BREAKING: in what seemed like a cheap Valedictory speech, Obama builds Canada’s ego…

The President also confirmed Canadian’s farts smell better than any other nation’s

This could have been the headline from after president Barack Obama addressed parliament yesterday. 

Like a single guy at last call, Obama was determined to make sure the person (or people) he was talking to, felt like the prettiest belle at the ball. He did this with the typical rhetoric about friendship and trade, following this up with Beavertail anecdotes, and plenty of jokes staggered carefully through the speech. 

Was Obama trying to pump Canadian MPs up before summer break by telling them what they want to hear? Yes. In my opinion because he's a lame duck, with limited desire to say anything more than generic positive pluralist values, this is what he's left with. That and inform Canadians we had the best smelling farts in the world. Thats the only explanation in my mind for how the PM was acting. With the amount of times during the stream of Mr. Obamas speech that Justin smiled and knowingly nodded while slightly lowering and tilting his head, and then putting on an expression most reserve for inhaling the odour of their own gaseous bowel releases. 

Obviously i’m being a bit stupid here, but the point i’m trying to make is, why the hype if this whole speech was going to be fluff? Presidents don’t address the house that often, it is a big deal. When they do, its usually to set up policy for future leaders, or for themselves if they are at the beginning of their terms. 

This was not the case, Obama is a lame duck, and his speech was more a stand up act that also happened to espouse liberal, pluralist values at the same time. 

In their last days in office, presidents have some power to make activist moves. They can pardon individuals, finalize executive orders, in Obamas case try and slip in one last liberal Supreme Court Justice. Obama has a plethora of issues he could dress in his remaining days. He could take a last stand for freedom and privacy issues for instance, and pardon Edward Snowden. He could have mentioned in his speech some regrets on his administrations toxic and contradictory stance on Marijuana, and compliment Canada’s clear move to bring some sense to international drug policy. 

Instead he made jokes about hockey, Beavertails, greying hair his brother in law, burning the White House in 1812, and basically anything else that would pander well. He also called PM Trudeau, "Justin Trudeau" once, and simply “Justin” four times. A move a former leader was criticized for during the last election cycle.

The core of Obama’s speech; some comments about  UN and NATO commitments, with the soon to be famous line “The world needs more Canada” was about as progressive as he was going to get. It was all obvious pandering though. For instance after compliments the Liberals for raising the pride flag, and Complimenting himself for making the White House a rainbow:

“The colours of the rainbow flag have flown on Parliament Hill. They have lit up the White House. That is a testament to our progress, but also the work that remains to ensure true equality for our fellow citizens who are Lesbian, gay, bisexual or transgendered.” - Macleans speech transcript  

He  then went on to say: 

“I have a bias on these issues, but — but our work won’t be finished until all women in our country are truly equal, paid equally, treated equally, given the same opportunities as men; when our girls have the same opportunities as our boys. That’s who we need to be.” - Macleans speech transcript

So you’ve just said you want to make progress on LGBTQ issues, but you only want our “girls, and boys” to have the same opportunities?

What i’m digging at is the obvious pander. Whether or not Obama cares about these issues is irrelevant. As even the Liberal minded CBC put it “Obama tells us what we want to hear, and Canadians love him for it” . He knew he had to give a shout out to Gay Lesbian Bi and Trans people, but in the very language of the next sentence we see the gap in how far you can pander to a Liberal democratic audience. 

To mix up trans rights issues and equal pay for women, dilutes the power of both issues because in making a giant even diagram of issues, you lose people opposed to the new addition. Trans people have said there is a wage gap for them as well, why isn’t this issue brought up when discussing equal pay? 

Because it doesn’t sell. Because this whole display, from the Trudeau twins nodding along and smelling their own farts (why was the PM’s wife on the floor anyway, is she gunning for an office?), to Obama giving obvious support to Hilary, and making some carefully ambiguous Trump disses. Watching the speech was a waste of time, and I guess that makes writing about it worse. However, I had to sit through the nonsensical fart sniffing pander that occurred, and now, if you’ve reached this part of the article, and you’re a Liberal staffer who had to check this because of a google alert (likely how I achieve readership) then i’ve paid you back. 

If you’re not affected by my obviously specific burn, then I only hope you’re as annoyed as I am over the pander filled waste of a speech, by a lame duck president. 

Why do the Liberals hate Intersex people ?

The problem with equal rights, acceptance, and the “me” generation 

Justin Trudeau made headlines again yesterday. In yet another example of the pandering we can expect from the Liberal government (who are so happy with themselves they must be smoking some of their supply) Mr. Trudeau announced he will proudly fly the pride flag on parliament hill in support of LGBTQ Canadians. While this seems like a supportive move (albeit while also obviously a pandering one) I have a couple problems. 

First, I take issue with the term equal. As no other sexuality has had their flag (do straight people have a flag? I kinda hope not…) fly, nor have the majority of minority groups, how is singling one group out as deserving of recognition equal ? It’s not, and its stupid to pretend it is, because equality in this sense doesn't exist. After all I, nor anyone else with a based opinion deny the suffering of communities of people who don’t share the homogenous qualities of society at the time through no choice of their own. People identifying as Gay, Lesbian and all the other terms have faced more persecution than those who don’t, this already bleeds the equality. What societies do to help these people is try to re do wrongs. Turn of the century police forces hired many immigrants, after several years prior denying them jobs. Universities were forced to hire people of colour through affirmative action to make up for excluding them systematically in the past. These actions by their explicit nature were not equal. They were meant to balance a relationship that was not equal. This basic principle is called equity - or the principal of being fair and impartial. So firstly, it’s stupid to say this move is to treat non straight Canadians as equal, it is by its singular nature not equal, it is attempting to be equitable by building up with special treatment, a group that was put down. Calling it equality is trying to make everyone feel better, but special treatment of a group,  is what is happening here, no matter how you call it equality. 

(One letter representing two groups?
hardly seems "equal")

My next problem is with the group itself. Well more accurately, i take issue with the “branding” of the group. When I first was in school the terminology we used was LGB, by the time i was graduating T (for trans!) had been added, to recognize the growing number of people born in the wrong gender. A few years later I saw people adding a Q to the acronym, at the time i was told this meant “Queer” which seemed redundant to me. After some recent research I found out it can also mean “questioning” for people who haven't made up their mind, and some acronyms include both (making it LGBTQQ). Ok so now we’re getting a little long, but even more recently while watching Veep they made a joke about not including “I” or intersex people into the acronym, which in my mind made the acronym now LGBTQQI , but apparently thats just stupid and what activists in the community prefer is LGBTI, oh no! Questioning people, and Queer people are now out in the cold. 

The point i’m trying to make here is that the acronym is becoming ridiculous. The reason people make abbreviations like acronyms in the first place is for ease of use, familiarity, and so forth. This is why organizations like NATO (North Atlantic Treaty Organization) didn't keep adding letters every time a new continent became represented (for the record since Europe, The Middle East, and Eastern Europe are represented the acronym might be NAEMEEUTO if they tried to remain “equal”). Yes people might get offended, but its more important to forward to cause than it is to hold yourself back by being so internally divisive.  

This brings me to the title of this post and what I meant by it. By dropping the “I” from the acronym, PM Trudeau has sent the message that Intersex people aren’t included in this celebration. Or at least this is what I assume legions of easily offended people must be thinking. Ah, the “me” generation. When people hear about acceptance,they immediately think that their group, regardless of its size, age or any other metric, deserves to be on the same level as whatever other groups are considered “peers”

(One of only several stupid frames from a
very long comic)

Thats why you don’t have to search far to find individuals defending and arguing for recognition of their group.  Yeah thats a comic saying using the term “Neckbeard”  quote “Sends a message to autistic people that they’re unwelcome. Its ableist as hell!”  What ? Somehow because according to the research for this comic, neckbeard and autistic were both insults used to describe certain people, this conflates the two. Just because I call whoever wrote this comic a donkey-raping shit-eater, it does not imply the all those who rape donkeys also eat shit. I am saying that in this circumstances, to conflate the use of autism as an insult, with a separate insult that degrades someone for being fat lazy and unkept but isn't a actual medical disability means you must be the kind of sick fuck who both rapes donkeys and eats shit, but for what I assume are unrelated reasons. 

The “me” generation (also “social media generation” - for those not keeping track this is those born post generation “Y”) is insistent that every little ism important to a person, no matter how small, needs equal protection. That’s simply not true however. As our world as a whole becomes more and more accepting (Trudeau the first thought the pride flag was the flag of the Jewish Autonomous Oblast from what inside sources tell me) groups don’t need more and more protection, they need less. The more we recognize the same groups over and over who have suffered, the more this catches the ire of those who have not yet been recognized, or apologized to. To mover forward, and to be truly equitable to people would be to asses the struggle of groups today, give those still downtrodden the support they need to be at an equitable level as their countrymen. I don’t think PM Trudeau hates Intersex people, but I do think someone will say that in seriousness before this day is done.

Its because of this Liberal pandering I predict with great certainty, that much money and time will be wasted by this government, recognizing the recognized, apologizing to the apologized and generally confusing equity with equality. I predict with somewhat less certainty that Trudeau will apologize for forgetting Intersex, Twin Spirited, and Asexual people during yesterdays ceremony.