Heidegger and nazi’sm

November 9, 2009

I did not know this about him. Some, in particular Emmanuel Faye, a French Philospher, want to wipe his work out of philosophy.

First published in France in 2005, the book, “Heidegger: The Introduction of Nazism Into Philosophy,” calls on philosophy professors to treat Heidegger’s writings like hate speech.

Richard Wollin, a close reader of Heidegger and Faye says:

“I’m not by any means dismissing any of these fields because of Heidegger’s influence,” he wrote in an e-mail message referring to postmodernism’s influence across the academy. “I’m merely saying that we should know more about the ideological residues and connotations of a thinker like Heidegger before we accept his discourse ready-made or naïvely.”

I had no clue and was naively reading his work. Not knowing his roots is like reifying Robert Moses without taking into account his deep racism and how that influenced his infrastructure building in New York, or glorifying Athenian democracy by forgetting that slave ownership was rampant, only wealthy men could participate and women were non persons and treated worse in Athens than in other Greek cities at the time. To claim that technology is socially or politically neutral?

How to read? How to think about technology, infrastructure, works? Most of what I have been exposed to in academia was written by white men of power, most of our technology and infrastructure was built by the same batch, many amazing artists are creeps like Woody Allen, Michael Jackson or Roman Polanski. Do we dismiss their art, thinking, artefacts? I have refused to see a Woody Allen movies since he got away with marrying his step daughter, but I do not dismiss his skill as a cinematographer, and I always considered Michael Jackson to be a sad sick person who also happened to be a musical genius, while what’s his name is nothing but a rich perverted creep. Glenn Gould? What about Ayn Rand? Her writings reflected her very disturbed psyche, and perhaps if people knew a little more about her before reading her work, they could at least frame it as writings stemming from a very disturbed mind. Or how my respect for Edward Said grew once I knew more about him.

I have great difficulty with judgemenalism and reading because I sometimes loose or gain respect for the authors once I know about them. Should the work stand on its own? I can easily dismiss the work because of the person, is that fair? Do I falsely claim a connection? I find it hard to read the work of people who write about equality and reflexivity when they cannot seem to practice it. Do these not go hand in hand?

Bref, I think it is important to learn about the people whose work we/I read. I am not promoting essentialism yet I am really not sure if we/I can separate the person from the work, that we/I should, but maybe some of their personal history does determine what they pursue and how they do so. I certainly wonder all the time about where I have come from and the reasons why I pursue the work that I do. I have not yet figured out all the details, but I can certainly see that my past, personal experience and learning trajectory very much influences how I think and how my thinking has evolved overtime. If people know our pasts, will they judge the work from that lens? Will they dismiss what we do if they judge who we are and perhaps falsely associate what they think about the work based on what they can only partially know about the person? With Heidegger, it is not just the person, but also the ideology, and as a philospher, I presume that the ideology and the philosophy are inseparable, yet we do not dismiss the entire German nation for their technology prowess? Nor do we stop using IBM computers or driving BMWs because of their historical roots with the Nazi regime either! Do we stop using electricity because because Edison was a megalomaniac? Or dismiss Turin because he was gay, as the British establishment did at the end of the war? Or should we at least know so that we can position these technologies in a historical context and then consider these when we build new ones? In the case of Turin, does it matter? Should Glenn Gould’s should his music be dismissed because he was autistic and somewhat OCD? When does it matter?

Inspired by: An Ethical Question: Does a Nazi Deserve a Place Among Philosophers?

Broadband for Africa Maps BBC

September 23, 2009

I am over my picture allotment on Blogsome so here is a link to a broadband map of undersea cables connecting Africa.

Copyright Consultation Submission

September 13, 2009

Addendum:

There is a 48 hour grace period for submissions until midnight Tuesday.

I also submitted the following addendum to my earlier submission based on a discussion on CivicAccess List between Jennifer Bell and Russell McOrmond and public education work over at Visible Government. Thanks to both of you!


Another solution to improve Canada’s Copyright law is to abolish crown copyright all together and follow the lead of the NZ Government Open Access and Licensing (NZGOAL) framework. Wherever Crown Copyright would be used, Creative Commons Attribution (CC-BY) would be used instead. The proposal argues:

“Now more than ever is there a very present need to bring information the Government holds on behalf of its people into the public domain so that it may be used in ways that stimulate innovation, generate cultural creativity, social interaction and dialogue, while also kick starting economic growth.”

This is very interesting and could be very helpful for the dissemination of government data. Also, the 2009, UK government’s Power of Information Task Force final report found that Crown Copyright was a major barrier to the re-use of Public Sector Information, and recommended that Crown Copyright be changed to a ‘Crown Commons’ license to encourage re-use.

The creation of progressive unrestricted use licenses by some government departments has moved the access discourse toward citizen participation, these are not global enough across government, but are an extremely innovative and creative step in the right direction.


Today is the last day!

Below is my submission to the copyright consultation. I read a number of submissions, and clearly, I am more of a novice on the topic than I thought. I am not at all an expert in this area, but spoke about what I know, in my own language and hope other non experts will also add their view. I saw that many submissions are about art related content and have not yet come across science nor data topics. If you come across any can you point me to them?


Public Sector Information, Government Data, Government Digital Maps, Publicly Funded Research Data - belong to citizens.

Author: Tracey P. Lauriault

Contact information: tlauriau@gmail.com

I am a researcher and a geomatician. I have worked for many years with a number of community based organizations, not-for-profit groups, research groups and the private sector to create evidence based maps, indicators, tables, analysis, and reports for decision making. I have worked in housing and homelessness, environment, quality of life indicators, child care, education, public health, social planning, etc. I am also a founding member of CivicAccess.ca and a co-author of datalibre.ca.

The greatest impediment to my work has been the high cost of public sector data & information and restrictive licensing regimes that surround these. A few examples help illustrate this: Statistics Canada Data is cost prohibitive and data pricing seems arbitrary; Vital Statistics Data are very expensive; the database that links postal codes to electoral ridings is cost prohibitive; postal code base maps are very expensive; non-private health data from CIHI are very expensive again; there are arbitrary reasons for not releasing non private non security risk data from numerous federal governmental agencies, and there are very restrictive use licenses for public sector information in general and especially the aforementioned Federal organizations.

High costs, restrictive licensing, arbitrary policies and practices, and the government acting as a monopoly on access to public sector data - data citizens have already paid for with taxation - has greatly affected the kinds of research I can pursue, has strained the pocket books of charity organizations and has left citizens and community based organizations marginalized in democratic debates since they do not have access to the data they need to formulate their arguments.

I have tried, as a citizen to analyze the characteristics of my neighbourhood, compare those with others, develop a business plan, investigate the socio-economic profiles of school catchment areas and school closures, or do a spatial location analysis for a new park. I have the skill, knowledge and tools to do this work, however, the cost of the data and use restrictions either a) make it to expensive to do this work or b) restricts how I can disseminate the results.

There seems to be a lack of coherence from the Federal Government of Canada regarding access to and fair use of public data by the public. These are data that the public has paid for already. Crown Copyright and cost recovery for public data impede participatory democracy and puts citizens, community groups and small businesses at a disadvantage when it comes to evidence based planning. It also thwarts innovation since instead of focussing on value added activities, businesses, researchers, non-profit groups and citizens are scrambling to pay for and to adhere to multiply conflicting licenses as opposed to a license that makes it easy to use these data, share these data and add value to them.

To include citizens in the process of decision making I recommend an unrestricted user license such as that developed by two Federal Government programs GeoBase and Geogratis. Also, the government should act less as a monopolist regarding its public data and more as a public agency and abolish cost recovery policies, and create an infrastructure to share these data with their necessary metadata and licenses. We also need to consider the long term preservation of these to ensure they can be disseminated for the long term. This I believe will enable and facilitate the process of citizens and the Government working together. This will also provide a way for us to think together, particularly on troublesome issues such as homelessness.

Sincerely Tracey

Image Deception: Magicians and War

September 6, 2009

I was discussing the use of remote sensing images for a variety of purposes with my academic advisor who recalled a book about magicians who staged a variety of illusions to fool air photographers during WWII. We also discussed the time stamps on remotely sensed images and how some were nefariously used during the first Iraq war to show how the Iraqis were encroaching on Kuwait - photos going to the border but not the photos showing a turn around and move away from the border that were taken shortly after.

Things are not always as they seem and you cannot believe everything that you see!

  • Jasper Maskelyne (& Wikipedia): war magician & illusionist
  • The War Magician
  • Deception In War: The Art Of The Bluff, The Value Of Deceit, And The Most Thrilling Episodes Of Cunning In Military History, From The Trojan Horse To The Gulf War
  • Magic at War
  • Fact, Fiction and Rationality - War Games of the Imagination
  • District 9., Slumdog Millionaire, Hotel Rwanda, Un Dimanche a Kigali

    August 24, 2009

    Story telling, I think, is what is going to change the conditions of some of the worst places on the planet - urban slums in developing countries.  Members of my family who do not read the newspaper, who go on all inclusive trips, and never get near an urban/social/policital academic journal, who do not read any in-depth journalism, are talking about slums!  I came back from travels in my 20s completely downtrodden from what I witnessed in the Manilla, Bangkok, Hong Kong trying to explain it, trying to express that we were a big part of that problem, working on the issue, all on deaf ears.  "Dear, you cannot fix the world’s woes" is all I would hear as I watched them all put on more weight and purchase more stuff! Hopeless, the west is hopeless is all I thought.  I say this now, back here, as I squander my time in a day and avoiding work.

    But alas, Hollywood crafted movies, narrated in a language and using symbol sets the mainstream understands, might actually be doing the trick.  People talked about Bombay slums, Chiawelo is on the map, and we will not forget Rwanda. Also, those who made those movies, had to experience those conditions while filming on site, wealthy people who can use their capital and social resources to influence change and perhaps even change themselves are getting first hand education.  I do not know how long it will take for those stories to stay in the memelight, and what kind of change will occur and how deep that will be, but I think this may be more powerful than the starving children late night clips tugging at our heart strings on late night television.  Maybe.  Just maybe we need stories.


    Ani Difranco Self Evident Lyrics:
    (inspired by the WTC disaster)

    yes,
    us people are just poems
    we’re 90% metaphor
    with a leanness of meaning
    approaching hyper-distillation
    and once upon a time
    we were moonshine
    rushing down the throat of a giraffe
    yes, rushing down the long hallway
    despite what the p.a. announcement says
    yes, rushing down the long stairs
    with the whiskey of eternity
    fermented and distilled
    to eighteen minutes
    burning down our throats
    down the hall
    down the stairs
    in a building so tall
    that it will always be there
    yes, it’s part of a pair
    there on the bow of Noah’s ark
    the most prestigious couple
    just kickin back parked
    against a perfectly blue sky
    on a morning beatific
    in its Indian summer breeze
    on the day that America
    fell to its knees
    after strutting around for a century
    without saying thank you
    or please

    and the shock was subsonic
    and the smoke was deafening
    between the setup and the punch line
    cuz we were all on time for work that day
    we all boarded that plane for to fly
    and then while the fires were raging
    we all climbed up on the windowsill
    and then we all held hands
    and jumped into the sky

    and every borough looked up when
    it heard the first blast
    and then every dumb action movie
    was summarily surpassed
    and the exodus uptown by foot and motorcar
    looked more like war than
    anything I’ve seen so far
    so far
    so far
    so fierce and ingenious
    a poetic specter so far gone
    that every jackass newscaster was
    struck dumb and stumbling
    over ‘oh my god’ and ‘this is
    unbelievable’ and on and on
    and I’ll tell you what, while we’re at it
    you can keep the pentagon
    keep the propaganda
    keep each and every TV
    that’s been trying to convince me
    to participate
    in some prep school punk’s plan to
    perpetuate retribution
    perpetuate retribution
    even as the blue toxic smoke of
    our lesson in retribution
    is still hanging in the air
    and there’s ash on our shoes
    and there’s ash in our hair
    and there’s a fine silt on every mantle
    from hell’s kitchen to Brooklyn
    and the streets are full of stories
    sudden twists and near misses
    and soon every open bar is
    crammed to the rafters
    with tales of narrowly averted disasters
    and the whiskey is flowin
    like never before
    as all over the country
    folks just shake their heads
    and pour

    so here’s a toast to all the
    folks who live in Palestine
    Afghanistan
    Iraq

    El Salvador

    here’s a toast to the folks
    living on the pine ridge
    reservation
    under the stone cold gaze of mt. Rushmore

    here’s a toast to all those
    nurses and doctors
    who daily provide women with a choice
    who stand down a threat the
    size of Oklahoma City
    just to listen to a young woman’s voice

    here’s a toast to all the folks
    on death row right now
    awaiting the executioner’s guillotine
    who are shackled there with
    dread and can only escape
    into their heads
    to find peace in the form of a dream

    cuz take away our playstations
    and we are a third world nation
    under the thumb of some blue blood royal son
    who stole the oval office and
    that phony election
    I mean
    it don’t take a weatherman
    to look around and see the weather
    Jeb said he’d deliver Florida, folks
    and boy did he ever

    and we hold these truths to be self evident:
    #1 George W. Bush is not president
    #2 America is not a true democracy
    #3 the media is not fooling me
    cuz I am a poem heeding hyper-distillation
    I’ve got no room for a lie so verbose
    I’m looking out over my whole human family
    and I’m raising my glass in a toast

    here’s to our last drink of fossil fuels
    let us vow to get off of this sauce
    shoo away the swarms of commuter planes
    and find that train ticket we lost
    cuz once upon a time the
    line followed the river
    and peeked into all the backyards
    and the laundry was waving
    the graffiti was teasing us
    from brick walls and bridges
    we were rolling over ridges
    through valleys
    under stars
    I dream of touring like Duke Ellington
    in my own railroad car
    I dream of waiting on the tall
    blonde wooden benches
    in a grand station aglow with grace
    and then standing out on the platform
    and feeling the air on my face

    give back the night its distant whistle
    give the darkness back its soul
    give the big oil companies
    the finger finally
    and relearn how to rock-n-roll
    yes, the lessons are all
    around us and a change is
    waiting there
    so it’s time to pick through the
    rubble, clean the streets
    and clear the air
    get our government to pull its
    big dick out of the sand
    of someone else’s desert
    put it back in its pants
    and quit the hypocritical chants of
    freedom forever

    cuz when one lone phone rang
    in two thousand and one
    at ten after nine
    on nine one one
    which is the number we all called
    when that lone phone rang right off the wall
    right off our desk and down the long hall
    down the long stairs
    in a building so tall
    that the whole world turned
    just to watch it fall

    and while we’re at it
    remember the first time around?
    the bomb?
    the Ryder truck?
    the parking garage?
    the princess that didn’t even feel the pea?
    remember joking around in our
    apartment on avenue D?

    can you imagine how many
    paper coffee cups would have
    to change their design
    following a fantastical reversal
    of the New York skyline?!

    it was a joke, of course
    it was a joke
    at the time
    and that was just a few years ago
    so let the record show
    that the FBI was all over that case
    that the plot was obvious and
    in everybody’s face
    and scoping that scene
    religiously
    the CIA
    or is it KGB?
    committing countless crimes against humanity
    with this kind of eventuality
    as its excuse
    for abuse after expensive abuse
    and it didn’t have a clue
    look, another window to see through
    way up here
    on the 104th floor
    look
    another key
    another door
    10% literal
    90% metaphor
    3000 some poems disguised as people
    on an almost too perfect day
    must be more than poems
    in some asshole’s passion play
    so now it’s your job
    and it’s my job
    to make it that way
    to make sure they didn’t die in vain
    sshhhhhh….
    baby listen
    hear the train?

    When an elder dies, a great library and archive burns to the ground

    August 21, 2009

    An Ethiopian saying I read this morning that was quoted in an article about peace activist Muriel Duckworth (2) (3), who at 100 is saying goodbye to her friends.

    How come I only ever get to learn about these amazing people in obituaries or when they themselves are saying goodbye.  Where would we read about people like her, how do my kids get to find out about these people?  History class in Canadian high schools - not!  People like her changed the face of Canada and we know very little of them.

    High-Resolution Satellite Imagery and the Conflict in Sri Lanka

    August 13, 2009

    The Science and Human Rights Program of the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) has done an assessment of the Sri Lankan Civilian Safety Zone (CSZ) and surrounding environs in the northeast by analysing high resolution images derived from multiple satellites: DigitalGlobe’s QuickBird and WorldView satellites; and GeoEye’s Ikonos and GeoEye-1 satellites. This work was done at the request of Human Rights Watch (HRW) and Amnesty International USA (AI-USA).  In addition, a set of photographs taken during a helicopter over flight of the CSZ by UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon on May 22 provided critical information which aided imagery analysis. These data were accompanied by ancillary information on mortar and artillery was derived from publicly available United States Army Field Manuals, as indicated below and also public statements from the Sri Lankan Government and the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE), as well as media reporting.  The latter were not considered to be accurate.

    In one assessment six images, spanning dates from 9 May 2005 through 24 May 2009, were compared to discover significant land cover change, human displacement and an expanded area cleared for graves. Between May 9-10

    no outside parties were allowed access to the area during the timeframe in question, commercial high-resolution satellite imagery was one of the only options for gathering information.

    This report summarizes results of satellite imagery analysis concerning possible indications of shelling, IDP movements, changes in gravesites, and possible artillery and mortar positions. Selected images and analysis results described below have been made available on GoogleEarth for public use. 

    The report explains how the analysis is done, which visual cues to look for (e.g. raised rims, circularity, peripheral ejecta, bowl shapes and size to determine bomb craters) provides images and explains all data sources.  The images captured:

    • the displacement of people,
    • the destruction of permanent structures,
    • changes in land cover,
    • three graveyards with approximately 1350 unique graves counted
    • possible artillery and mortar positions 
    The AAAS has a number of other case studies to learn from.  This type of reporting accompanied by investigative reporting around the Balibo Five and its movie, makes it harder for atrocities to be lied about.  Now that it is hard to lie, what do we do to prevent these things in the first place! 

    Field Projects - Fafard and GPS Mowing

    August 12, 2009

    I am writing about the work of Jeremy Wood at the moment, that is terribly late, and for some reason more difficult to do than expected.  Jeremy has a series of pieces called Mowing the Lawn that I was thinking about yesterday.  He the traces the lines of mowing his mother’s paddock using a motorized mower and the global positioning infrastructure.  Seems mindless really, but these are quotidian movements through space that millions of farmers, golf course owners, gardeners and suburban dwellers do.  So why not trace the lines, distance, time and the movement of going nowhere but doing it somewhere!

    As I was thinking about it, I recalled Joe Fafard’s field work project - Maclaren Against the Grain: The Fafard Field Project.

    The early winter of 1996 marked the beginning of an idea of the MacLaren Art Centre to work in conjunction with the 1997 International Plowing Match (IPM) to create a plowed and planted work of art in a farm field—a big farm field. The MacLaren Art Centre’s Director and Curator, William Moore began by talking with internationally recognized Canadian artist Joe Fafard from Regina. Joe is known for his agricultural imagery and his ability to tackle big projects. An idea began to take shape.

    The idea developed that a well defined image be planted in various crops suitable for aerial and elevated viewing at or near the International Plowing Match site. Roy Hickling, because of his background as a farmer and his abiding interest in art, was invited to act as the Curator and Project Coordinator. After a presentation to the1997 IPM committee, they agreed to incorporate MacLaren Against the Grain: The Fafard Field Project into their event.

    A completely wonderful cooperative effort was born. Its connections linked farmer and artist, cultural and farming institutions, and the City of Barrie with its rural community. The MacLaren Art Centre is responsible for organizing and creating the work for the plowing match in exchange for the use of an adjacent fifty acre field that the match secured. The result is a truly unique growing installation exhibition. It represents the plowed image of a horse and is planted in different crops which, over the period it runs, will change with the seasons—like an animation.

    Fafard’s work was exhibited last year at the National Gallery of Canada and there I saw a film of the changing seasons of the Horse.  This just stayed with me.  Especially the images of the farmers doing this work.  I am not much of a nationalist, but, this just seems like a Canadian’s thing to do.

    Housing desegregration

    August 11, 2009

    A housing desegregation pact was just signed by one of the richest New York Counties.  Racial red-lining has been banned in the US for decades, but there are work arounds, such as property values, the loss of building permits, apathy and so on. But not for this place where a court order is

    compel[ing] [Westchester] to create hundreds of houses and apartments for moderate-income people in overwhelmingly white communities and aggressively market them to nonwhites in Westchester and New York City.

    The agreement calls for the [Westchester] county to spend more than $50 million of its own money, in addition to other funds, to build or acquire 750 homes or apartments, 630 of which must be provided in towns and villages where black residents constitute 3 percent or less of the population and Hispanic residents make up less than 7 percent. The 120 other spaces must meet different criteria for cost and ethnic concentration.

    Some cities have almost gone bankrupt arguing against desegregation. It must have been brutal for the kids going to the white schools once the cases were won!  Imagine doing this in the Glebe, Rockliffe Park, Westboro, Westmount, Rosedale and so on.  The Anti-Discrimination Center successfully argued this case in court.  The Anti-Discrimination Center works

    to prevent and remedy all forms of discrimination in housing, employment, education, and public accommodations through advocacy, litigation, education, outreach, monitoring, and research. The Center is a 501(c)(3)not-for-profit corporation organized under the laws of the State of New York.

    NIMBY (not in my back yard) has been around for a long time.  Mostly, it is neighbourhood members coming together to get prostitutes & crack dealers out of their communities using vigilante style tactics because the police do little.  Usually the problem just moves to the neighbourhood next door and the social issue continues.  In other cases NIMBY coalitions come together to stop environmentally detrimental projects from coming to their hoods.  Often, but not always wealthier neighbourhoods win and poorer neighbourhoods that do not have the resources to fight and so get the unwanted projects.  Again, nasty development does not disappear or is made cleaner, it just moves. 

    In Ottawa we see NIMBY in gentrifying neighbourhoods like mine - Chinatown, where first time home buyers realize that their house was cheap because it is beside a rooming house or public housing and so they organize to close these down or to stop the construction of new ones.  NIMBYs have successfully lobbied against payphones as these were used by drug dealers.  Too bad for the rest of the population such as the poor family that needs the phone!  Bref, instead of dealing with the real issues, poverty, social inequality and exclusion, we construct ugly social housing or concentrate all the poor and marginalized in one small area where we cannot see them or we displace them from prime real estate. 

    Lebreton Flats is a classic example of this, where an entire community was expropriated in the 1960s as their neighbourhood was suddenly deemed a slum.  The area remained vacant for 40 years and now high end ugly condos are being built by a sole builder - Claridge homes! A deal that sounds much like those negotiated in the Wire. Claridge even has the nerve to call it one of Ottawa’s newest urban villages!  Good grief - it was one of Ottawa’s first neighbourhoods! We are still waiting for housing to show up, the bike paths to open and for a definition of affordable housing.  Funny that the housing just across the street on Lorne by Nanny Goat hill, Booth Street or Primrose has become high end.  It was the same kinds of housing that was on Lebreton Flats and some are considered as heritage districts. Go figure! Who gets to label a slum as a slum!

    I read about great spatial location analysis of public housing strategies in the city of Montreal.  The objective was to locate public housing in mixed income neighbourhoods, with access to public transit, grocery stores, schools and daycares.  Then proposals were developed to build small numbers of affordable and/or subsidized units in those areas, but designed in such a way that they would blend into the neighbourhood look and feel.  This reduced public housing blight and does not ghettoize the poor. In Ottawa we have hid and concentrated high numbers of really horrid looking public housing in inaccessible neighbourhoods - no library, no transit, terrible walkability, no grocery store, no trees, no parks.  I am not a geographic determinist, but I am sure that these are not the best conditions for developing pride of place and for kids to thrive.  Class segregation is alive and well in Ottawa.

    Hell on the streets - Cities are turning poverty into a crime & Ottawa looks like hell

    August 9, 2009

    In the spring of this year I attended a conference in Calgary on the topic of homelessness in Canada.  I attended all the francophone sessions since, well, they were not going to be well attended in that town, and also I wanted to hear about how researchers in Quebec think about this issue.  I listened in to a session given by Celine Bellot on Judiciarisation et criminalisation des populations itinérantes à Montréal.  This research is the result of the Collectif de recherche sur l’itinérance, la pauvreté et l’exclusion sociale (CRI) that has produced much interesting trans-disciplinary work on the topic.

    In Calgary Bellot reported the fines homeless people had received in Montreal, the fine arrears that homeless people accumulated and how eventually these unpaid fines lead to jail terms.  The fines are for spitting, sleeping on a park bench, etc.  Her research demonstrated that it is incredibly expensive, let alone regressive, to imprison and administer these accumulated fines and that it might in fact be cheaper to find a way to house these people!  Go figure!  Her research also led to a reduction in arrests.

    Today I read an Op-Ed on the same topic Is It Now a Crime to Be Poor? The issues are the same as those discussed by Bellot and cities are jumping on the bandwagon of criminalizing corporeal necessities, public addiction and mental illnesses performed in public spaces.

    But what of the absence of public washrooms, water fountains, community showers, coop laundromats, clean safe spaces for people to rest, the reduction in mental health beds and the lack of a social and health infrastructure?  The Op-Ed was inspired by a new report Homes Not Handcuffs by the The National Law Center on Homelessness & Poverty and The National Coalition for the Homeless.

    And if that is not bad enough, as institutions are banding against the homeless, society is lashing out with an increase in violence against them (e.g. bum Fights, random murders, setting them on fire, rapes and easy targets for teenage violence).  These Attacks on Homeless Bring a Push on Hate Crime Laws in US Cities.

    Wot! In both instances we revert to the law and not social change!  What have we become? 

    Last night my son and I walked through a bunch of shortcuts to get to the Bytowne Theater.  We walked through small greenspaces on the edge of overpasses, through parking lots, construction zones and by the Shepherds of Good Hope.  We saw a woman using the park as a washroom, a group of drunken men hanging out behind the shelter along a chain linked fence surrounded by trash, we saw a few men laying about Rideau street watching the construction.  On the way home, we walked along Rideau street toward the Rideau Centre.  My son mentioned that it seemed like every other person we walked by looked like a criminal, and he was right, at least like the stereotypes. We saw a couple of drug deals, we saw a fight, lots of public drunkenness, beggars, and there were plenty of disenfranchised and rough looking youth hanging around, some with babies in carriages.  The bus shelter no longer had windows with trash and cigarette butts everywhere!  Woooo!  Ottawa!  What have we become, the Nations capital, but 3 blocks from parliament, there is hell on the streets.  The city is empty of Ottawa locals, full of tourists and people who cannot afford to leave town for the weekend and the homeless.  My son asked me why we took these routes?  I mentioned that we need to see all sides of the city, the good with the bad, the beautiful with the ugly, and we need to remind ourselves or our good fortune and to not forget to work for the less fortunate because in the end it is us who have created this.  Yes us!