealed. Now if they would only release the 500-600 people still in jail for counterrevolution. Not to mention the 2000 or so people in jail for the Tiananmen Square incident. Also counterrevolution.
Ummmmm okay, what about the UN conventions they’ve signed? Like the 1990 convention on the Rights of the Child. But, we know of at least one child who’s been in custody for 10 years now and is only 16. He also has recently been declared the 11th incarnation of the Panchen Lama of yada yada yada. Immediately after that declaration he and his parents were moved to an undisclosed location and haven’t been heard from since. Oh yeah, he’s a holy figure in Tibet. Shall we mention Tibet?
This year a couple Tibetan monks got 11-year prison terms for hoisting Tibetan national flags. No, there’s way too much about Tibet. Let’s get back to the UN conventions. The 1988 convention against torture was signed by China. However, many deaths in custody produce strong evidence of torture and autopsy results are refused release. Mostly because of China, the UN human rights council has come to be regarded as a sad farce. The upcoming UN conference will no doubt maintain this record since even the UN doesn’t want to jeopardize any country’s shot at a piece of that huge Chinese supply of slave labour.
And speaking of that conference, what is our boy, Mr. Martin seeking there? His plan of attack is to advocate more aggressive UN action against genocides and war crimes. He also wants to mention the Kyoto Protocol and stress the protection of the environment. Peace, non-violence and global ecology. China still executes more people than any nation on earth, they have three of the top ten polluted cities on earth and they are the most polluted country. They have not signed the Kyoto Protocol but if they did, they would dishonour it the way they did all the UN conventions they signed, aaaand pretty much everything else they sign. And getting back to the original point, there is no FUCKING way they will honour any trade agreement they sign with Canada.
China is the absolute antithesis of everything Canada is trying to appear to stand for. Yet Mr. Martin is saying, “Hey China, let$$$ be friends.” Is there anybody in Canada but greedy politicians who want to be friends with China? Maybe some greedy businessfolk. But I sure don’t. Not until I see some genuine reform.
In case you have any misconceptions of the size of the Chinese economic/war snowball as it pertains to Canada, let me bring up another point. One that Paul Martin actually might have a clue about. He did say recently that, “As long as they obey our laws…” when referring to China and the blindfolded leap of faith he’s ready to take into a more extensive trade agreement with them.
We already have a 25 billion a year trade relationship with China and we have had many years to get to know them as citizens of our country. There are, (scoff), a million Chinese Canadians right now. (YEAH! In downtown Vancouver!) What is their record in obeying the laws of Canada? Abysmal at best. And this is yet another form of the deception talked about as part of the war/business plan. They try to make us think that they disobey our laws through ignorance. Quite the opposite. No citizen is better informed than a Chinese Canadian about our legal system especially pertaining to matters of business. But as long as they can play dumb and break laws, nobody notices that they are being very clever and CHANGING our laws. Or at least per$uading the appropriately corrupt government officials to relax certain laws to make profit easier. That is until such time as they can elect Chinese Canadians to these offices so they don’t have to do quite so much per$uading. They are also very good at abusing the Canadian fear of anything that can in any way shape or form be construed as racist or discriminatory. The famous Canadian reverse racism where we treat people BETTER because they are not from Canada. Canadians don’t know it but we are actually one of the most racist countries on earth. This is the only reason any Chinese people have a hope in Hell of becoming a Canadian politician. Let me tell you a story to illustrate my point.
I worked for a Chinese college in Vancouver for a couple of years and in that time I saw half of my students. The other half never came to class. Not even once. It was the same for all the teachers at both locations. This represents many thousands of Chinese people who knowingly breached their student visa agreements. And this was only one of over 120 foreign “schools” in Vancouver at the time, many of which were owned by Chinese. I have no doubt that just about all of these mystery students worked illegally for a friend or relative with an existing business in Vancouver. When you start figuring the amount of money in taxes, potential revenue and jobs for Canadians gone by the wayside in this little deal, it is upsetting. I felt a duty to report this to the appropriate Canadian authorities. When I finally reached a human being, she promptly called me a racist and hung up on me. I suffered through the requisite Canadian government agency phone gymnastics another time and a different human answered. He told me very nicely that there was absolutely nothing that anyone could do. Nothing Canada can do about illegal Chinese workers posing as students. The Chinese had obviously relaxed this law in some private agreement. Possibly it was lobbied by one of an increasing number of Chinese Canadian politicians. Who knows? Not the Canadian public.
Another issue Martin and Hu were talking about in their recent meeting is for China to change Canada’s status to “preferred” country thereby allowing regular citizens of China to visit. But now you know that they are already coming over posing as students. Until now it has officially, but not in reality, been only businessmen, dignitaries and “students” who were allowed out of China to visit Canada. This doesn’t make me any more comfortable since with the obvious lack of concern for Canadian law, I have no doubt that a lot of the regular citizens will work illegally in Canada and break Canadian laws as well. This is not to mention all the stories I’ve heard from people at the housing authority, social assistance office, insurance companies like ICBC and many other agencies who all just shake their heads and roll their eyes when you mention the Chinese. They have knowledge of our laws, they just have no concern whatsoever about them. The Chinese behave this way in Canada in one accord, for the common purpose, to make money.
My concern about the new increased trade with China, and our new “preferred” status in Canada is what laws will China get to weaken or relax or change in exchange for this privilege. If we do get increased tourism it’ll only be the rich Chinese coming to Canada. And who the hell needs them? There is only one way to get rich in China and that is to cheat, lie and steal better than the other billion people. So with the new increased trade with China we will be importing all the least moral, (by western standards), and most moral, (by Chinese standards), businessmen and their families. If there are any honest businessmen in all of China, they are languishing in mediocrity or more likely abject poverty in China. Don’t think I’m being too hard on the Chinese because when I worked at the Chinese school, my students, who were predominantly majoring in business, all agreed with every word of this.
When you think of all the hardship Canada will suffer through increased trade with China, it makes it even worse when we contemplate the fact that without a doubt, China needs Canada much more than Canada needs China. However, one must show some compassion for the Chinese state of affairs and wonder whether or not ANY country wouldn’t be the same under such conditions. The official estimate of urban unemployment in China is 4%. In reality it’s closer to 20%. In the country it’s even worse. The estimated per capita income in 2002 was $933 US in the city, $300 in the country. The World Bank estimates that 100 to 150 million people are living in absolute poverty in China. A dollar a day. That’s not absolute poverty, it’s something beyond. It creates an entirely new Maslovian list of principles. Look at things realistically, (i.e. not buried in multicultural, hypersensitive, super-tolerant niceties we suppress realism with in Canada), if the minimum wage in Canada is 9 bucks an hour the average Chinese person can make more in an hour in Canada than a week in China. By mathematical projection an 8-hour day, (which is all but laziness to a good Chinaman), represents 72 times the salary available to the average Chinese person. What would YOU do for 72 times what you’re making now? This is a question immigration and government officials need to ask themselves when dealing with the Chinese. But they don’t because these stats are so well hidden. Sun Tzuian deception or Canadian dismissive positivity? Hard to say.
Is there any Chinese product, other than chicken chow mien, that Canada desperately needs? No. But China desperately needs raw materials that Canada abounds in. Look how desperately they needed steel back in the 60’s. Canada is in a fantastic position to bring about real and needful changes in China but we must do that by DENYING China increased trade until they change. But instead it looks like Paul Martin will decide to give a lot to get a little. The MUCH more important issue here is wiping out one of the most inhumane, savage, demonic reigns of terror the world has ever known. Are we really so sick with the money disease that we can’t see this? It appears our Prime Minister is.
Part of the Olympic philosophy is, “Olympians seek to create a way of life based on … the educational value of good example and respect for universal fundamental ethical principles.” Until China becomes more Olympian Canada has to tell them to hit the bricks and FOR THE LOVE OF GOD, can you find a worse country to host the Olympics???
“At any rate, he has been shot.
As a precautionary measure,
whether he did, or not.”
The new post is inspired by another visit to China by our Prime Minister.
Harsh language and opinion warning.
“The Phoenix is dying, some say dead.
‘Dead without issue’ is what one message read.
But that has been repressed. Officially denied.
I think myself the man who sent it lied.”
And attached to the message was the following:
Hu? We want to increase trade with Hu? Danger! Danger Paul Martin! Danger!
The whole world has unanimously, (though inexplicably), decreed that China will be the next economic superpower and since money is so much more important than anything else, all other countries are falling all over each other trying to see who can give China the economic ass-sucking of a lifetime. It appears that Canada is in the lead. I’m so proud!
But just whose ass are we sucking here? What do we really know about China? What the hell does Paul Martin know? Here’s what he knows: “President Hu smiled and shook my hand. China is wonderful! I think I’ll risk everything and do a whole lot of trading with them.” Moron! Anybody who lives in Vancouver or Toronto knows better than to trade with the Chinese unless it is absolutely necessary. And I’m talking REALLY lived. Not led the life of a sheltered-from-reality politician. The following is why two seemingly unrelated things like trade and human rights violations not only ARE related, but they are the very reason why China is about the worst trading partner Canada could possibly choose. We should not only avoid doubling trade, but we should stop the already existing relationship until China does something about the horrible state of affairs in their country. Unfortunately, if China was to, say, raise the income level of the average person to somewhere within sight of the poverty level in an attempt to quell the existing state of nothing less than national slavery, they wouldn’t be quite so attractive a trading partner, would they?
The first thing we have to understand is that trade, business, MONEY, is not a pastime, game, interest, casual pursuit, job, hobby or anything else so humdrum to the Chinese. IT IS WAR! This cannot be overstated. This is not overstated. It is not hyperbole or metaphor. War has always been about the conquest of land and people and the acquisition of wealth. Since conventional warfare is vastly unpopular worldwide, (just ask America, the most hated nation on the earth), China has chosen the next best way to acquire land, conquer people and get more than enough money to fill a room and roll around naked in: business.
When talking about war and China, one cannot escape mention of Sun Tzu. It has become fashionable to quote The Art of War in books, TV shows, even general conversation. Here are some fashionable quotes that will help us understand better the fact that once we start the Chinese war/business snowball rolling towards Canada, it’ll be a moon-sized city crusher in no time.
The first, and most important factor in considering military conditions, according to Sun Tzu, is the moral law. This actually sounds nice, but we have to understand that the Chinese idea of morality is completely different from our own. Tzu defines the moral law as that which “causes the people to be in complete accord with their ruler, so that they will follow him regardless of their lives, undismayed by any danger”. Call it brainwashing, mind control, Big Brother, whatever, there is absolutely nothing moral about it. Are all Chinese people of one accord in the pursuit of wealth heedless of life, or danger? Check.
Sun Tzu writes, “All warfare is based on deception.” Is Chinese business based on deception? Check. And the Chinese will tell you so unless they are doing business with you.
Last one, I promise. “Many calculations lead to victory, few to defeat.” Is the Chinese business plan to economically annex Canada coldly calculated? CHECK! But as a testament to the skillful Chinese deception, (rule #2), nobody in Canada knows it yet!
So how do we educate Canadians as to what’s going on? The first step is knowing our enemy. Who is the “ruler” who the Chinese are in one accord with? Right now the president of China is Hu Jintao but he’s just a representative of the real ruler of China. I’m referring to the Chinese Communist Party, of course.
How is it that Chinese communism has prospered while all others have failed? Is it simply that the Chinese are too arrogant and stubborn to change that even when something better comes along they cling to what they have? There IS something to be said for that argument. 85.2% of Chinese people are illiterate but will they make themselves an alphabet? Nooooo! I admit, Chinese letters are cool, but get an alphabet for God’s sake! But then, I guess it’s easier to keep uneducated people “in one accord” with the ruler, isn’t it? Yes, I said uneducated people. It flies in the face of all our Chinese stereotypes to think of them as an uneducated people because everyone in Canada or America has had Chinese kids in the same schools with them and invariably they are obliterating the bell curves and making us normal students look bad. But that’s only because when you get to a country that has a lot of something you can’t get in your own country, you take advantage of it.
For that matter, why are there so many Chinese people who are so good at so many things? Is it just because there are 1.2 billion of them to choose from? I think that’s part of it, but I think it’s mostly because of that one accord thing. The goal in everything is money. Education for the kids means money. Becoming a better acrobat means money. Swimming faster, whacking the ping-pong ball harder, diving with less splash means money. Heedless of life or danger, Chinese parents heroically beat hell out of their kids in the single-minded attempt to achieve the common goal. It’s going to take a lot of money to buy Canada.
But getting back to the question of why the CCP is still in power, it’s pretty much the same reason why kids study or practice for a parent snapping a belt while hovering menacingly over them. Wouldn’t you obey a parent like that? How about if your parent chopped off the heads of two of your siblings and held the bloody axe to your neck and told you to work. Would you then? That’s a little more like how the CCP stays in power.
I don’t want to throw too many stats at you because the Chinese are so secretive about things like how many people they’ve killed today, but it’s generally accepted that between 65 and 80 million people have died at the hands of the CCP since they came to power in 1949. That’s more than Hitler killed. If they had only tried a bit harder they could have made 2 million people a year. And who knows, actual stats might even be that high.
Between 1950 and 1952 the CCP eliminated all village leaders throughout China, stealing massive wealth and replacing them all with CCP representatives. They actually admit to killing, by their calculations, 2.4 million people during what the CCP euphemistically called its “Land Reform” program. The real total is closer to 5 million.
Between 1959 and 1961 the CCP decided that China needed more steel so they forced all the farmers to help all the other citizens in the production of the steel. Crops were abandoned and rotted in the fields. This was called the “Great Leap Forward” but really it was just a nice catchphrase for “national labour camp”. It was a huge success. They produced lots of steel and thinned the population by about 30 million through starvation. Who knows which of the two pleased the CCP more?
From 1966 to 1976 Mao Zedung started his “Cultural Revolution”. The aim was to eliminate traditional Chinese culture and beliefs and start anew. Does this, (Pol), ring any, (Pot), bells, (Cambodia), historically? In Cambodia there are stories of people being killed for speaking a foreign language or wearing glasses during the time of Pol Pot. During the Chinese Cultural Revolution there was comparable chaos. Since it was harder to convince the older people of China to abandon tradition, children from middle school to university age formed the Red Guard. The purpose of the Red Guard was to be revolutionary and to stop all non-revolutionary behaviour in adults. Killing solidified your revolutionary status. Kids beat and even killed elders, teachers, relatives, even parents. Or sometimes they would turn them in to authorities who beat, tortured, publicly humiliated or killed them. Things became so Lord of the Flies insane that they actually deteriorated into rampant cannibalism. This is not a million years ago. I was alive while this was happening!
June 4th, 1989. Tiananmen Square. Between 600 and 3000 peaceful protestors were shot or crushed beneath tank tracks. Most were unarmed students. NOW how do you like that guy in the famous picture standing in front of the tank? The CCP has never admitted to any wrongdoing, much less apologized for Tiananmen Square.
1999. Yes, 1999! That’s 6 years ago folks. CCP chairman Jiang Zemin, (remember him?), became jealous of the popularity of Falun Gong and ordered it eradicated. Falun Gong is a terrorist group right? It’s an organization plotting against the CCP, right? Not even close. It’s a type of breathing exercise like Tai Chi that aims to refine the body and mind through breathing and meditating. When the number of its practitioners was deemed to have exceeded the number of CCP members, Jiang Zemin outlawed it. 3 million were sent to prison or forced labour camps and there have been about 30,000 reported cases of torture and abuse in custody. Why? The CCP didn’t like the way some people were BREATHING!
In 2002 Dr. Wan Yanhai was detained. The charge was “revealing state secrets”. What, you ask, might he have done? He was trying to control the outbreak of AIDS in Hunan Province where hundreds of thousands of rural villagers had been infected through faulty blood collection practices in CCP government-backed clinics. I suppose this was another CCP attempt at population control and shame on Dr. Wan for revealing it! The same thing happened a little while later with the news of SARS being repressed in China until it had become an epidemic.
In 2003 Zhang Bin was beaten to death in a “reeducation-through-labour” camp. There are an estimated 250,000 people in these labour camps at any given time in China.
The government of China has tried to reform. In 2005 they released the White Paper outlining how good they’ve been. No doubt to ease people’s fears about the upcoming Olympics in China. They have, for example, tried to control population in less objectionable ways. In all areas of China there are local officials, (all members of the CCP), who are in charge of family planning. Forced abortions and sterilizations are commonly used by these officials, whose paychecks are based on performance. If someone tries to flee a forced abortion or sterilization, his/her family members are held hostage and beaten until the person returns. So far zero deaths have been reported! But in a country that mandates an 80%/20% ratio of good news to bad in all media, it’ll be a while before anything leaks out. A guy named Chen Guang Cheng tried to protest forced abortion and sterilization and he is now under house arrest. No phone, no computer, regular beatings by police, you know, REFORM!
But they repealed the crime of counterrevolution! You remember the one that lead to the Red Guard, the beatings and killings and many a delicious meal during the Cultural Revolution period? Yeah, repealed. Now if they would only release the 500-600 people still in jail for counterrevolution. Not to mention the 2000 or so people in jail for the Tiananmen Square incident. Also counterrevolution.
Ummmmm okay, what about the UN conventions they’ve signed? Like the 1990 convention on the Rights of the Child. But, we know of at least one child who’s been in custody for 10 years now and is only 16. He also has recently been declared the 11th incarnation of the Panchen Lama of yada yada yada. Immediately after that declaration he and his parents were moved to an undisclosed location and haven’t been heard from since. Oh yeah, he’s a holy figure in Tibet. Shall we mention Tibet?
This year a couple Tibetan monks got 11-year prison terms for hoisting Tibetan national flags. No, there’s way too much about Tibet. Let’s get back to the UN conventions. The 1988 convention against torture was signed by China. However, many deaths in custody produce strong evidence of torture and autopsy results are refused release. Mostly because of China, the UN human rights council has come to be regarded as a sad farce. The upcoming UN conference will no doubt maintain this record since even the UN doesn’t want to jeopardize any country’s shot at a piece of that huge Chinese supply of slave labour.
And speaking of that conference, what is our boy, Mr. Martin seeking there? His plan of attack is to advocate more aggressive UN action against genocides and war crimes. He also wants to mention the Kyoto Protocol and stress the protection of the environment. Peace, non-violence and global ecology. China still executes more people than any nation on earth, they have three of the top ten polluted cities on earth and they are the most polluted country. They have not signed the Kyoto Protocol but if they did, they would dishonour it the way they did all the UN conventions they signed, aaaand pretty much everything else they sign. And getting back to the original point, there is no FUCKING way they will honour any trade agreement they sign with Canada.
China is the absolute antithesis of everything Canada is trying to appear to stand for. Yet Mr. Martin is saying, “Hey China, let$$$ be friends.” Is there anybody in Canada but greedy politicians who want to be friends with China? Maybe some greedy businessfolk. But I sure don’t. Not until I see some genuine reform.
In case you have any misconceptions of the size of the Chinese economic/war snowball as it pertains to Canada, let me bring up another point. One that Paul Martin actually might have a clue about. He did say recently that, “As long as they obey our laws…” when referring to China and the blindfolded leap of faith he’s ready to take into a more extensive trade agreement with them.
We already have a 25 billion a year trade relationship with China and we have had many years to get to know them as citizens of our country. There are, (scoff), a million Chinese Canadians right now. (YEAH! In downtown Vancouver!) What is their record in obeying the laws of Canada? Abysmal at best. And this is yet another form of the deception talked about as part of the war/business plan. They try to make us think that they disobey our laws through ignorance. Quite the opposite. No citizen is better informed than a Chinese Canadian about our legal system especially pertaining to matters of business. But as long as they can play dumb and break laws, nobody notices that they are being very clever and CHANGING our laws. Or at least per$uading the appropriately corrupt government officials to relax certain laws to make profit easier. That is until such time as they can elect Chinese Canadians to these offices so they don’t have to do quite so much per$uading. They are also very good at abusing the Canadian fear of anything that can in any way shape or form be construed as racist or discriminatory. The famous Canadian reverse racism where we treat people BETTER because they are not from Canada. Canadians don’t know it but we are actually one of the most racist countries on earth. This is the only reason any Chinese people have a hope in Hell of becoming a Canadian politician. Let me tell you a story to illustrate my point.
I worked for a Chinese college in Vancouver for a couple of years and in that time I saw half of my students. The other half never came to class. Not even once. It was the same for all the teachers at both locations. This represents many thousands of Chinese people who knowingly breached their student visa agreements. And this was only one of over 120 foreign “schools” in Vancouver at the time, many of which were owned by Chinese. I have no doubt that just about all of these mystery students worked illegally for a friend or relative with an existing business in Vancouver. When you start figuring the amount of money in taxes, potential revenue and jobs for Canadians gone by the wayside in this little deal, it is upsetting. I felt a duty to report this to the appropriate Canadian authorities. When I finally reached a human being, she promptly called me a racist and hung up on me. I suffered through the requisite Canadian government agency phone gymnastics another time and a different human answered. He told me very nicely that there was absolutely nothing that anyone could do. Nothing Canada can do about illegal Chinese workers posing as students. The Chinese had obviously relaxed this law in some private agreement. Possibly it was lobbied by one of an increasing number of Chinese Canadian politicians. Who knows? Not the Canadian public.
Another issue Martin and Hu were talking about in their recent meeting is for China to change Canada’s status to “preferred” country thereby allowing regular citizens of China to visit. But now you know that they are already coming over posing as students. Until now it has officially, but not in reality, been only businessmen, dignitaries and “students” who were allowed out of China to visit Canada. This doesn’t make me any more comfortable since with the obvious lack of concern for Canadian law, I have no doubt that a lot of the regular citizens will work illegally in Canada and break Canadian laws as well. This is not to mention all the stories I’ve heard from people at the housing authority, social assistance office, insurance companies like ICBC and many other agencies who all just shake their heads and roll their eyes when you mention the Chinese. They have knowledge of our laws, they just have no concern whatsoever about them. The Chinese behave this way in Canada in one accord, for the common purpose, to make money.
My concern about the new increased trade with China, and our new “preferred” status in Canada is what laws will China get to weaken or relax or change in exchange for this privilege. If we do get increased tourism it’ll only be the rich Chinese coming to Canada. And who the hell needs them? There is only one way to get rich in China and that is to cheat, lie and steal better than the other billion people. So with the new increased trade with China we will be importing all the least moral, (by western standards), and most moral, (by Chinese standards), businessmen and their families. If there are any honest businessmen in all of China, they are languishing in mediocrity or more likely abject poverty in China. Don’t think I’m being too hard on the Chinese because when I worked at the Chinese school, my students, who were predominantly majoring in business, all agreed with every word of this.
When you think of all the hardship Canada will suffer through increased trade with China, it makes it even worse when we contemplate the fact that without a doubt, China needs Canada much more than Canada needs China. However, one must show some compassion for the Chinese state of affairs and wonder whether or not ANY country wouldn’t be the same under such conditions. The official estimate of urban unemployment in China is 4%. In reality it’s closer to 20%. In the country it’s even worse. The estimated per capita income in 2002 was $933 US in the city, $300 in the country. The World Bank estimates that 100 to 150 million people are living in absolute poverty in China. A dollar a day. That’s not absolute poverty, it’s something beyond. It creates an entirely new Maslovian list of principles. Look at things realistically, (i.e. not buried in multicultural, hypersensitive, super-tolerant niceties we suppress realism with in Canada), if the minimum wage in Canada is 9 bucks an hour the average Chinese person can make more in an hour in Canada than a week in China. By mathematical projection an 8-hour day, (which is all but laziness to a good Chinaman), represents 72 times the salary available to the average Chinese person. What would YOU do for 72 times what you’re making now? This is a question immigration and government officials need to ask themselves when dealing with the Chinese. But they don’t because these stats are so well hidden. Sun Tzuian deception or Canadian dismissive positivity? Hard to say.
Is there any Chinese product, other than chicken chow mien, that Canada desperately needs? No. But China desperately needs raw materials that Canada abounds in. Look how desperately they needed steel back in the 60’s. Canada is in a fantastic position to bring about real and needful changes in China but we must do that by DENYING China increased trade until they change. But instead it looks like Paul Martin will decide to give a lot to get a little. The MUCH more important issue here is wiping out one of the most inhumane, savage, demonic reigns of terror the world has ever known. Are we really so sick with the money disease that we can’t see this? It appears our Prime Minister is.
Part of the Olympic philosophy is, “Olympians seek to create a way of life based on … the educational value of good example and respect for universal fundamental ethical principles.” Until China becomes more Olympian Canada has to tell them to hit the bricks and FOR THE LOVE OF GOD, can you find a worse country to host the Olympics???
“At any rate, he has been shot.
As a precautionary measure,
whether he did, or not.”
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