The struggle continues . . .

THE MAYLAY MAIL has a disturbing report about intolerance in Malaysia. According to Ram Anand, Lesbian, Bisexual, Gay and Transgender (LBGT) lifestyles have been equated to social ills like prostitution and drug abuse by Deputy Minister in the Prime Minister’s Department Datuk Mashitah Ibrahim.

“The (LBGT) issue has its own after-effects, which can lead to prostitution, drug abuse, psychological problems and also mental illness. We have been raising awareness on our fatwa against LBGT tendencies with heavy media publicity on the issue to raise awareness, and also about the bad effects homosexuality has on health.”

Makes you wonder how long it will take for Stevie's troglodytes to start making the same noises?

Ottawa, we have a problem . . .

Many children are scalded and burned from living in densely overcrowded houses with makeshift wood stoves.

AND IT'S NOT GOING AWAY. According to Charlie Angus, who's the MP for Timmins-James Bay, the plight of our aboriginals on the northern Ontario reserve of Attawapiskat is intolerable. His post on Huffington Canada, "What if They Declared an Emergency and No One Came?" has a must-see video, as well. It's AOL-resident, and AOL doesn't play nice like YouTube for embedding, so check out the Huffington link to see it. I wonder who owns the new Cadillac Escalade to be seen in it? A $60K SUV could supply a lot of plumbing.

It's been three weeks since Attawapiskat First Nation took the extraordinary step of declaring a state of emergency. Since then, not a single federal or provincial official has even bothered to visit the community.

No aid agencies have stepped forward. No disaster management teams have offered help.

Meanwhile temperatures have dropped 20 degrees and will likely drop another 20 or 25 degrees further in the coming weeks. For families living in uninsulated tents, makeshift cabins and sheds, the worsening weather poses serious risk.

Two weeks ago I travelled to this community on the James Bay coast to see why conditions had become so extreme that local leaders felt compelled to declare a state of emergency. It was like stepping into a fourth world.

• • •

You'd think that a medical warning from a provincial health authority would move government into action. Think again. When it comes to the misery, suffering and even the death of First Nations people, the federal and provincial governments have developed a staggering capacity for indifference.

H/T to le grand chef Daniel

CANADIAN. The racial slur edition.

I remember a sign on the door of a hotel in a place far from Canadian shores. It said, No dogs or Canadian sailors. There was a good reason for that. We had, shall we say, abused greatly the hospitality of our hosts.

On that occasion we deserved what we got. But that is hardly normal. Canadians are generally looked upon as affable and nice, if somewhat unexciting.

So, are you wondering why the "Stars and Bars" in the corner? That's because this is an American story.

When you hear the word "Canadian," what's the first thing that comes to mind? Someone who is hockey-crazed? Someone who says "eh" at the end of every sentence? Someone who is, dare I say it, nice?

How about someone who is black?

Shocked?

It would seem that in place of the former racial slurs used to describe black Americans, the racist segment of the US has taken to using Canadian in its place.

Earlier this month, an e-mail that had been circulating since 2003, written by a Houston assistant district attorney Mike Trent, resurfaced. The e-mail was short, only about 100 words, and was sent to the entire office. It started out by praising a junior prosecutor for a job well done. Then the message continued:

He overcame a subversively good defense by Matt Hennessey that had some Canadians on the jury feeling sorry for the defendant and forced them to do the right thing."

The problem however, (and this raised concerns with Trent's superiors), is that Canadians are not permitted to serve on US juries. So Trent had to mean something else.

Check The Racial Slur Database and scroll down to "Canadian". There's your answer.

Trent claims that he was unaware of the meaning, overheard someone saying that there were Canadians on the jury, took that literally, and just repeated it in his e-mail.

Really? One would think Trent might have discovered the odd "Canadian" during the Voir Dire phase. You know, jury selection. It was, after all, a criminal case. In a place like Houston, Canadians have funny accents. And we say, "eh" a lot.

Why Canadian as a racial slur referring to blacks? From the National Post:

Last August, a blogger in Cincinnati going by the name CincyBlurg reported that a black friend from the southeastern U.S. had recently discovered that she was being called a Canadian. "She told me a story of when she was working in a shop in the South and she overheard some of her customers complaining that they were always waited on by a Canadian at that place. She didn't understand what they were talking about and assumed they must be talking about someone else," the blogger wrote.

"After this happened several times with different patrons, she mentioned it to one of her co-workers. He told her that ‘Canadian' was the new derogatory term that racist Southerners were using to describe persons they would have previously referred to [with the N-word.]"

A similar case in Kansas City was reported last year on a Listserv, or electronic mailing list, used by linguistics experts. A University of Kansas linguist said that a waitress friend reported that "fellow workers used to use a name for inner-city families that were known to not leave a tip: Canadians. ‘Hey, we have a table of Canadians.... They're all yours.' "

Stefan Dollinger, a postdoctoral fellow in linguistics at University of British Columbia and director of the university's Canadian English lab, speculated that the slur reflects a sense of Canadians as the other.

In other words, when used by a white racist, "Not one of us. Not a real American."

Disgusted?

Thought so.

Thanks to Cheryl for catching this.

We'll insure your frog, but not your human partner.

Your pet is a member of your family. So says the Palm Beach Community College.

But your human domestic partner isn't.

The pets of Palm Beach Community College employees will qualify for discounted group medical insurance beginning in January, but domestic partners are still barred from receiving similar benefits.

School officials sent a memo last week explaining the new voluntary pet benefit available via payroll deduction through the private company Veterinary Pet Insurance.

And it's not like the college's pet insurance scheme is restricted to just dogs and cats.

Full-time college employees can receive a 5 percent discount on services because of the college's enrollment in the program, which covers dogs and cats, but also hedgehogs, frogs, guinea pigs, geckos, iguanas and sugar gliders - small flying mammals native to Australia.

You can buy college sponsored health insurance for a frog. But your adult human partner? Well that's a different story, and it was a conscious decision on the part of the college trustees.

In August, PBCC trustees voted down a proposal to allow the domestic partners of full-time employees to receive insurance benefits. The plan wouldn't have cost the school anything because it pays employee premiums only, not those of dependents.

Now the kicker. (Yes, it gets a little worse). The pet health insurance plan (which insures frogs) was made available a mere 90 days after the trustees rejected the option for insuring domestic partners.

The college trustees apparently had a concern.

[Grace] Truman, [PBCC spokesperson] said trustees weren't concerned about costs to the college, but potential long-term increases for employees because of additional enrollees in the group plan.

That's weird. Maybe it's just me but I have always understood that the more enrollees in a plan, the cheaper it got for each member. Silly me for thinking that way.

Palm Beach Community College now joins the ranks of Home Depot, Sprint, Ecolab and Waste Management, all of whom offered pet health insurance and had to be pressured into providing the same option for domestic partners.

For more on this sick form of disconnect, head on over to Pam's House Blend.

And, oh yes, if Palm Beach Community College had ever seen what my two male terriers liked to do for fun, they probably wouldn't have insured them either.