dialamah

Ukrainians are only one group; there are many examples. Consider the fear felt by anti-Japanese xenophobes after Pearl Harbour, and the stories of kamikaze pilots! Have you seen any of the anti-Japanese propaganda from WW2? We all know what happened to the Japanese in Canada and the States, eh? Then, we had to apologize. Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it. George Santayana

Its been pointed out to you already that those same arguments have been used against other groups. Those earlier xenophobes were equally as certain as you are today that their immigrants were vastly different, too violent, too religious, too backwards, too fertile, too many of them, they'd take over and destroy the culture and the economy. Its a pattern, right? We (humans) have done this before. The pattern also includes the new people becoming functioning and contributing members of their new country. Some of them no doubt exercised their right to xenophobia towards even newer immigrants.

Its a tiny minority of women in Canada, the States, the UK who wear it. Who knows how many do so willingly? https://www.theglobeandmail.com/canada/i-wear-a-niqab-it-is-my-choice-thats-the/video45e41ef8-9032-4520-868b-4677b1024c0f-2/ https://torontolife.com/culture/art/sisters-project-muslim-women-alia-youssef/ https://nationalpost.com/news/canada/canadian-survey-of-women-who-wear-the-niqab-reveals-choice-may-be-a-bit-of-a-youth-movement

Yeah, I don't think so. Let me simplify. I don't like niqabs. I also don't like pants that hang halfway between knees and butt cheeks, showing off hairy butt cracks and dirty underwear. But neither are illegal. And in a free country, neither of them should be illegal. No matter how offensive they are to some portion of the population. If a business should choose to disallow niqabs and underwear-exposing pants for their employees or customers, they are free to implement such policies. If an individual refuses to abide by those policies, the business can ask them to leave and call the cops to enforce that request if needed. Both people can claim discrimination, though I expect the niqab wearer would be more likely to win a court case due to that Canadian value known generally as "freedom of religion". The police cannot stop by a public park or street and arrest someone wearing a niqab or low-slung pants. In that case, both people would win court cases against the police. You are trying to tell me that company policy about acceptable wear for employees or customers is the same as legislation directing what people can or cannot wear and its not. The problem for you, I am guessing, is that people's right to practice their religion as they see fit (within the law) is more important than pandering to people who don't like niqabs, at least so far. Things may change; Canada has never shrunk from pandering to xenophobia, from the Chinese head tax, to interring Japanese, to turning away Jews. No reason Muslim women shouldn't be next on that list.

What did I say exactly ... Let's see:

The law of the land tells us we must keep our genitals covered. Some places may also require female breasts to be covered. Beyond that we're pretty free to wear what we want, even if some of us are put off by what others of us wear. Company policy and the law of the land are two separate issues. Restaurants can put up a sign saying "No shirt, no shoes, no service" and if a customer fails to heed the sign and requests to leave, the cops could be called. If we tried arresting shirtless or shoeless people as they walked down the street, that would be a different thing. Banks may have a "visible face" policy and if a customer fails to comply and fails to leave, cops may be called. I assume this applies equally to balaclava-covered and burqa-covered faces. (Has anyone ever seen a Muslim woman in a bank with face covered? I never have, but I rarely go into a bank.) Our culture recognizes balaclavas in banks as a potential danger so we wouldn't be surprised at a robbery. We also recognize religious dress and would be surprised at a robbery by a niqab-clad woman. I suppose if we are suddenly presented with a rash of Muslim women robbing banks and convenience stores while wearing burkas and niqabs, balaclavas and religious wear would be comparable.

Not really. I personally think burkas and niqabs are horrible things, they give me the creeps. But I just don't see how that gives me the right (through my government) to tell women they can't wear them. Its not that I don't understand that some women are forced to wear them by husbands and parents, just as some women are forced to do lots of things by husbands and parents. I still don't think that justifies telling women who want to wear those things that they can't. If the government passed a law that made it illegal for girls under 16 to wear, I could support something like that because I suspect there are actual health issues associated with them. But I don't think its my business or government's business to dictate what an adult woman can or cannot wear.

Why is it that whenever people think they are being called out on their behavior/attitude, suddenly that word doesn't mean anything anymore? Every single argument made against today's immigrant has been made about immigrants in the past. Various groups have been called backward, violent, culturally incompatible, economically unviable. They've been accused of being unwilling to become patriotic citizens, of being lazy, of being immoral, plotting to take over and impose their own culture either through violence or by increasing their numbers till they become overwhelming. In every single case, the immigrants have ultimately become indistinguushable from the rest of the population. Xenophobia seems to be as natural and predictable as immigration. While xenophobes tend to scream endlessly about how this bunch of immigrants is different from the last bunch, the truth is that within 3 or 4 generations Muslims will be part of the landscape and xenophobes will be screaming about some other immigrant group that they are convinced is going to destroy Canada. Unless climate change destroys us first.

I personally think xenophobic/homophobic/misogynistic Canadians are as inferior as xenophobic/homophobic/misogynistic refugees/immigrants.

Also resulted in an increase in sales of burkas and niqabs. People just seem to double down when their ideology, religious or political, is mocked. So I guess this is really just a political football to kick back and forth, enabling both sides to "virtue signal" to their followers. Nothing to do with the women themselves, who stand to loose the right and freedom to wear what they want - as they have in Iran and France, as well as many other countries, Islamic and Western. Funny how both restricting or imposing apparel is claimed to be "for the woman's benefit".

If Government dictating to women what they can or cannot wear is an indication of backward and misogynistic values in other places, how can Government dictating what women can or cannot wear be considered a superior and female-empowering value in Western nations?

So? He still shot people and we haven't yet been told why.

I don't think it's random either. I "speculate" that it's another White Guy pissed off that the woman he wants doesn't want him and his inherent misogyny and sense of entitlement justifies his murderous rampage. But no "official" confirmation. Should I start wondering that the police/government/media are withholding information because they don't want us to know how dangerous White Guys are? Not to mention all the White Guy votes JT would lose if he dared be honest about the scourge of White Guy violence.

What other information are you waiting for about Faisal? Both cases have had event descriptions, perpetrators names and victim names released. Both cases have had comments by friends or family, and both cases have had descriptions of the shooters behavior prior to the shooting. By this point in the story, Faisal had had information about his mental health history from the last 10 years published, as well as information about his family - much more info than we've had about Raymond so far. We haven't had an official motive for either shooter yet. Since Raymond is still alive, we're more likely to know his motive before we know Hussain's. The dissemination of information looks pretty identical so far. Unless of course you are waiting for authorities to confirm what you have already decided is true - the Hussain shooting was terror related.

Agree, it was pretty ugly. Don't think I even watched half.

Is that chuck as in "upchuck" or "chuckle"?

The claim you made is that Islam is so incompatible with Western culture that reconciliation is impossible and that it seeks to impose Sharia law everywhere. Inter-demoninational differences within religions are not the same. Agree; that reform is currently happening in Islam. But just as Christian reform took longer than a generation and was hard-fought between progressives and traditionalists, so will Islamic reform. It doesn't help a bit that myths about Islam and Muslims are spread about. Your video is as representative of Islam and Muslims as were the Charlottesville White Nationalist marchers representative of Christianity and Westerners. I condemn both extremist views equally. But consider that if I advocated for White Nationalist groups to be shut down and their message removed from the internet, many people would accuse me of being a leftist intent on shutting down free speech with accusations that I wasn't willing to "listen to opposing views" and that suppressing such views doesn't do any good; its better to confront them head on. But if I were to advocate for shutting down groups like the one portrayed in your video, there would be considerable agreement, especially by the people who'd support the rights of White Nationlists to speak.

It took over 24 hours for us to even learn the name of the Fredericton shooter, and still nothing about his motives; we had more info from police 'sources' about Hussain mere hours after the event. So where is the thread speculating about the Fredericton shooter's motives, building the conspiracy case that this was a terror attack and "authorities/media" are hiding that info?

These myths was also spread about Catholics in the 1800s and early 1900s. Catholics were a danger to US culture, and they sought to impose their religious views on everyone in the country. The claims of cultural incompatibility and a desire to impose religious rule on everyone wasn't true about Catholics then and it's not true about Muslims today.

Your situation sucks, and my heart goes out to you really. We had a friend who suffered several strokes, along with liver failure during the last few months of his life. He was on a fixed income, imposed by heartless conservative policies; it was clear, and confirmed by a health care worker, that such patients are considered essentially ignorable. He was sent home repeatedly, though he was clearly unable to care for himself adequately and presented a danger to others as well as himself. The lack of adequate resources isn't the fault of frontline health care workers; they must practice triage as best they can. Conservatives scream bloody murder whenever the idea of increasing funding for health care is raised; their own personal bottom line is their only concern when it comes to government policies; they could care less about how such policies affect others. So, governments pander to Conservatives through policies that reward them with lower taxes and leave people who are poor and/or sick at a distinct disadvantage. Canadians pay among the lowest tax rates in the world, but that doesn't matter to Conservatives: any amount of taxation is too much and so what if our health care, education system, social infrastructure falls apart? As long as they get theirs, everybody else can go hang.

I understand what you are saying, but I personally don't think its been treated much differently than the van attack was. Big news for a few days, then nothing for a few weeks, then an update on a victim or two, followed by more silence. The Mosque slaughter was the same, as I recall, although the story initially lasted a bit longer on the airwaves. Two weeks after the event, I was checking for updates as to Bissonette's motive and found nothing. Commenters here were also saying the same ... "Why the silence from media and government, is it a plot to hide terrorism from Canadians?" A year and a half later, I am still wondering what his motive was - was he really that misled by far-right rhetoric? Was mental illness a factor? I really don't see this event as significantly different in terms of information released and time in the headlines. The speed with which a statement from the family was released is different, and JTs response does seem muted to me. But in my opinion, both of those things are explainable due to increasing anti-Muslim sentiment and JTs drop in polls recently. A conspiracy to hide facts seems a less likely explanation, at least to me.

Ok. By the same token, the sources provided to support a terrorist motivation for the attack are mere hearsay. And the inclusion of the link about his brother's drug and gun cache are even less relevant. Do you agree?

How would that shattering be accomplished?

I provided a whole bunch of links, just look back a few posts. If they aren't official enough for you, I guess you'll also have to deny the claims made about Hussain's link to terrorism since those sources are equally unofficial.

I can agree with that, at least.