Victor's Story

Once, what feels like many years ago, I was friends with a man called Victor. He came from Kenya and he was always smiling and positive; seriously I don't think I ever even saw him sporting a frown. He was friends with everyone at our school. Victor was always up for a party and he would travel far and wide in search of them. I wasn't very close with Victor, probably because I couldn't keep up with him.

Victor had a problem though. You see he was born with the curse of dark skin. This condition didn't matter so much in Kenya but when he traveled to Britain everyone noticed like one notices a trail of ants passing crumbs across a floor. They didn't say anything though, that wouldn't be polite. But you could feel it in their quick stares and the way the Kashmiri kebab shop owner would almost ignore you as he took your money. It didn't matter how much he smiled his skin meant he was condemned. Though it took a while for this sentence to be carried out, after his tuition cheque had cleared of course.

Like so many other international students Victor enjoyed living in Britain. I loved Britain for the Guardian and Radio 4 and pub quizzes. I wonder what was most special for him. Maybe long winter nights, maybe the constant rain. I could ask him I suppose. Maybe it's better to keep guessing.

So like most unattached international students, Victor extended his education for as long as he could to stay in Britain. He was due to hand in his dissertation in September and managed to push the deadline back as almost all of us did. There was nothing sinister in this, nothing malicious. Even Americans did it and we know they can't be malicious.

But Americans are Americans and Kenyans are Kenyans.

Victor had a job working in a gym. He was super athletic so this was a natural fit. As an international student he could only work 20 hours a week when school was on and 35 when school was out. His extension complicated things. He worked full time while continuing to work on his dissertation. An American friend did the same and never asked any questions.

But Victor wanted to make sure, so he paid a visit to the local immigration office. As he explained his situation in perfect English and handed over his passport, the staff conferred and told him that they were confiscating his passport overnight. He should return in the morning to collect it, the lady at the desk smiled a dull smile and dismissed him.

Back at home Victor watched some TV, checked his emails on his computer, did some laundry and slept in his bed. He had toast, eggs and bacon for breakfast. His plan was to head to the immigration office before heading to work his afternoon shift at the gym.

It was raining. We all learned pretty early that an essential purchase in Britain is an umbrella. Victor entered the office and shook the drops of rain out of his umbrella. He took his number and approached the desk, leaning the umbrella against the cubicle. Why did they build all the government offices to look as though the staff were under siege from their patrons; where you couldn't see what was happening behind the desk? He asked for his passport politely, always politely, the British way.

After a few brief moments several security men approached him and took his arms in theirs. They led him to a small room where they left him. No explanation. No passport. After a few hours they returned and bundled him into a waiting van. He was driven for several hours. He couldn't tell where he was because there were no windows in the van. He was handcuffed to his seat; his wrists were sore.

When the van door opened it was night and he could hear the roar of jet engines. He had been brought to the world's busiest airport from his sleepy life in a fallen industrial city in West Yorkshire. He was taken to a British Airways desk by the two guards and waited with one while the other spoke with the staff; they eyed him suspiciously from behind their desks. Still no explanation but he knew what was going on. Summary deportation. No appeal. He had no bags to check, just the clothes on his back and his mobile phone.

The guard came back annoyed and pulled Victor outside to the waiting van. He was told there was no room on the flight to Nairobi; must be all those aid workers returning to their lucrative positions with the various UN agencies that called Nairobi home.

Again Victor was bundled in the vehicle and driven to a miserable place, worse than any government office. It was a privately operated detention centre near Heathrow where criminals mixed with the lowest segment of humanity in Britain, asylum seekers. It smelled of bleach. Everyone was quiet and looked down. If they were silent long enough, the authorities might forget they were there and let them stay, like ghosts.

He spent a week in detention. He was fed enough. He had a bed. But he was not given a change of clothes. They must have decided that he had already taken enough from their beloved state. Not even a scrap of cloth was good enough for Victor.

Then they came for him again. A seat must have been vacated on a flight to Nairobi. Perhaps an ex-pat had decided roughing it wasn't for him. Victor was angry at being denied clean clothes for a week so before they came to get him he threw away his fetid t-shirt. He wore his jacket over his bare chest. The guards didn't mind. This was a job and they were looking forward to the pub and Chelsea vs Bolton later that night. The sooner this stinking African was on the plane the better.

Back at the airport, he met those familiar stares from the BA staff. This time they looked at his bare chest and shook their heads. Rejected yet again. The guards were enraged. Now they had to take him back and process him again. This fucker was supposed to be on the plane and they were supposed to be at the pub. They took Victor back to the van and took turns pounding on him, making his cheek swell from their assault.

But they made a big mistake. Victor wasn't a timid asylum seeker or refugee. He was a fighter and he was smarter than them. Back in detention he asked for his mobile phone to get a phone number, not his lawyer's he assured them. Satiated by their beating, they allowed him his phone. It was a camera phone and in a second he had snapped a shot of his swollen cheek and texted it to a trusted friend.

This friend exposed Victor's disgraceful treatment at the hands of these thugs. Many kind white, brown and black faces appealed to the government on behalf of Victor. They tried their best to understand his deportation. Why him? But of course everyone knew the answer. He was black, unwelcome in the British Isles. It would never happen to an American or a Japanese.

Despite the appeals, Victor was deported but the guards learned to be weary his sharp mind and never laid a hand on him again. And they also gave him a clean t-shirt. Resistance matters.

They couldn't take Victor's smile away and today it beams on Kenya like the sun. It's Britain's loss, though I doubt they'd be able to recognize it in the cold dark winter.

Sick of the Season

Yes, it's that time of year again. Everywhere the televisions and radios remind us of the good deeds of all the wonderful philanthropists out there. Where would we be without them? How good of them to help losers that can't eat or can't hold down a job. Let's celebrate charity! After all Jesus would give to charity, wouldn't he?

I'm pretty tired of philanthropy and this miserable season. I'm tired of lame-ass feel good solutions to our society's problems (hunger, homelessness, abuse, poverty). You can't donate your way out the fact that the people that give are really responsible for this blight. You middle class philanthropists demanded tax-cuts starting in the 1990s which have ruined all the good things that made Canada special. And now you complain when you get asked for change by that smelly person on your walk from your SUV to your office. Are you blind?

Walk down the street; take a bus; stare into a gated community and you'll see that Canada is an unequal society. I can accept this, reluctantly. But what matters is to do everything possible to make things more equal. I'm not a communist but people that do well in Canada have an obligation to help those who are not so fortunate. But charity is not good enough (as good as it makes you feel to write those cheques).

We need to demand that the state redistribute wealth from the wealthy to the poor. This is a (more) just society. We had this but somewhere along the line we decided that we would rather have our fellow human beings suffer alone, unsupported. Were they undeserving of our love?

Charity and the private sector haven't delivered as we were told they would. They are a nice way of avoiding dealing with the systemic problems we have created. Government was actually good at redistributing wealth; deny this fact all you want. Sure there was always some waste but I guarantee that the food bank that you'll give to this Christmas is wasting much of your hard earned money. And the miserable food the poor receive at food banks barely keep them going. Don't expect any fresh veggies this week or ever but here have some yummy Wonder Bread.

Therefore I advocate a moratorium on tax cuts and actually new taxes on the well-off. They can afford it if they can afford to give to charity. Hell, I can afford it on my $15 an hour salary if I know it will make my country a better place. Ironically I think a small tax rise to cover social programs would put the rich out a lot less than their annual planned giving regime.

But it's crucial that these elites be given choices as to how their money is spent. I think that they like the idea of charity because they decide where the money is going; probably has something to do with feeling powerful. Also our society worships (the illusion of) choice so it would resonate with people. So you could offer them themes like:

1) Food security
2) Housing
3) Health and wellness
4) Sports and physical activity
5) Public Transportation

This seems logical to me but of course I'm a dangerous radical or maybe I was just paying attention in church. Matthew 19:24: "Again I tell you, it is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for someone who is rich to enter the kingdom of God".

And I promised myself I'd stop being preachy.

On and On

Today two Canadian soldiers were killed in Afghanistan by a suicide bomber. Obviously this is a sad day and one I hope is not repeated. Though realistically I know that there will be more to come because the Taliban, far from being desperate as we are told, are growing in strength, if not popularity (Oppress us please! Ban music and dancing because they are sinful!).

I found the following comment interesting:

"They are a determined lot. Although they have lost good friends, it will only harden them more to make sure they carry on with the mission and bring it to a successful conclusion."

Who do you think said it? Well it was one of the senior Canadian officers in Afghanistan responding to questions about the soldiers' deaths. But I think it could have just as easily been translated from a Taliban commander. I think that's something we're not recognizing. As confident and positive as we are, our "enemies" are equally committed. They have a mission and goals too.

Here's a great quote from Gandhi: "Let us honour our opponents for the same honesty of purpose and patriotic motives that we claim for ourselves."

Of course I recognize that I'm not being constructive here; my usual cynical self I suppose. So what if they're just as committed as we are, you might be saying. This likely means that the war is not going to be stopping anytime soon, right? I think the next step after recognizing that our enemies are very much like ourselves, which is a huge step, is to analyze our power (we have tanks and fighter planes and they have cars with bombs inside--I assure you if they could they would gladly choose fighter planes over car bombs) and build a space to meet and converse with our "enemies".

What is going on in this world when we can't even conduct negotiations with our "enemies"? Do we actually think we'll win outright and destroy the Taliban forever? Doesn't look like we're doing a great job.

Read Between the Lines

Today Hamas threatened to unleash a third intifada if a viable, real Palestinian state did not begin to coalesce within six months. Unfortunately for Hamas, intifadas are spontaneous and most Palestinians are tired of fighting for a state for forty years, if not longer. But the threat is not what actually struck me, it was the content and declaration that didn't sound anything like Hamas.

We're always told that Hamas is out to destroy Israel and drive the Jewish inhabitants of historic Palestine into the sea. Has anyone heard of rhetoric? Most political organizations, like Hamas, wouldn't get two feet toward a goal if they were not flexible. Hamas is pragmatic and shouldn't be pigeonholed as a rigid fundamentalist group.

So at his press conference today the political leader of Hamas, Khaled Meshaal, described his goal. He said: "We give the international community six months for real political horizons . . . There is a historic opportunity for a Palestinian state within 1967 borders."

Did you catch that? Within the 1967 borders. What happened to driving the Jews into the sea that we always hear about? It sounds a lot like Meshaal is endorsing the mainstream two-state solution pushed by all the parties to this conflict.

I doubt that Israel will grasp at this lifeline Hamas is throwing because Hamas is a "terrorist" organization. It's really quite sad. If Hamas has accepted the two-state solution based on the 1967 borders perhaps Israel should too. As much as we're told that Hamas is committed to the destruction of Israel, perhaps by rejecting this olive branch, Israel is demonstrating that it is not willing to make peace and let go of its settlements in the West Bank.

Perhaps what's needed is an Israeli intifada against their own government. Though Israelis are equally as burned out as Palestinians and the rest of us by this never ending war.

Remembering

Do our minds work better in the morning?

I listened to this interesting "debate" the day before remembrance Day that I just recalled so clearly in my dozy morning state. The CBC was interviewing Mark Kurlansky author of Nonviolence: The History of a Dangerous Idea. I give them credit for raising this important concept at a time when we are almost glorifying war and violence. Is it just me or isn't the line "Never Again" part of Remembrance Day? You didn't see it once this year and that was deliberate.

Then the CBC brought in the celeb Canadian academic Margaret MacMillan to offer an alternative view to Kurlansky's. Unfortunately MacMillan doesn't really understand nonviolence. She claimed that the British were engaged in nonviolence when they were appeasing Hitler in the run-up to the war. Nonviolence is active not reactive and has nothing to do with appeasement.

She proceeded to claim that the Second World War, that trump card to nonviolence, was inevitable. You might have heard the familiar, incredulous refrain: "So you think nonviolence would have worked against Hitler?" Don't you know that the Allies had to make war on the Axis? There was no way to liberate the concentration camps and remove the Nazi regime without resorting to violence.

The major bone of contention between the debaters came down to the fates of the occupants of Nazi concentration camps, the majority of whom were Jews. MacMillan claimed that they could have done nothing but been marched slowly to their deaths. Kurlansky rightly pointed out several cases where nonviolent action slowed of prevented the murder of Jews. He wondered what might have happened had the Jews and the other victims of the concentration camps embraced nonviolent tactics.

I should say that I don't criticize the victims of Nazism for not standing up for themselves in this way. It was an impossible time, unbelievable. By going along with the Nazis they probably thought that they were saving themselves and their families. Until the very end. I would have probably done the same in their place. Much thought went into dividing and destroying the Jewish inhabitants of Europe.

I think that if the Germans really wanted their pure state they should have been forced by their victims to get blood on their hands. Refuse to go into ghettos, march and occupy symbolic locations. As difficult and scary as it would be: make them fight you and hurt you. Though difficult in a totalitarian state, every effort should have been made to make this resistance public and visible. Even dictators need, if not popular support, then popular indifference.

The success of the concentration camps was that they were far away from the public eye; is it any wonder that they were built in the middle of nowhere? This was industrial genocide, something that would have appalled most Germans had it been exposed. This is much like modern factory farms; if people knew what was happening to the animals there they would challenge it.

Humans, I firmly believe, are good at heart. And perhaps that's why nonviolence works. It recognizes this reality and gives emboldens it whereas violence dulls it and puts it to sleep.

Perhaps it's time for the morning philosopher to get some breakfast . . .

183-4

Today the United Nations renewed their annual call for the United States to lift its longstanding embargo on Cuba. In a General Assembly vote, 183 states voted in favour of lifting sanctions while four states demurred. These four states were the United States, quite obviously, Israel, never far behind their masters, Palau and the Marshall Islands, those paragons of Polynesian virtue.

Cuba is hardly a great power in the world. Yet almost all states on earth sided with them against the world's only superpower. That speaks volumes. The United States and Israel essentially do what they please in the world today. They invade countries, they place embargoes on countries, they assassinate whom they will. Best of all they wrap themselves in a cloak of righteousness and claim that they alone are right and just. I remember long ago, writing in this blog, that if you think you're just, you probably aren't. Over the years this unilateralism has made them isolated, a fact exemplified by today's vote. Doesn't there come a point when you think: maybe I'm out of step, not everyone else. Aren't 187 friends better than 3? Maybe Bush needs a Friendster site to get him started.

The resolution is not binding on the United States in any way and they are expected to continue to subject Cuba to crippling sanctions until they, childishly, get their way. Once George W Bush is replaced in two years don't expect this course to change without divine intervention. Please God(dess) intervene!

What Now?

Smiles all round. Today Nancy Pelosi, slated to be the new Speaker of the House of Representatives, met with George W. Bush at the White House. Despite railing on one another during the bitter campaign, they were quick to pledge to work together in the final two years of the Bush Administration.

This may just be politics and come January 1 Representative Pelosi and her party may decide to make life difficult for Bush. I fear that she's telling the truth and she and Bush will work together to continue the policies of the past six years. More sneaky tax cuts for the wealthy; less environmental protections; more adventuring into Iran and North Korea; less rights for more "security". Maybe I'm just cynical from the past 6 years.

But you see I have a major problem with the Democratic Party. They didn't win this election, the Republican Party lost it. The Democrats don't have any vision beyond getting out of Iraq. I certainly think that at their worst they are better than the Republican Party but by how much? An inch? I fear that they will allow business as usual at a national level. No one will say a word about climate change; no one will mention universal healthcare, bringing all Americans under one system; no one will demand a living wage; no one will question the $400 billion plus flowing into the military year by year.

I think that as much as Bush and the Republicans have purposefully taken the United States to the far right of the political spectrum, the Democrats should ditch the middle and push a strong "liberal" agenda (though I don't know how it's "liberal" to provide all Americans with free health coverage or demand workers get a living wage). And bang home the message that this would be what Jesus would do. Religion matters in America. Don't let the evangelicals in their suburban homes off the hook; they have a responsibility, according to the Bible, to help the poor and charity isn't good enough. Go to the deep South, go to the Mid-West with this message. Eventually, if you do it correctly, you'll make the American people, confused by Karl Rove and his spin machine, realize that you don't get the country you want by building walls and demanding tax cuts and more police and more jails.

But for now I think that Bernard Sanders is going to be a lonely man.

Small Censorship

Yesterday I was taking my usual quick look at the Globe and Mail's website. The Globe is far from perfect but it's a decent national paper. I probably am loyal to it because my father had a subscription when I was a boy. For that same reason I opened a bank account with CIBC--now thankfully I've seen the error of my ways and removed myself to a credit union. Along the same lines I think that I'll be abandoning the institution of the Globe and Mail.

What could have caused this sudden change? Yesterday on the Globe and Mail's website, which features four major stories followed by specific categories such as sports and business, had an interesting third story. This was apparently the third most important story of the day.

This mundane story dealt with a small local argument between a synagogue and the YMCA in Montreal. Perhaps the Globe thought that they had come across a sexy clash of civilizations story to boost their flagging readership. Perhaps their editors are thick. Sadly it's probably a little of both. The synagogue demanded of the YMCA and received a pledge to frost over some windows that gave young acolytes a clear view of exercising women (and men for those so inclined); now some YMCA patrons are demanding that the windows be un-frosted. It's almost not even worth devoting some brain cells to.

Being outraged that this base story was considered national news I joined the online conversation that the Globe encourages with all their stories. I called them on this lame story and questioned if this was indeed worthy news. I encouraged the editorial staff to consider real issues like peak oil or climate change instead. Who cares what windows are frosted when your planet is uninhabitable?

I expected to receive an email that my commentary was posted. It never came. Long live censorship! Goodbye Globe and Mail and good luck!

Smart 'Stash

Just before the "monumental" US mid-term election tomorrow, I thought I'd commend Jack Layton on his successful positioning of the NDP, but mostly himself, as the official opposition in all but name. We can't forget about Canadian politics in the face of the American election.

Jack really seems to be dominating the news these days. He's the one challenging the Clean Air [sic] Act and threatening non-confidence votes. You don't hear a peep from the Bloc Quebecois or the Liberals beyond vague criticism; they're less worried about Harper's Conservatives than they are the NDP under Layton. Liberals you'd better hurry up and pick your new leader. Otherwise the only way he'll get any airtime is if he grows his own mustache (I'm assuming a man will win the race I know).

Today Jack played a deft hand by offering to make one of his NDP MPs miss votes in the House of Commons so the Prime Minister could attend an European Union (EU) meeting. Harper's lame excuse is that he can't leave Parliament because it might bring down his fragile minority government; he has to be there to vote.

The truth is if George W. Bush called he'd be on the first flight to Washington. The reason he's not going to meet the EU in person is that he knows he's going to get hell for withdrawing from Kyoto and proposing a toothless alternative.

Jack knows this too and has wisely presented Harper with a favourable solution to his homemade "problem". Now Jack just has to sit back and watch Harper squirm. Well done!

Semi-Successful Tactics

The death of two Palestinian women and the injuring of ten others in Gaza today at the hands, or rather bullets, of the Israeli Defense Forces has the potential to be truly revolutionary. All that is required, and I know this is a tall order, is a rethinking of Palestinian liberation strategy.

Since 1967 if not before 1948, Palestinians have assumed that arms and violence will win them their state. In fact, with every suicide bombing or rocket attack this goal gets further away. Israel merely has to label Palestinians as terrorists and they are allowed to do pretty much what they will including execution, torture, exile and worst of all the destruction of livelihoods. The international community and the international conscience, the ones that will make Palestine free (despite what Israel might think) are not easily swayed by violence. Even if the violence is committed in a just cause.

What is different about today is that these women were unarmed and were standing valiantly in the path of one of the most advanced and deadly military machines in the world. And it wasn't a small group of women either but a mass of women surrounding a mosque in Gaza. They were not threatening, they were just standing with their heads held high, as they should be. You are Palestinians, you should be proud.

Unfortunately they were not defending their children, their homes or their crops but were protecting armed men taking refuge inside a mosque. This is where their actions lose their power. Israel now has an excuse for the killing of these two women, they were protecting terrorists. Open and shut case. I can already hear the Israeli spokesperson dismissing these deaths as necessary in the "war on terror".

I've always argued that if the Palestinians or any marginalized and dominated group is really interested in gaining their freedom, they must embrace nonviolent tactics. If these heroic women and the millions of other Palestinians rotting in Gaza and the West Bank could be mobilized in a nonviolent struggle, they would have their state in a day. The two largely nonviolent intifadas of the past two decades got the peace process moving much more than hijacked planes and executed athletes.

Also using violence to cast off an oppressor doesn't lead to a constructive and respectful society once that goal is achieved. In fact, I would argue, it entrenches the method of violence deep within a people's psyche. It becomes how they relate to one another; one only has to view the current tension between Fatah and Hamas to see this truth at work.

I recently listened to a radio show about Algeria's independence struggle and this lesson is perhaps best described there. Algeria is free from the French but at what cost? Algeria is a sad and violent place today. How do you remove the stain of violence from your soul? Best not to start down that path.

Late Thoughts

For this one I'm going to have to dip into the recent past and something I've been thinking about for a while. First, George W Bush labeled it part of the Axis of Evil (albeit initiates but on the rise). Then his government deported Canadian Maher Arar there upon seizing him on American soil. It's Syria of course and there seems to be a clear disconnect between Washington's usually strong verbal attacks on, if not threats, to Syria and Syria's willingness to torture on behalf of the Americans. Even today the Americans warned that evil Syria had designs to overthrow the Lebanese government and made veiled threats. What gives?

If Syria really is an enemy of the US then why would they act as a sub-imperial power and torture Maher Arar on command from Washington? Syria isn't like Uzbekistan or Egypt, evil states surely but on the right side so above reproach; Syria is on Washington's hit list. Surely once Maher Arar was in Syria they could have hailed him as an enemy of Washington and let him go. Instead they went about pulling out his nails and electrocuting his genitals (I'm sure Dick approved heartily). Maybe the Syrian state just loves torture that much that they'll even torture the enemies of enemies. But isn't the enemy of your enemy your friend?

Makes you wonder if the whole thing is just one big load of . . .

The End

George W. Bush's last presidential opponent, John Kerry is under fire from the Republican Party over comments he delivered to university students recently. He warned them that if they didn't study hard they would end up in Iraq. Obviously this gaff has given the Republican Party a controversy to push during the dying days of the US mid-term elections. As if they weren't enough of a one-issue party already. Security, security, security are their only watchwords.

Kerry's comments are true. If you're poor and uneducated you stand a good chance of ending up in the military. Now that American manufacturing jobs have been exported to China, there isn't much choice for people with few skills or education. You have to be pretty thick to not realize this reality; yet Kerry is thick enough to make this comment during an election year, let alone a week away from one.

But John just because they're true doesn't mean you have to say them. I think I've said this before when Michael Ignatieff (a Kerry in the making) stated that Israel had committed war crimes in Lebanon and was surprised to hear that no one wanted to hear that. Again there's the truth and then there's the truth. You'd think politicians would understand this most of all.

I have no hope that the Democratic Party will take either Congress or the Senate on November 7. The Republicans will make short work of them because Americans know that the Democrats have no ideas; they have abandoned the ideas that should get them elected including universal health care and a living wage to campaign like Republicans. This is the end of the Democratic Party. For one thing the Democratic Party has become merely the Republican Party Lite so perhaps it deserves to die. What use is choice when there is no choice?