I have a constant fear and being a step dad doesn’t help to ease that fear.  It’s a fear that I’ve actually had since I was a small boy which makes it all the more irrational but such is life.  I have lived with a fear of this thing for almost as long as I can remember being alive and while perhaps not as irrational today as it was during my childhood, it is as ever present as one could imagine.

I fear being labelled in the public eye as a rapist, a child molester or any kind of sexual offender.  Beyond financial losses, physical harm to my person or any other type of spurious assassination of my character, I sincerely fear being labelled in the public as a sexual deviant as perhaps the worst thing that could happen to me beyond death and should this thing ever come to face me, I can’t help but wonder if I would wish for the latter.

It is perhaps with this in mind that while I have yet to voice any kind of opinion regarding WikiLeaks, their public face Julian Assange or their choice to release a large sum of unedited, classified American military documents that has endangered a great many people, I can perhaps sympathize with Assange’s recent ordeal handling charges of rape and molestation.  Assange has been, without trial, cast into the public sphere as a rapist and even if only just for a few hours, the damage has been done and certainly there are people now in the world who will think for certain that this man is a sexual deviant, more so seriously, a violent one.

In a recent story I saw on Saskboy’s twitter feed, a story about Assange being cleared of the charges that resulted him being labelled as a rapist.  It’s important that stories like these are published if some one’s reputation has been tarnished but this story is in fact terribly incomplete.  In part, it reads,

Assange — who has denied both accusations — is still suspected of molesting a woman on Aug. 13, but molestation is not a sex crime under Swedish law

I begin to wonder why on earth molestation wouldn’t be a sex crime.  Certainly when a detractor with their own biases sees this, molestation is nearly as bad as rape if not equally as bad depending on what molestation may mean.  So again, I wonder why on earth molestation wouldn’t be a sex crime in Sweden.

And so it goes that translating Assange’s criminal charges remaining (still yet to be tried in any court) may have been a second priority for English speaking journalists.

Assange has been charged with something including the word Ofredande which literally translates into molestation/harassment.  The reason this isn’t a sex crime is because it’s possible that this type of thing is merely a charge of harassment which could be anything from inappropriate comments to being overly persistent when some one denies your advances.

I’m not here to defend Assange but I think (especially in regard to this type of subject) that a person’s public character is not something to be dealt with in a flippant fashion.  being publicly named in the media when you have yet to face thr courts can be devastating to one’s public character and things like this foggy translation and non-specific wealth of “details” don’t help matters.

Think what you may of Assange and his organization but to accept that some one’s character be so terribly tarnished on speculation is at the very best, malicious and barbaric.

In a break from our regularly scheduled ranting, check this out.

Cool picture huh? I was recently in Humboldt, SK where a friend of mine and myself fixed up a trailer. This is the highway #5 just outside of Humboldt where a lake has flooded over the road. When driving through it, I had the sudden urge to hang my phone, which cost me in excess of $800, over the water to get a shot of the front tire churning water. I’m just glad I didn’t drop the darned thing.

I often call myself a Jew because in technical consideration of my ethnic heritage, I am.  My family is a Jewish family though hardly an observant one in large part.  It was when I was about 19 or 20 when I quite inadvertently found out I was Jewish when visiting my Grandmother for the first time since infancy.  It had simply never come up as a point of discussion between me and my converted Buddhist single mother.  It was as much a shock to me to find out that I was Jewish as it was for my grandmother to find out that I had not ever been told.  I should say that this doesn’t mean I don’t consider myself a Jew.  I do indeed consider myself to be Jewish and relished the close knit Jewish community in Toronto during my time there.  It’s honestly a privileged to be a part of so incredible a community full of so many kind people.

Now, even though I’m Jewish, I am perhaps more vulnerable to the label of “self hating Jew” than those who have had more foreknowledge of their heritage than I.  It doesn’t help that I am non-observant on the religious side and often quite critical in my views of Israel and the history of that entire region.  When I look to the Middle East and that area in particular, I think it has been a dark and disappointing black mark on the history of humanity as a whole.

In my eyes, there is no legitimate dispute resolution in this area of the Middle East currently underway and whether it be Egyptian, Jordanian, Israeli, Palestinian or otherwise, none of the players in the Israeli-centric Middle East conflict are viewed positively by me.  whether driven by ignorance fuelled by poverty and religion, ideology fuelled by greed or megalomania or otherwise, I am not in favour of Middle East policies from most any nation currently involved.  As is clear here, this includes Israel.

So why blog about this now?  Well, I’m becoming concerned about the propensity for media and individuals alike to jump on critics of Israel’s domestic policy as anti-semites.  It’s always been a problem of course.  Israel has done very little to make any type of distinction between policy criticism and criticism of Judaism.  Israeli leadership has very often used this to their advantage calling on critics of a nation as critics of an ethnic and religious group.  It is possibly one of the most disingenuous types of argument one can make on the world stage and rightly offends a great many people.  No one likes to be called prejudiced when they are likely not.

John posted recently on his blog about Helen Thomas being hurled from the White House Press Corps for making remarks that many viewed as strongly anti-semitic.  I didn’t view them that way and though I wasn’t surprised at the virulent outrage that followed her statements, I was expectedly disappointed.  At first glance, Thomas’ comments did seem very strongly biased against Jews in particular but it’s so easy to remember that this is frankly because Israel bills itself as the world’s Jewish state.  I should say here that as a Jew, I do not see any reason why I should ever exercise my right of return under Israeli law and identify as an Israeli. I have no desire to associate myself with the state of Israel in its current form.

Thomas said that the Jews should “Get the hell out of Palestine” and continued shortly after by saying they should go back to “Poland, Germany [...] and America and Everywhere else.”  Perhaps it’s the identification of Poland and Germany as a homeland that got everyone’s knickers in a twist but on it’s face, I don’t think those views are anti-semitic.  There is a valid and very spirited debate around the world as to whether or not the Jewish state is even legitimate in how it was established.  It was the British that essentially created Israel and began the Jewish state, forcing one group upon another.  It was like tossing powdered garlic on an exposed ulcer.  But this blog post isn’t about history, it’s about the debate of that history and our perception of it.

So in short, I don’t believe that Helen Thomas expressed anti-semitic views and her later release of a statement insisting that she regretted her comments were almost certainly (I think) a result of public pressure.  In this case, I think that the label of antisemitism and the public outraged resulting from such a label set a tone for debate that left Thomas no choice but to recant or face endless condemnation rather than dissenting discussion.  This does not strike me as an attempt at seeking the truth but rather a mission to make some one express themselves in a manner that makes us more comfortable.  Shielding ourselves like this does not help us develop intellectually.

Perhaps responding to the public momentum created by Helen Thomas’ remarks, a Canadian New Democratic Member of Parliament has recently been under the gun as well being called an anti-semite.  Libby Davies, deputy leader of the New Democrats in the House of Commons has been attacked as anti-semitic after making comments supporting a boycott of Israel and indirectly questioning the very legitimacy of the Israeli state.  In the video of her comments, she actually goes on to say near the end of it that people are often afraid to speak to their views because criticism of the Israeli state often results in accusations of being anti-semitic.  Lo and behold, Libby Davies is being accused of exactly that.

Now I don’t necessarily support a boycott, divestment from the state of Israel or sanctions and I’m not actually opposed to a two state solution despite my position that the legitimacy of Israel is indeed a valid point upon which to cast doubt.  I think the debate needs to be clear and honest but with so much ideological emotion involved in the debate, it hasn’t come close to being that.  You have multiple sides to the argument and fractured view points on those sides.  some are motivated by reason, some by a particular interpretation of history, some by an interpretation of a religion and others by simple prejudice.  Ah yes, it’s not like antisemitism or racism in regard to Arabs doesn’t exist, it simply doesn’t wash over all view points as some may assert.

I get awfully saddened when I observe the debate regarding Israel.  I stopped attempting to really get into that debate because I found constantly, a want to argue motivation, religion and ideology rather than historical evidence, facts, moral grounds or what is simply fair to the people in the region outside the context of religion.  There is so much incredible suffering and ill treatment of people going on in the Middle East within this conflict and, as mentioned above, I don’t find any one particular player to be morally superior to any other.  I see mountains of ignorance, greed, hatred, violence and essentially the worst attributes of humanity at play in this region.  I see very little peace, love, consideration of neighbours and so on.  I have to wonder if it’s not just a hopeless thing of which to think.

I am Jewish.  I strongly believe that I have a right to identify myself as such.  I am not anti-semitic nor am I inclined to racial discrimination against Arabs or any other ethnic group.  I am saddened by the States of Israel, Jordan, Palestine, Egypt and others who participate in the massacre of what could possibly be referred to as stable living.  It is in this region that I see so little hope for normalcy and honour.  Again, I fault no one for being Jewish, Arab or otherwise, but rather I fault so many for being horribly ignorant and ill-minded in causing so great an amount of needless conflict and suffering over so many years.

The fact that the debate of Israeli statehood has been so mired in bias from all sides is a very sad commentary on the human condition of our times.  It is why I remain largely an observer of the debate and not a participant.  It is why I am so concerned about those who do participate, that they must tread lightly and avoid complete and honest intellectual positions that may help us all to understand this situation that for some is so many unfathomable miles away and for others, so unimaginably close.

All I want is for the people of this embattled region and those around the world to simply step back, take a breath, attempt to look into the eyes of their fellow human beings with whom they have so much in common and be honest with each other.  Sadly, I don’t think that’s about to happen any time soon.

By all accounts, today has been something of a downer but not too terrible.  I managed to finagle myself some free time and got all excited about garage-saling.  How do you spell garage sailing?  Garage saleing?  Hmm…

Anyhow, as I got all worked up at the thought of finding a nice dresser or even a living room set, (very macho n’ manly, I know) I badgered my better half to come out with me and hit the local front lawns to see what we could find.  After a good bout of whining, she caved and off we went; or at least off we would have went were it not for a slight problem.

Tanya locks her car and I usually don’t lock my pickup.  I figure since it’s parked in the driveway and since it’s a 92 model pickup, I don’t have to worry about that.  Well, scratch that I guess.  As I turned my ignition, I noticed my signal was on and when I went to turn it off, I realized that the side of my steering column had been gone at with what I can only guess was a cheap pair of pliers and a screwdriver.  Who knows.  Regardless, the truck was not drivable.

So my day started off finding out that some jerk had tried to hot wire my truck in the middle of the night.  Thankfully, the coward never made off with my beloved pickup and must have been scared off because he even left a brand new (still in the box) set of $50 jumper cables in the cab.  It really gets me that this would happen and of course, it does, but when it happens to you, you definitely feel violated and angry that some one would be inconsiderate enough to do something like that to your belongings.  Almost kinda shocked despite the common incidence of this type of thing.  I’m more upset though at the fact that now, I’ll always feel as though I must lock my pickup or semi when I don’t think I should have to feel that way at all; especially in a place like Saskatoon.

This is not the end of the story however.  Something else unfortunate happened today.  After making a couple of phone calls to those with more wisdom than I and viewing the damage, I decided to get a whole new steering column from a wrecker.  My better half (she has boobs so how can I even compare?) got right into crawling around unbolting this and that and I worked on separating the shaft under the hood to remove the damaged column.  We then went to the wreckers armed with some tools to rip another shaft out of an old Chevy there.  Half an hour and $70 later, we were on our way home with a new steering column and a gallon or two of sweat dripping off our faces.  Driving on a dusty road with the windows down even for just a minute was NOT a good idea.

Before even reaching the highway to make our way back home, we firmly resolved to shower and leave replacing the steering column for tomorrow.

As we arrived back at home, I grabbed at my phone feeling symptoms of e-mail withdrawal.  As I clicked a button to bring up the screen, my second big bad terrible incident of the day hit me.  I had dropped my phone at the wreckers when I was crouched down beside the engine trying to get at a bolt on the steering shaft.  Not thinking twice, I stuffed it back in my pocket only to realize when we got home that the LCD screen had been borked.  “that’s it!” I thought to my self.  “Shower time!”

So two incredibly vital possessions of mine were rendered inoperable today.  I was delighted at the thought of spending a couple of hundred bucks at garage sales and instead, I ended up spending $70 and all day (and some of tomorrow morning) on a steering column and another $75 for a new LCD screen for my phone off eBay which probably won’t get here ’till Wednesday and who knows what corner of the province I’ll be in then.

All in all however, things ain’t so bad.  My family life is secure, the problems I have today are fixable and I haven’t claimed bankruptcy yet.  So honestly, this wasn’t a terrible day and I had fun rummaging around the wrecker’s for a steering column.  I just wish I could have been rummaging around at garage sales instead with a working blackberry tour blinking and beeping to tell me all about how the world around me was being destroyed by British Petroleum.

Oh and to whoever decided to try n’ steal my pickup?  Go ahead n’ try again.  I’m a lover, not a fighter and pretty easy going but for you, I’ll make a very notable exception to living with that general attitude.

This actually struck me quite recently when I attended the Sask’ Liberal Party’s leader’s dinner where Ryan Bater gave a very good speech and again today as I read a Vancouver Sun article on the subject.  Before everything was to start at this dinner, I outwardly showed a very notable lack of public etiquette.  Actually, this was pretty bad because when in public, I at least like to express myself with some grace even if I do lately maintain a kind of five o’clock shadow.

Moving a glass of ginger ale during a native prayer was kinda bad.  I mean, I can only imagine what the little elder at the front of the room thought as she heard ice clinking about at my table located at the very front of the room.

After that of course, we all stood to sing O Canada.  These are the ceremonial procedures that I had totally forgotten and they made me think of how comfortable I was with them in the past compared to how alien they seem to me now.

Here’s the deal.  Less than half a decade ago, I was a virulently patriotic Canadian.  Every remembrance day ceremony and every Canada day celebration was a great time to rob me because you could be assured that I wasn’t at home.  I was out expressing my love of Canada and in many cases, citing fact after fact about our military skill and social constructs that made us so great.  At one point, I wanted to leave high school simply because I so badly wanted to enlist in the Army corp of engineers.  Now today, none of that seems to be a part of my life and my feelings of patriotism have waned considerably.  Where once I would belt out the lyrics to O Canada with confidence and vigour, now I can’t even remember them and when I do sing along as I did at the Liberal convention, it feels some how wrong.  Never mind the lack of patriotism, it just feels strange to sing “god keep our land” and “in all our son’s command” as the lyrics seem sexist and overtly religious to me.  Before it was an argument of little consequence in my eyes (I started not to care what a national anthem had for lyrical composition) but recently, having been in a situation where you’re absolutely expected to sing the song with some outward show of conviction, it definitely made me feel uncomfortable, compounded with the fact that I felt like I was singing the song to placate those around me rather than express myself.  I don’t do very well expressing myself in a manner that I feel is dishonest or hollow.  I was even moved to sit down early and felt like it was a major snafu resulting in a half sit and then me standing again to wait until every one else started to sit.  Again, this is all happening at the front of the room just a few feet from the speaker’s podium.

Shucks, talk about feeling out of your element!

So anyway, I come to wonder if this is a big problem or not.  I mean, I do actually like our country and I think we have it really good here.  I appreciate that we Canadians can work together to make and maintain one of the most livable nations on the planet but I don’t feel like a patriot and have recently been made plainly aware that I feel uncomfortable when made to express myself as such.  I don’t have any great love of our military and look at the formal construction of our country as being built by dishonest and dishonourable folks passing themselves off as having a mandate to run the country and its numerous separate jurisdictions.  I guess I love the country but not the managers?  I dunno, it’s a tough thing to think about really because of how much of a fanatic I was about patriotism in the past.

Is this actually a bad thing?  I work for a living and own my own very small business.  I pay taxes and I participate in the political system to a minor degree.  I call myself a Canadian and bear no ill will to the nation.  I consider myself some what educated even if I don’t have any type of diploma.  As a productive and concerned citizen of the nation and resident of the province in which I live, is it a terrible thing that I don’t feel like a patriot or am I patriot and I just don’t know it?

It’s actually a really tough question to ask myself because it’s dawned on me that I really don’t know the answer today whereas I knew the answer for sure a number of years ago.  It would have been an enthusiastic yes.  If the answer is that I am indeed not a patriot, what are some compelling reasons that I become one or on the other hand, should I even be concerned?

I don’t think it’s realistic that I could ever hope to be both an anarcho-capitalist and a patriot at heart I suppose but I wonder if that’s a sufficient answer to my questioning of my feelings about our country or not.

what about you?  Do you know the lyrics to O Canada?  Are you a patriot?