The Current State Of The Music Industry

An article published on Jam Music says it all – The music industry has hardly progressed since 2007.

I am is still waiting for multiple video compilations on DVD that are just sitting on the shelf because the labels are spending all of their funds promoting acts they tell the kids to like….

The Gun Culture

I watched an episode of Morgan Spurlock’s 30 Days the other day and I was surprised to hear that people actually claimed Virginia Tech could have been prevented if students were armed. Similar claims pushing the gun culture were also published after the beheading of a person in a Greyhound Bus here in Canada in July.

Having easy access to weapons would not have prevented either and would have likely resulted in more casualties. How ? In a panic people make quick decisions and mistakes happen in haste.

In a school setting where everyone was armed police would not have known who the perpetrators were, and those who are armed who not recognise plain clothed policemen and security. And worse the perpetrator could be dressed as a policeman or security.

The situation worstens in close quarters where shots are likely to result in other casualties because of stray bullets and the resulting panic from weapons fire.

So arming students and bus passangers would not have helped in these situations, at all. And possession is not in any way justified by the crime rate here in Canada – Break ins would likely happen more frequently because criminals want guns.

Universal Health Care – Personal Life & Death Experience

Here are my personal experiences with health care here in Canada.

Until my mid 20’s I have had numerous minor surgeries and one major surgery in my early teens, none of which were delayed. And from the mid 90’s and on I have had several minor surgeries in clinics, without delay.

In the early 80’s I had one major surgery – An inflamed and highly infected appendix that burst as it came out, requiring me to take strong antibiotics and to have a drainage tube installed for several weeks. And I spent two of those weeks in the hospital.

At the time my family was in dire straights because of a lack of employment where I lived. I was so concerned about this that I didn’t speak about the initial signs of the infections I felt for a day, so imagine what would have been the outcome if I wouldn’t have been covered. Imagine how stressed I would have been to find out the family had needed to file for bankruptcy over this.

This despair is felt in communities where there is no government assistance and in people that thought they were covered because they paid their insurance. But aren’t those fraud cases a convenient way to deny people some humanity…

Let’s face it, the mid upper and mid classes have been brainwashed into believing they’re superior to the working poor by the upper class elitists, who have sold them this idiotic concept of fulfillment via consumerism for decades. And until this recession they quite literally “bought it”.

This recession was caused by the sheer indulgences of the masses in America. People lived beyond their means to fit this image of wealth and in doing so accumulated incredible amounts of debt. This was all caused by this social conditioning where people we’ve valued by their possessions, not by their generosity and how they treat their fellow Americans.

This assumption that people aren’t making it because they aren’t working hard enough is a fallacy that dismisses the fortuitous circumstances of most of the more wealthy Americans.

Most people will likely scrape by, regardless of their efforts, so assumptions of laziness or fraudulent behavior are based on ignorant, antiquated stereotypes.

Universal HeathSCARE

Socialism. That is the boogie man that scares people away from Universal Health Care in the United States.

No, it doesn’t matter that other socialist services are available in all municipalities the States – They are afraid of it because they immediately associate socialism to communism. And they’re using Canada’s current problems to claim it couldn’t possibly work.

Well, if it weren’t for the demand for doctors in the States we would have line ups and delays in Canada !

That’s right. If American HMO’s weren’t so insatiable we’d keep our doctors, nurses and medical technicians.

We just can’t outbid HMOs, who cut costs by refusing coverage to people who paid ! These companies obtain funds regularly from over 300 million Americans while Canada has only just over 33 million people.

And worse the American pharmaceutical companies fleece these Americans via their HMO/insurance companies with their exorbitantly high prices. These are the same people that claimed that medicine from Canada was inferior when they actually came from their Canadian subsidiaries !

The insurance company and pharmaceutical companies fear regulation. They want to keep their cash cow. And the nightmares these cause in turn scares Canadians about public-private partnerships.

There’s fear all around it seams when it comes to health care. Yet public-private partnerships could reduce that fear in both countries.

Arbitration by the government in the case of insurance could also help.

No insurance company should be able to short change people that have paid and they should face fines that could then be used to fund arbitration. And on the other hand insurance fraudsters should be prosecuted fully by these government run bodies.

The amount of litigation over these cases are incredible, burdening the civil courts of the United States.

But of course there are plenty of Americans that think Universal Health Care is a “free ride” open to abuse. Some even go as far as claiming they don’t want to pay for someone else’s health care.

The later is like stating you don’t want to pay municipal taxes for fire services for your neighbour.

People who are sick or are taking care of the sick don’t work and don’t spend.

People who work multiple jobs just to pay their health care bills don’t spend, burn out and make mistakes.

So Universal Health Care is far from anti-capitalist. And if companies like Walmart and McDonalds had covered most of their employees, Universal Health Care would not have been required, because of the existing programs.

Dismissal By Classification

These anti-seal hunt protests think that there is no way in hell that someone could hold an opinion other than theirs unless they’re uniformed/stupid or have vested interest in the seal hunt.

This is quite apparent because they become frustrated. They get dismissive and angry at you. They attack your “morality” and “conscience” in the hope that you can be guilted away. And some attack and/or harass you personally, in the hope you will get frustrated and walk away from the debate.

That’s how desperate they are for control.

They don’t want normal people like me to talk about it. Otherwise they wouldn’t block me or censor my comments. Nor would they use straw men arguments and keep me from defending myself from random personal accusations.

Not once did I demand personal information from these people yet they demand it from me. Why ?

What exactly qualifies these people to demand personal information ? Because i have a different opinion than theirs ?

Why can’t they just stick to the subject at hand ?

They’re arrogant because seal pups are cute. The evidence against the hunt doesn’t add up yet it always comes back to “seals must be protected because they’re cute”.

Youth isn’t an issue because they do not protest the countless deaths of ALL young animals. They concentrate on the ones that are physically appealing.

The vegans and vegetarians do but they’re in the background buried by media friendly imagery ; A minority that joined these groups in the hopes that the majority could be converted into their lifestyle.

Some of these groups may have been founded by vegans and vegeterians but it isn’t a prerequisite for membership or employment with these groups. And the majority of North American and Europeans eat meat so I question any claim stating that they the only people behind this are vegans and vegeterians.

No human can be “humane” without civility, especially towards his fellow man. And assumptions of guilt is neither civil or humane.

I’ve watched rights erode in the United States simply because of this assumption that people who want privacy have something to hide.

Those who believe this willfully surrendered rights under the presumption that due process would always prevail and that misinterpretations would never happen. The ends, the alleged eradication of terrorism, justified the means, a “temporary” suspension of rights.

This is the very attitude I was subjected to by some of these protesters, who in the hopes of trying to incite defensiveness attacked me with every unfounded accusation they could think of. And when that didn’t work they stopped me from responding all together.

In the end they’re just making fools of themselves. They obviously lack the ability to do research because with little research everybody can find my name, location and primary interests. Unless they’re completely paranoid…

I guess that’s something to think about while i’m hunting seal in the Ottawa River…

How Predictable…

Not only did one of those protesters post taunts on an unrelated video of mine but he also posted a video, in which he mentions me by name, and refuses to let me respond. He had also failed to mention the video, obviously in the hopes I would not respond to it.

Well, though luck. It’s going to be reviewed here and exposed for what it is : A straw man argument.

Let’s start off with the title : “Killers Also Lie Part I“

Apparently it’s an “objective” piece. Or a piece of something else…

Yes, they believe that any person that kills and/or eats anything that could be perceived as cute should be vilified and harassed. And that people who aren’t willing to to this aren’t truly “defenders”.

For example, I don’t eat veal and it is a personal choice that I don’t push on anyone. I also think seals are cute but I don’t think sealers are the boogie man for using them to sustain themselves.

But there is no such thing as a moderate view when it comes to the seal hunt with these people. they’ve appointed themselves saviors and you’re the enemy if you don’t go on witch hunts like them.

If you in any way contradict them they just throw all these idiotic accusations at you, hoping one would stick so they can dismiss whatever you’ve said. It doesn’t matter that there’s nothing anywhere subsctatiating their accusations. They’ll accuse you of everything because the ends justify the means.

This “person” threw everything he had at me months back to imply that I have vested interest or emotional attachment to the hunt. And when that failed, he ran off claiming he couldn’t be bothered. This was after he managed to convince someone to block me with misinformation about by second account.

This is of course why the video begins with these pot shots about “spin” and “exaggerations”, and this claim that I must be a “seal hunt advocate”…

- The “baby seal”.

That said he then starts off with a statement insisting that he absolutely needs to call seal pups “babies” because  fifteen year olds cannot comprehend anything but that term – Insisting of course that “neonatal” is the only alternative terminology to use to define these seals.

I had previously asked why a person wouldn’t be able to understand “beaters” when they could appreciate the graphic footage they present. He did not respond to that question because he knew quite well that these were not the “white coats” most would be thinking of when he mentions “seal babies”.

The December 2007 EFSA report clearly states “The hunt focuses almost exclusively on harp seals (Table 1), the vast majority (~ 95%) of whom are killed when they are between 1 and 3.5 months of age (i.e. “beaters”; Stenson, 2005).” – source

In this video he claims the EFSA said 95% of the seals hunted are 14 day to 3 months old. This is of course incorrect and he does not use the term “Beater” in this part of the video – He used the term “white coats” instead, several times, when “white coats” are actually younger than 14 days.

Sea Turtles and adult crabs were then of course then mentioned in defense to this need to protect “young animals”. “White coats” are protected and the nature of the hunt makes it difficult for them to hunt full grown mating adults…

- OH MY COD !

The protesters do love making claims on behalf of the sealers and this is one of their favorite ones.

I have never claimed seals were a threat to cod stock nor did I believe they were. I have rarely encountered that statement either outside of the protest sites, who use it to bash the DFO.

Their diets vary.

- “Seal fur is not edible”

This very text appears in the next segment of the video while he attempts to claim that seal is only hunted for fur.

Well, one of the questions he refuses to answer is why Iniut find seal meat palatable while their white neighbours don’t. Why would they just stop eating seal meat, having done it for so long to survive ? And what of all those traditional recipes enjoyed by non Iniut in Newfoundland/Labrador ?

The only response i’ve ever had to that from the protesters is that seal meat is then “barely eaten”. They also threw in irrelevent statistics about meat consumtion outside of the area in an attempt to dismiss the fact that it is a regional food product.

- Tradition

The next second contains the most ridiculous statement on how the commercial hunt is limited to French Canadians and can only be traced back 125 years.

Newfoundland/Labrador was a British colony ! It joined Canada in 1949. And these people came from the British Isles, where many did the same thing. The Nordic countries still have hunts.

Then there are the Acadien who settled New Brunswick, Nova Scotia and PEI since the mid 1600’s. They hunted and ate seals. I’m quite sure that’s more than 125 years back. And yes, they also sold the pelts, meat and fat locally.

- Guilt peddling

Yes, the video then continues with the customary guilt peddling and self congratulatory posturing.

In order to emphasize how superior their morality is, they always compare the seal hunt to human rights abuses and genocide. The purpose being ? To imply that if a person that supports the hunt must also supports these violations.

In 1755 the Acadien were subjected to human right violations and genocide so I find this tactic particularly disgusting.

Harp seals do not witness the death of their children as portrayed in the seal holocausts these protesters like to conjure up (explanation). On the other hand some Acadien did witness their children dying and some of them actually ate seal to survive !

And slavery was abolished in Canada in 1834, decades before the States abolished theirs.

- We’re in the money

In this later part of the video he claims my quotes from the HSUS payroll was meant to be shocking.

No. It was meant be informative.

Why exactly are they getting that much ? What are they doing in regards to the seals, other than donating to other charities ? Couldn’t the fund be used in a manner to accelerate the process, which has been lingering for years ?

Those would be the questions i’d ask myself, along with this question : Is the HSUS in a possition to do what they promise ? That one is quite important, seeing that they do not have any political influence  in Canada.

The failure of the boycott, which started before 2006, is proof that it isn’t going well for them. And they’re dependent on studies from other groups…

- Lying about lies

And this is how the video ends. With these vague claims about lies.

I like how some protesters just label everything lies just to avoid being caught repeating the misinformation they’d need to post in the attempt to refute the claims.

It’s the “trust me it’s a lie” defense, where we are expected to read their minds for answers.

Seriously, we rarely find out where they get their information from because they know some of the sites may be questionable or hasn’t been updated for some time.

And sometimes they make stuff up on the spot – Like how the EFSA is funded by the Canadian government… I’m not kidding…

Canadian Seafood Boycott = By Proxy Protest & Manipulation

If a neighbour did something I didn’t like, would it be logical for me to break another neighbour’s window in the hopes that neighbour would do something about the neighbour I didn’t like ?

That is exactly what the American lobby groups have been asking people to do since 2004 !

To hell with the fact that the vast majority of Canadian fishermen aren’t actually involved in the sealing activities – Guilt by association sells and these groups are looking for ignorant people to sell it to.

It’s one thing to try to garner support from vegetarians and vegans, whose beliefs are quite obvious. But these people don’t want the majority to look at the map and notice that the hunt is limited to several small areas in Eastern Canada. They don’t want people to know that even the majority of fishermen there are not sealers.

No, they want people to boycott products from the Pacific fishery. They want people to boycott seafood from the Bay Of Fundy, from the Atlantic south of Nova Scotia, etc.

The name of the game is harassment. They got kicked off the ice flows for harassing sealers and now they want everyone to harass the poorest workers in Canada to try to get them to harass the equally poor sealers, both of which are scrapping by.

And who exactly are these protest groups ? Who are they supported by ?

These are American lobby groups staffed with “upper class” media manipulators that openly look down on the working class. Groups that are supported by American seafood lobbyists, who want people to buy their seafood instead of Canadian Seafood.

Some of their supporters may be ignorant but these people definitely know that Canada’s fishermen have nothing to do with the seal hunt.  They’re simply using them as tools, as hostages, in an attempt to garner more donations. They clearly don’t care about Canadian fishermen, at all.

They’ve created a crisis out of thin air on the backs of these fishermen, a crisis that will never end because seal hunting will persist in Atlantic Canada. And to keep the donations flowing they’ve claimed they are the only ones that can correct this crisis.

Arrogant, elitist opportunists with vested interest in prolonged crises cannot be trusted. And there can be no doubt from their biased documentation and nonviable solutions that these people are media manipulators.

They publish unsubstantiated claims about bias in documents that contradict their claims when they paid for, edited and published several of the main studies they continuously regurgitate as “new” and “independent”.

Their solutions are either redundant procedures, that they will clearly never claim are being followed, and closure of the sealing industry in Canada, that they obviously know will probably not happen as long as they publish questionable claims and documents.

Or am I just overestimating the intelligence of these people ?

Are the people compiling this information just bad at editing or unable to grasp the information they’re handling ? Are the obvious fallacies in some of their reports just the result of stupidity and not intentional ?

More Sea Shepherd Censorship On Youtube

I have yet again had one of my comments censored by Sea Shepherd on Youtube.

I had responded to this claim that seal meat is “barely consumed” in Newfoundland and Labrador by non aboriginals when it was deleted. Upon trying to repost this response, I noticed that I had been blocked.

So, what exactly caused them to delete my message and block me ? The facts that I had posted. Facts that counter their campaign to vilify Newfoundlanders.

Basically they want people to think of Newfoundlanders as invaders that exploit seals like the settlers exploited buffalo in “Dances With Wolves”. They want people to think Newfoundlanders never eat seal meat because they want to push this image of seal carcasses rotting on the ice. They generally want to deny Newfoundlanders have a traditional hunt, at all.

Well, Newfoundlanders mostly originate from the British Isles and Nordic countries, where seal was hunted and consumed. Seal is still being hunted and consumed in the Nordic countries.

Arriving in Newfoundland and Labrador, the settlers consumed seal to survive, more-so in more remote areas during the harsh winter. This resulted in local delicacies like Flipper Pie and the settlers continued to use this meat in this diet for hundreds of years.

But apparently some people think that the non aboriginals in Newfoundland and Labrador suddenly woke up one day, looked in the mirror and dropped seal meat from their diet simply because they’re white.

Yes, while the Inuit eat seal the whites are now ordering pizza or Chinese, even in the most remote parts of Labrador !

Furthermore, the protester’s reality is apparently limited to the popularity of products in the States – To substantiate their claims that seal meat isn’t consumed they have repetitively presented estimates on how much seal meat is sold and consumed in the United States.

This is tantamount to claiming Sushi wasn’t eaten in Japan and Asia until it penetrated the American market in the 60’s. Yet those preposterous claims remain…

I’ve seen seal meat in the fish market here in Ontario – Canned and fresh. Why exactly would it be this deep into Canada if nobody bought it ?! It makes no sense ! And why are there recipes online, if nobody eats it ?

They have never had answers to those question other than these idiotic conspiracy theories.

As I was saying…

Just noticed that I accidentally deleted some of my previous post. Argh !

Anyhow, what I had mentioned is that in the end this need to indoctrinate people in the trends imposed by the labels is a projection of insecurity.

Some obviously lack the fortitude to expand their horizons beyond what they perceive as normal. Why ? Because deep down they fear isolation and solitude. And this in turn results in a fear of individuality and the classification of individuals in these prefabricated labels.

I, for one, have been completely dissatisfied with what the labels have been offering for some time. And quite frankly it is obvious that they are trying to ram formulated material down our throats, having diverted funds from the new acts to their most media palatable acts.

Every time I turn on the radio or music video stations the music industry is telling me what to listen to. “Pay For Play”, payola’s brazen cousin, is in full force resulting in the death of eclecticism and choice through repetition. And this is what is causing their woes, not downloading.

I am not so desperate for entertainment as to willfully dance to the crack of a whip. I am not here to fulfill their needs, they’re here to fulfill mine.

Musical Sheep

Why do these musical sheep try to make other people into musical sheep ?

Seriously, I listen to everything but if it isn’t my cup of tea, then it isn’t my cup of tea – Regardless of the chart activity and sales of the single, album, artist or genre in question.

Some people have obviously been brainwashed into depending on other people’s opinions when it comes to music. They assume “talent” with chart activity, sales or a lack thereof and those are dependent on the actions of others.

I like some generic pop acts but I certainly don’t think they are more talented simply because they happened to find a niche and sold a few CDs, especially in such an image driven marketplace ; Many more talented pop acts have been passed over by the labels and media simply because they couldn’t be sold on teen magazines or on the newer MTV, which is only a shadow of what it used to be.

Of course the labels will shortly offer more rock in response to the recession. It’s all very predictable.