Satire: literary or dramatic form in which human or individual vices, follies or abuses are examined, using burlesque, irony, parody, humour and caricature, sometimes with an intent to inspire social reform. Stories, verses, dialogues for the Satirocene Age from Vancouver Island, Canada. (Posted by F. Jardine or guests)
Tuesday 28 September 2021
First Year University, and the Snowflakes are Experiencing Meltdowns
Wednesday 15 September 2021
Colonies and Canadian Indigenous Groups
Recent Social Studies Essay Topic in BC Schools - Impacts of the
Colonial Era on Indigenous Canadians
Proposition: No positive impacts resulted
from the colonial period of Canadian history*, so discontinuation of institutions and services originating in colonial times, and eviction of descendants of European settlers, is advisable. DISCUSS.
Describe your vision of Canadian life after the following colonialist
institutions are banned:
Legislative assemblies, Parliament, elected representation
Courts of Law, trial by jury, equal rights legislation, Legal Aid
Land Title Offices and property acquisition (except through raids and warfare)
Income Assistance/welfare
ferry service (e.g. BC Ferries)
trains
cars (and everything else involving wheels)
electricity
building maintenance
road maintenance
banks
farms (food henceforth to be gathered, dug, or killed by spear)
wineries, breweries, pubs, orchestras
dentistry, surgery, medical imaging, pharmacies, painkilling pharmaceuticals
schools, universities, professional degrees, science labs
books, publishing, literacy and computers
Supplementary Question: Should governments dictate the Correct Study of History, and the content of school curricula?
* "Mother Fuming" -- https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/british-columbia/prince-george-school-assignment-colonies-indigenous-1.6176059
Sunday 12 September 2021
Muses File Complaint Against BC Museum
Responding to the filing of museum employees' human rights complaint, the nine classical Muses have accused the Museum of racist discrimination against THEIR heritage and culture: “As our home (“Seat of the Muses”), a Museum should be sheltering and protecting us, not throwing us to ethnic and identitarian wolves”, says Calliope, Chief of the Muses.
In a document crafted by Melpomene (Muse of Tragedy), Thalia (Comedy) and Polyhymnia (Rhetoric), the group charges that they are victims of hate speech and ethnic cleansing.
“Clio, Muse of History, is the particular target of hate speech." Many people have already claimed that “History Is Dead”, and now they wish also to eradicate History's mother, Mnemosyne (Memory).
Although Clio's enemies try to “disappear” her she keeps recurring. “History is what it was,” she assures supporters. She leaves a trail of documents, letters, songs, memoirs, statues, gravestones, globes and charts so that scholarly detectives can still trace her to places where her enemies have imprisoned her. These scholars often work under cover, secret-agent style.
The Muses, filing their complaint with the Rights Agency, have documented civil rights abuses by chapter and verse, confirms Euterpe, Muse of Verse.
“We will not let the judge dance around the issues,” vows Terpsichore, Muse of Dance.
“We'll sing our own praises,” add Erato and Melpomene (Song and Speech).
Their children (Orpheus and the Sirens) will with their world-music band of that name mark the launch of the Muses' Rights Complaint with a celebratory concert at Mount Olympus Park. The human race is invited to attend.
Tuesday 7 September 2021
Change of Vocabulary, Post-COVID
We hope we've inoculated COVID away,
and want certain phrases also not to stay
Let's hear no more of “vaccination”,
“plexiglass” and hand sanitation
Don't say “lockdown” or mention a mask,
and who's been vaccinated let's not ask
Don't say “challenged”, don't say “bubble”,
all reference to “distance” reminds us of trouble
Let's stop saying “tunnel”, with light at the end of,
or planks or curves we flattened the bend of
Don't say “essential” of services or workers,
or visitors, travel, or "virtual-shirkers"
Don't say “needle” or even “arm”,
which reminds us of horrors and causes alarm
Hospitals: stop saying “herd immunity”
and “respirator” with impunity
To skip all reference is wiser,
to Astrazeneca, Moderna and Pfizer
The very mention of a vax passport
often causes nothing but a very loud snort
When we hear “pivot”, “variant” and “surge”
to cover our ears is an overwhelming urge
If COVID really ends these words will melt away,
we'll choose other language, having other things to say
Maybe something eloquent without a silly rhyme?
Let's save that habit for another place and ... day.
Wednesday 1 September 2021
We otter do better with birth control
“Weaker Penis Bones in River Otters Linked to Oil Sands Contaminants" – CBC News, Nov., 2020
Does the oil industry hold the secret to human
over-population control?
In case you weren't aware: the male river otter's penis bone is long, curvy and slender. Daintily referred to as a “baculum”, it has become even daintier in Canadian otters thanks to contaminants produced by Canada's oil sands industry. Noting that otters living close to sites of fossil fuel extraction have the most brittle penis bones, resulting in smaller otter families, scientists see a clue to solving human over-population – almost eight billion – which is a greater threat to the planet than are fossil fuels.
Some biologists are concerned about otters' (family Lutrinae) reproductive success, while others are interested in human contraceptive success. Entrepreneurs are looking at ways to market the softening oily by-products to humans who prefer chemical to surgical birth control (vasectomy).
“Snake oil,” respond researchers,
when asked about this marketing initiative.
“Greasy anti-life opportunists,”
accuses the Catholic church, stiffening its opposition.
“Fossil Age thinking by the
pope,” respond pro-choicers.
Oil sands extraction will
continue to fuel controversy. As for the human overpopulation crisis, most
conservationists agree “we otter do better”.
Monday 30 August 2021
Designer Traffic Jams
Construction of Obstruction and Traffic
Constriction -- Victoria, BC
Although since COVID more people than
ever are having goods delivered to homes and offices, the vehicles
delivering them are being blocked by street design in Victoria,
creating fantastic Designer Traffic Jams.
In the ever-growing ocean of traffic
that grows with population, instead of crossing streets a pedestrian (or car or truck) is ship-wrecked on traffic islands
in the middle of intersections, and must dodge through a tangle of
bike lanes blocking the flow. In the middle of the road they will
find “community spaces” when all they want is traffic space, so
as to get from A to B without exhaust-spewing start-stop delays.
This traffic restriction is about ideological strictures against automobiles. “Stricture” is related to the Latin word “strictus” (strict) -- and “stringere”, to tighten, which is what the City is doing to roadway access. “Strait” too comes from “strictus”: in oceanography a strait is a narrow marine passageway. In urban crossings too we find ourselves driving in straitened circumstances, where we used to have relatively wide open seas to navigate. No one is benefitting, not even the cyclists it's all supposed to be for, who spend more time trying to decipher traffic signs and figure out the meanings of flashing lights and which green light is whose, than zipping along the curbs in the simple old-fashioned way we used to do.
Snarls-by-design create loud vocal snarling as well. Hate speech is okay, if directed against drivers. Yet if you don't drive, it's only because you out-source your delivery of cargo to others, professional and gig drivers who have to deal with anti-car street-design aggression every day.
The Waste Scream
The municipality is building a team for the Waste Stream Restructure Program
“It's a 270-step process,” announces Chief-Bureaucrat-in-Charge, “according to our newly-purchased tax-funded SafeWaste Digital Modelling APP.”
Estimating a twenty year completion time-frame, they are hiring several dozen new staff. Why will the project take so long, ask Taxpayers' Representatives?
“We can't begin until after the two-year comprehensive
analysis of existing services.”
“Why so long for that?”
“The time frame's only an estimate at this point, as we're
still in the pre-planning stage, before we get to the planning stage.”
“Oh. And in the distant post-planning future, what then?”
“Well, then we'll be do evaluation, estimation, consultation,
designation of de-marginalization ...
“And for the public ... information?”
“About what?”
“About, say, a completion date?”
“Completion will depend on the pace of upgrades to international Climate Change Protocols, plus consultation with stakeholder, racialized, indigenous and trans groups regarding equity, inclusion, diversity and of course the building of a de-colonization checklist in partnership with our advisors from the university's new Faculty of Dynamic Indigenized Gender-Free Social Equity.”
“Oh. Well, getting back to the waste-stream ...”
“The what?”
“The stream of waste, isn't that what the project's about?”
“Oh. Yes.”
“Will you be able to marginalize and exclude harmful plastics
from re-usable organic materials?”
(Pause) “Umm ... Well, of course I couldn't say, at this
point in time. We need to take a deep dive into consulting, partnering, de-gendering,
evaluating, assessing, sustaining and ...”
“So, my as yet un-born children will have graduated from
university before your program graduates to any actual separation of plastics
from organics, if anything organic still exists in the world by then, and ...”
“Okay, just hang on there, don't raise your objection at me Pal,
we have rules around abusive questioning of members of Protected Public
Employees Category A, and ... Why are you screaming? Do you have PTSD? Has
something triggered you? Do you need an ambulance? Wait ... I'll text them ...
Sorry ... can't. Their message says 'LA-LA-LA I CAN'T HEAR
YOU ...'”
This story is reproduced from LITERARY YARD, www.literaryyard.com, 2024/02/10 It's a common fairy-tale theme -- imprisonment in a tower ...
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