Melanie_

I wonder if Jon Gerrard will stay on as leader? I think he's done as well as he can, but the Liberals haven't been much of a force in Manitoba for some time. I think McFayden will stay on for the PCs; they need some rebuilding time, and he's young and energetic. (And he did eventually pull ahead and win my constituency, even though for a little while there it looked interesting.)

Yikes! Its PC 291, NDP 237 as the board cycled through just now. Far closer than Hugh would like to see! CTV has just declared an NDP majority.

I live in Whyte Ridge. Anyone running against McFayden is a lost cause, I thought. But I just saw the results of the first poll to report, and there is only a difference of 8 votes (41 PC; 33 NDP; a few Liberal). Maybe not so lost a cause as I thought - but I think the NDP candidate would be shocked if he won!

Polls just closed, and the coverage is beginning. I cast my vote for a lost cause, as none of the parties put up any kind of fight against Hugh McFayden in my constituency. Even so, all signs point to an NDP majority.

You seem to have missed one variation in your analysis here. Is a man who has sex with a girl a heterosexual, or just a pedophile?

All quotes courtesy of Betsy..... Betsy, your opening post set this up as a gender based issue, but you keep saying this isn’t about gender. What exactly is the natural male role, and how is it being decimated? You are arguing that the feminist movement has emasculated men, taking their power away, then you argue that power isn’t based in masculinity. Which is it? If power isn’t inherently masculine (and I will agree with you there), the feminist movement can’t emasculate men by promoting equal power for women. Bolding is mine. I interpret it to mean that Betsy in fact does think that men are being robbed of their power by women. This is a really disturbing line of thought. Are you saying that men should be in power, and that if women have any control in their lives it is because their men aren't man enough? I want no part of that world. Here's another thought - maybe power shouldn't be that big a part of a relationship. Two equal partners, choosing freely to be with one another, rather than one being dominant and one submissive.

Why? What business is it of anyone's to interfere with someone's fully conscious choice? Think about how much indoctrination children are already exposed to that promotes the heterosexual lifestyle - if sexual orientation could be indoctrinated, the overwhelming focus on heterosexuality would ensure that we wouldn't see any homosexuals in society today. Eliminating homosexuality, "curing" it, seems like a form of discrimination to me. You stated earlier that they can't do things that other people can do, but that is mostly because of intolerance and unreasonable restrictions placed on them; rather than curing the homosexuals, perhaps we should cure the bigots who place unfair barriers in thier paths.

Kuzadd, you’ve inadvertently stumbled on to the biggest secret in the Feminist Manifesto! But you’ve got it backwards……. Liberal men wear trunks, the non liberal man wears a Speedo. You see, our mission as feminists is to emasculate men, and what better way to do that than to deny them their right to wear tight spandex that reveals every detail of their Wobbly Bits. And really, of all the advances that feminism has made, this has to be the most widely appreciated.

Anecdotal evidence, but here's my most recent story (of many) that tells me racism is alive and well in Canada, and that discrimination isn't based solely on how you present yourself... My husband is Canadian, but of East Indian descent, which generally has no bearing on our day to day lives (other than fabulous curry). He plays field hockey on the Manitoba mens' team, and went to Calgary for the Indoor Nationals last month. As you might imagine, there are a number of players on the team of East Indian descent; when they got to the airport in Winnipeg and went through the gates, they were all pulled aside, frisked, and questioned. Their carry on luggage was searched with a fine tooth comb. These are men in their 30's and 40's, professionals, dressed in Western style (no turbans) and simply going to a sports tournament. I don't think they fit with your assessment that discrimination is contextual, based on dress and composure. They were travelling with the women's team, which is primarily made up of white women in their teens and twenties, and they all said they had never seen anything like this before in their lives - if your theory were true, at least some of them would have come into contact with this before.

How many people would actually choose to start their thread in the "tinfoil hat" forum? I think most people who start threads do so to generate debate on what they see as a legitimate topic; those of us who don't agree on that can just let the thread shrivel and die.

This will be a nonelection - just a reconfirmation for Gary Doer and the NDP. Manitoba likes the status quo. MacFayden hasn't been impressive at all, and I don't see him stepping into Doer's shoes anytime soon. Gord MacKintosh (Minister of Family Services and Housing) held a press conference today at Red River College to announce how some of the new budget's child care money will be spent. They've used the new transfer money to backfill the child care money the federal government cancelled, which means the Manitoba system will continue to grow despite Harper. Major capital funding for Winnipeg, rural and northern communities, to build new centres and fund new spaces. More funding announcements to come - it sounded like more money for training, although he didn't come out and say so. Sure there have been screw ups (I lost money on Crocus - don't think I'm forgetting it!) but child care has been one area of strength for the Doer government - a committment to providing quality child care for the families of Manitoba.

I don't understand the issue with harmonizing the age of consent. Sodomy is a sexual act, and if we are saying the age of consent for sex is 16, than it must include any sexual act a 16 year old is prepared to consent to. I see an issue here regarding the value being placed on sexual innocence - it seems like people are more concerned about protecting a homosexual boy's virginity than they are with protecting heterosexuals of either gender, or lesbians. Why?

You have made 16 posts to these forums, including this one liner. Maybe once you've established yourself as someone "with substance", you can come back and ask this question again. But if you do, try to provide some "substance" to your post, rather than simply flaming someone. If you don't like what PolyNewbie (or anyone else) has to say, there is an ignore feature, or you can choose to avoid the thread in question.

I wouldn't feel safer at all. That sounds like an armed fortress, feeding on paranoia, waiting to explode, rather than a campus devoted to learning. Learning can't happen when you are looking over your shoulder all day, focused on real or imagined threats rather than on studying; armed guards would just constantly reinforce the perceived need to be on edge. Unstable individuals with guns and their own agendas are deadly, that's why. Stable individuals in urban settings have no need for guns, and have more constructive means of resolving their problems. The same thing goes for stable and unstable governments - if the unstable ones didn't have them, the stable ones wouldn't need them.

I'm a college instructor, and I agree with Geoffrey - I don't want to see guns on campus. The whole idea is crazy - why would anyone need a gun at a school? Some here are arguing defense, but school shootings aren't so common that daily personal defense is necessary - I suspect the need would grow if everyone carried a gun. I feel sick when I think about the victims, and my thoughts are with the families and the survivors of this attack.

Thank goodness. I wouldn't want any other counrty implementing a major (or minor) amendment to Canada's constitution. Perhaps you meant to say that no other country implements amendments to their constitution? Look south of the border, they have all kinds of rights guaranteed by one amendment after another, and several proposed amendments still pending. Wikipedia

I have always found this to be the most damning evidence of a cover up of colossal proportions. In the immortal words of the enlightened one, Weird Al Yankovic (to the tune of "American Pie"), http://www.lyricsandsongs.com/song/484102.html How much more evidence could possibly be asked for???

Gays and lesbians also have biological children. I have a good friend who has two children, born to her by artificial insemination, from the same father. She is as good a mother as any heterosexual woman I know, and both her children are smart, strong, and well adjusted. Being a lesbian doesn't change the fact that she is a woman, with a maternal instinct. Another friend of mine has a daughter born before she was ready to admit to herself and to her family that she was a lesbian - her daughter is 22 now, and is an amazingly gifted, self assured young woman. I have several other friends and aquaintances who are also gay or lesbian, and so do each of you - you just might not know it.

This is the point I was responding to, and I don't think I missed it at all. You want to engender guilt in those of us who aren't soldiers, and I refuse to be a part of that. It is self aggrandizing to say that those of use who aren't soldiers are standing back; all of us play a part, overt or subtle. It leads to the question - how much respect do you have for the average Canadian citizen, who is going about the business of being free?

Borg - I respect and value the job of soldiers, but I refuse to feel guilty for not being one. Its not just standing back and letting someone else do "it" for you - we also serve the cause of freedom by simply going about our lives, living in a way that embodies and models freedom for others. As a woman, I like to think that I serve the cause of freedom with every paycheque I earn. The article above was moving for me, a former "army brat" - I remember when my dad went to Cyprus in the early 70's. I don't think I really understood until years later what could have happened to him while he was gone, but I clearly remember being resentful that he wasn't there for a school play. Maybe he was just as unhappy to miss it.

But I was so excited when I read the part about him stepping down from Canadian Idol...

In comparison to a world without Christianity. (Let's keep our hypotheticals to a minimum!)All things considered, has Christianity been a civilizing force in the world? Would the world be a better place if Christianity had never existed? Don't be shy. And certainly don't be smug or patronizing, if you honestly believe otherwise. Then, don't be shy to say what you believe politely. Thanks for the posting advice, August. I'll try to keep all of that in mind, particularly the patronizing part. (this would be a good spot for an emoticon.) I do think Christianity has had a positive impact, but how can we determine if the same impact wouldn't have happened without it? If Christianity had never existed, some other mythology would have filled that void, and we would be talking about the net positive impact of that belief system. The possibilities are endless - whose to say a better one wouldn't have evolved? Or a worse one?

I was without alcohol during The Time of the Perpetual Pregnancy, 8 years solid of either being pregnant or breast feeding, so I know what you are talking about when you say your mind is clearer. But there is a difference between drinking to the point of incoherence and having the occasional glass of wine. When you say that people who regularly consume alcohol never have a clear head, I have to disagree. It is a matter of tolerance and the knowledge of when you have had enough.

Interesting question, August. I was discussing something along these lines with my 14 year old daughter yesterday (its amazing what comes up in casual conversation when you are just driving your kids around). Christianity has given a great deal of good guidance to people for 2000 years, and I would support the idea that some of the mythology of Christianity has value. But it has also been the instigator of so many narrow minded and hateful social constucts. Whether or not it has made people more civilized - more civilized than whom? Other cultures, or who we would have been in the absence of Christianity? How can we know that? I think each of us answering your question will have a different take on it, and each will have a measure of validity. My answer is that Christianity has had a net positive effect on humankind, but so too have other religions in their own cultural contexts.

The best red we ever did was a Syrah/Shiraz, so I'll agree with you there. The extra week clarifying is really important for whites and for fruit wines (mmmmm, I can't wait for summer time, sitting on my deck with a glass of the Citrus Ice we are just about to bottle). We make wine with 4 other couples, so everyone buys a kit that makes 30 bottles, then we each get 6 bottles of 5 different kinds of wine. Great variety, and if you do make a dud you've only got 6 bottles of it rather than the full 30. I have less than 100 on stock right now, but we are bottling in a couple of weeks so I'll be up a few by then. Can't say that we do anything special to make it taste so good - in fact, with the number of people involved I'd say the potential to screw up is fairly high. But we haven't had a lot of wine we didn't like in the 3 years we've been doing this - the kits are pretty idiot proof.