Fired for being hot

[Rue]

Well to Betsy I get your point, no not all unions are great.All I meant though is that under a collective agreement, there is a grievance process and a dismissal process that must be followed which almost always gives better rights to employees than those of us not in unions who are at the mercy of

eac province's Employment Standards Act.

The acts onluy provide a bare minimum of rights.is the point. The other point is employent contracts can not opt out of the minimum levels placed in those acts.

The other point is the clause Bush talked about in regards to firing people without notice has become common place but is still subject to these acts.

Bottom line you can put someone on probation 3 months, extend it two more three month periods and then once an employee hits one year, you can fire them on the spot with no cause but you have to pay them a minimum amount at that point.Its not much.

I have been on both sides of the bargaining table as manager and union grievance rep.Also I mediated labour disputes so I am pretty neutral. i have seen bad bosses and yah bad employees I am not saying its all black and white but I think BC's original point is which I agree with,we should not be able to fire someone simply because they are "good looking" the same reason we should not fire them beause they are "ugly".

I think we all appreciate in this particular case its probable the wife of the employer caught him sending some emails and have him the riot act. If not, if he wanted to fire her without notice and without cause I am with BC and those who believe she is entitled to compensation for unfair dismissal.

In my opinion in a time where jobs are hard to get I think employees have become very expendable.We are all now placed on contracts so employers do not have to pay us benefits.

I went for one job interview as a college professor to teach law and the college wanted to put me on indefinite probation and be able to fire me without notice at any time. While the contract is illegal obviously there is always a candidate willing to agree to it in this market. I did not. My remedy? I could have taken the college to a provincial tribunal but why bother? Even if I won my case and they had to hire me I would be on probation 3 months minimum and therefore could be fired the day after I was hired for no reason. From a practical perspective it would be pointless to fight it.

So it may be illegal but practically there is not much one can do about it unless they are fortunate enough as I say to now be in a union or they manage to last at least a year in their non union job to get that minimum pay in lieu of notice of 2 weeks. That aint much when you are fired with no cause.

Now true you can file a human rights complaint for discrimination which can have the employer fined but would you want to force a hiring of you by a human rights tribunal. If you won your case and they ordered you hired chances are that employer will make your life miserable and get you to quit and then only have to pay you 2 weeks unless you go to small claims court and can show entitlement to punitive damages for really bad behaviour.

The law may say one thing but applying it is another. So I agree with all everyone has said.

Do I think employees have too much protection? Not legally without a union heavens no. With a union? Sometimes where the unions are

very strong-depends on the union. Some unions are very week, some moderate, some too powerful.

My wife's union has very little power. Traditionally the Canada Post union has been the strongest to the point it put itself out of business.

Some argue the car unions put American car manufacturer's at an unfair disadvantage and pay them too much. I am not sure it is that simple. I

believe both Japan and South Korea have managed to be able to sell their cars in North America without caps or limitations but in reverse

we can not sell our American-Canadian cars in either country without agreeing to heavy import restrictions. I believe this came as a result

of defense agreements with the US. In order for the US to set up military bases in South Korea and Japan they had to agree to these import restrictions. I think that has a lot to do with it.

Then again it is true Korean,Japanese and European cars began to surpass North American vehicles in quality but was that simply because of a

difference in employee salaries. I am not so sure. I point some of the blame at unrealistic American designers building gas guzzlers and making inferior

transmissions, etc.

Look we do live in a world where manufacturing is if not already gone going going gone to Asia,Mexico, Indonesia, India, the Phillippines, Vietnam, China wherever labour is cheap.

Why pay a guy minmum wage in Canada when you can pay someone in Bangladesh far smaller wages and not worry about their safety?

Who is to blame? How about us consumers? We forces us to go to Walmart? Are you forced to go there or do the cheaper prices attract you.

I try now to purchase less much less and when I do rather than go for the cheap prices, buy for quality. It lasts longer. I try buy Canadian I do which is getting harder to do and I try avoid buying Chinese products which are now often hidden from the label.

You know in Canada as long as you can show on a sale that at least 50 cents of the sale goes to some kind of Canadian business, even though the entire product comes from China the label can say Canadian. Same law for saying something is American. So if you simply repackage the product and there are enough Canadians in on the sale, its called Canadian or American.

Its made knowing if a product is genuinely Canadian hard to decipher at times.

I don't mean to change the subject but one result of treating employees unfairly is inferior products and quality.

[Moonlight Graham]

I've been fired from 5 different companies for being too hot.

[betsy]

I've been fired from 5 different companies for being too hot.

temper..... or always sick?

Edited January 6, 2013 by betsy

[betsy]

Well to Betsy I get your point, no not all unions are great.All I meant though is that under a collective agreement, there is a grievance process and a dismissal process that must be followed which almost always gives better rights to employees than those of us not in unions who are at the mercy of

eac province's Employment Standards Act.

The acts onluy provide a bare minimum of rights.is the point. The other point is employent contracts can not opt out of the minimum levels placed in those acts.

The other point is the clause Bush talked about in regards to firing people without notice has become common place but is still subject to these acts.

Bottom line you can put someone on probation 3 months, extend it two more three month periods and then once an employee hits one year, you can fire them on the spot with no cause but you have to pay them a minimum amount at that point.Its not much.

I have been on both sides of the bargaining table as manager and union grievance rep.Also I mediated labour disputes so I am pretty neutral. i have seen bad bosses and yah bad employees I am not saying its all black and white but I think BC's original point is which I agree with,we should not be able to fire someone simply because they are "good looking" the same reason we should not fire them beause they are "ugly".

I think we all appreciate in this particular case its probable the wife of the employer caught him sending some emails and have him the riot act. If not, if he wanted to fire her without notice and without cause I am with BC and those who believe she is entitled to compensation for unfair dismissal.

In my opinion in a time where jobs are hard to get I think employees have become very expendable.We are all now placed on contracts so employers do not have to pay us benefits.

I went for one job interview as a college professor to teach law and the college wanted to put me on indefinite probation and be able to fire me without notice at any time. While the contract is illegal obviously there is always a candidate willing to agree to it in this market. I did not. My remedy? I could have taken the college to a provincial tribunal but why bother? Even if I won my case and they had to hire me I would be on probation 3 months minimum and therefore could be fired the day after I was hired for no reason. From a practical perspective it would be pointless to fight it.

So it may be illegal but practically there is not much one can do about it unless they are fortunate enough as I say to now be in a union or they manage to last at least a year in their non union job to get that minimum pay in lieu of notice of 2 weeks. That aint much when you are fired with no cause.

Now true you can file a human rights complaint for discrimination which can have the employer fined but would you want to force a hiring of you by a human rights tribunal. If you won your case and they ordered you hired chances are that employer will make your life miserable and get you to quit and then only have to pay you 2 weeks unless you go to small claims court and can show entitlement to punitive damages for really bad behaviour.

The law may say one thing but applying it is another. So I agree with all everyone has said.

Do I think employees have too much protection? Not legally without a union heavens no. With a union? Sometimes where the unions are

very strong-depends on the union. Some unions are very week, some moderate, some too powerful.

My wife's union has very little power. Traditionally the Canada Post union has been the strongest to the point it put itself out of business.

Some argue the car unions put American car manufacturer's at an unfair disadvantage and pay them too much. I am not sure it is that simple. I

believe both Japan and South Korea have managed to be able to sell their cars in North America without caps or limitations but in reverse

we can not sell our American-Canadian cars in either country without agreeing to heavy import restrictions. I believe this came as a result

of defense agreements with the US. In order for the US to set up military bases in South Korea and Japan they had to agree to these import restrictions. I think that has a lot to do with it.

Then again it is true Korean,Japanese and European cars began to surpass North American vehicles in quality but was that simply because of a

difference in employee salaries. I am not so sure. I point some of the blame at unrealistic American designers building gas guzzlers and making inferior

transmissions, etc.

Look we do live in a world where manufacturing is if not already gone going going gone to Asia,Mexico, Indonesia, India, the Phillippines, Vietnam, China wherever labour is cheap.

Why pay a guy minmum wage in Canada when you can pay someone in Bangladesh far smaller wages and not worry about their safety?

Who is to blame? How about us consumers? We forces us to go to Walmart? Are you forced to go there or do the cheaper prices attract you.

I try now to purchase less much less and when I do rather than go for the cheap prices, buy for quality. It lasts longer. I try buy Canadian I do which is getting harder to do and I try avoid buying Chinese products which are now often hidden from the label.

You know in Canada as long as you can show on a sale that at least 50 cents of the sale goes to some kind of Canadian business, even though the entire product comes from China the label can say Canadian. Same law for saying something is American. So if you simply repackage the product and there are enough Canadians in on the sale, its called Canadian or American.

Its made knowing if a product is genuinely Canadian hard to decipher at times.

I don't mean to change the subject but one result of treating employees unfairly is inferior products and quality.

Sustainability is the keyword these days - and it applies appropriately in this area.

Why are the salaries/benefits run by the Union so unbelievably high that they're unsustainable in the first place? How many towns/counties in the USA have filed for bankruptcy because they can't afford to pay for the pensions etc.., of their staffs? Did you see the kind of deals our own public servants get compared to most private employees?

What drives the prices of commodities up?

The union is largely to blame why there are ghost towns in America!

I guess some of us will never understand why some people in the third world appreciate working for what we consider as outrageously low-wages....since we have placed ourselves in a position of being so materially-driven. Our standard of living has become too high. We created a bunch of needs when there's actually no need for it! That we cannot fathom how someone in the third world could live and raise a family just by having food on the table, roof over their heads, and a few extras for clothings. These days, you need to have two TVs, at least. I guess it's human nature to want more....

The basics had gone on to include cellphones, with text messagings, laptops, HDtv, blue rays, (and all the latest in technology) among other things...some of it killed businesses and jobs.

Why is there a need for BIG BOX stores - all in one shopping? Because life had become too hectic! And why is that? Because we want to work more - so we can buy all those that the ads say we need to have! It's a vicious circle - and it'll only get worse for society.

Maybe there's some good coming out of the economic disasters. Maybe it can pull us back again to having some kind of normalcy with priorities.

Edited January 6, 2013 by betsy

[WIP]

I went for one job interview as a college professor to teach law and the college wanted to put me on indefinite probation and be able to fire me without notice at any time.

On that point, I've heard a few times, in articles I've read from some American academics who are considered radical, that new professors in American universities often aren't earning tenure to begin with. They will stay as permanent contract employees who could be terminated at any time by the university administration. This has been mentioned a time or two, whenever radical professors like Cornel West, Richard Wolfe, or Noam Chomsky are asked why there doesn't seem to be many younger university academics stepping into their shoes today.

Part of the problem may be that they have no protection if they run afoul of the administration....which is increasingly dependent on corporate and military money to keep everything running. Also, U.S. universities, especially state universities, are increasingly becoming glorified trade schools as the public financing which started them, and was promised to provide low cost (even zero tuition) post- high school education, has been cut back with successive budgets, in good times and bad. And as a result, the humanities programs, running from philosophy through anthropology and related social sciences are being scrapped altogether, as the universities refocus on churning out more engineers and mba's for their corporate sponsors.

Some argue the car unions put American car manufacturer's at an unfair disadvantage and pay them too much. I am not sure it is that simple.

The reason why everyone jumped on the bandwagon that line workers in GM, Ford and Chrysler, and the steel plants, were making too much, has more to do with basic psychology than any of the nuts and bolts debates about wages and contracts. Simple fact is that people judge their net worth by what others are making; so if they're working on a line in a small factory or a food processing plant, and making a lot less for doing a similar job, it is likely that they will agree with kneecapping the autoworkers and steelworkers just ahead of them, rather than working a little harder to advance their own interests. Same mentality crept in at the auto and steel companies, where workers started developing an attitude that they really were better than the average blue collar, and showing less interest in the problems going on in more marginal industries and especially with the growing non-unionized workforce. And that was pretty much the end of the worker solidarity that existed in the 1930's, when my father was young, and virtually all factory workers and farmers across the country felt that they had a common cause against the bankers and business owners.

The divide-and-conquer strategy against the unions will finally play itself out very shortly as our conservative politicians are going with the same basic plan adopted by U.S. Republicans over the last 10 years, to bust public service unions of nurses, teachers and all public service workers....except for police of course.....they know that's one union that they're wise not to screw with! I can see the same thing happening here as sifting through the smoke and noise about teachers unions across Canada, the reality is clear that young people entering the teaching profession are coming in under much different terms than the teachers who came before them.

Look we do live in a world where manufacturing is if not already gone going going gone to Asia,Mexico, Indonesia, India, the Phillippines, Vietnam, China wherever labour is cheap.

Why pay a guy minmum wage in Canada when you can pay someone in Bangladesh far smaller wages and not worry about their safety?

And that demonstrates just how shortsighted most Canadians have been over the years. Like I said, the GM workers thought they just deserved a lot more than the average factory worker, and never expected a situation like what's happening to GM in the U.S. -- where new hires start at half the money as they existing employees who are getting older and will likely take early retirement buyouts. And the decline in wages filters its way through the workforce....just as the rise in manufacturing wages bumped up the pay of non-union workers....even service workers working in hotels and restaurants. I know that new welders, machinists, tool and die makers, who thought their skills protected them, are also seeing their earnings decline.

Most Canadians hardly blinked 30 years ago, when textiles became the first manufacturing industry to leave the country. Even a lot of blue collar workers reasoned that those were lousy jobs that payed crap wages....let em go! But, outsourcing has challenged all manufacturing, even forcing wages lower in the first nations like Mexico who were the ones who originally benefited by outsourcing. As we are learning from this disastrous fire at Tazreen in Bangladesh - the supplier to Walmart - Walmart and other buyers who set these companies up at arms length, weren't satisfied with even 37c per hour with no pay for overtime....they were still demanding that the company make the products cheaper, even if it was at the cost of safety and health....and even looking the other way on the issue of child labour. The youngest victim of the Tazreen fire was a 12 year old girl! Would that situation be tolerated in this country? But, even that wasn't enough, in the brave new globalized business environment. They were threatening to pack up and move to Sri Lanka.

Who is to blame? How about us consumers? We forces us to go to Walmart? Are you forced to go there or do the cheaper prices attract you.

I try now to purchase less much less and when I do rather than go for the cheap prices, buy for quality. It lasts longer. I try buy Canadian I do which is getting harder to do and I try avoid buying Chinese products which are now often hidden from the label.

You know in Canada as long as you can show on a sale that at least 50 cents of the sale goes to some kind of Canadian business, even though the entire product comes from China the label can say Canadian. Same law for saying something is American. So if you simply repackage the product and there are enough Canadians in on the sale, its called Canadian or American.

Its made knowing if a product is genuinely Canadian hard to decipher at times.

I don't mean to change the subject but one result of treating employees unfairly is inferior products and quality.

And we were doing so well! No, you can't just dump the blame on the consumer; because you are presenting a fallacy that the social evil of globalization, which has been carefully planned and coordinated over the last two decades by the wealthiest and most powerful financial interests in the world, cannot be dealt with as matters of individual choice! This is a remarkably similar theme to the green capitalist bullshit arguments advanced by the likes of Al Gore and Maurice Strong, as the solutions to our environmental problems. The green capitalists have presented a collective evil - the externalization of environmental costs causing climate change, as issues that can be dealt with through individual consumer choice - low energy light bulbs, inflating your tires, making windmills and solar panels, and setting up a new market to buy and sell the right to dump carbon into the atmosphere (carbon credits). And, how well has that worked?

A real solution to the environment problems cannot happen without a reshifting of the way our economic system works, and virtually all of the green ventures promoted, will make little difference if the problems of growth in energy and resource consumption aren't dealt with first. Same with globalization. I think 40 years ago, before media consolidation and the present stranglehold that the wealth elite have on our government.....back then it was possible to have a real consumer movement. The consumer movement started by Ralph Nader had some success in pushing back against unsafe products, and if the situation would have been leading mass protests against globalization and outsourcing, or demanding that global standards be set for workers in third world countries.....but none of that has happened obviously this time, as Nader says himself, that many of his objectives - like mandatory seatbelts in new cars, would be impossible to do as a consumer movement today. In some of his interviews, he has mentioned that the changing media and political climate was the reason why he did those presidential campaigns in the first place! As he tells it, by the 80's, he was finding doors closed in Washington....first Republican, and then Democrats as well, except for a few holdouts with no power inside the Party. Nor was he able to get his press releases on consumer safety issues picked up in the MSM, unless there were deaths connected to a particular product....and even that would be a shortlived story in the news cycle. So, running for president was the only option left to get any publicity. But, as I remember his appearances on the news, they showed short clips of him talking somewhere and never included any substance of his actual speeches, or bothered to interview him. It would just be a voiceover of a reporter giving a brief synopsis of where the third party candidate was, and who he was talking to, usually followed up by a criticism from some prominent Democrat, criticizing Nader for "splitting" the vote. So much for the power of the consumer!

I could get into how modern info technologies, beginning with television, have played a pernicious effect of brainwashing, generating impulsive buying decisions, and promoting isolation and individualism...but that can wait for another time. Any successful movement pushing back against the collective evils that face society today are only going to happen as group action, not individual choice. Individualism is promoted because a few who have money and power, can so easily divide and conquer the vast majority of people, by keeping them isolated and focused on internal divisions, whether they are race, gender, ethnicity, union/non-union etc. We are heading into times remarkably similar to the era of the RobberBarons; and back then, a lot more people were much better informed about how banking and currency manipulation were used to enrich the owners of the money at everyone else's expense. Maybe if we head back into a time when everybody is a have-not, we will feel some real solidarity again. The big problem though is that the world our children are inheriting is a badly degraded and shrinking world that doesn't have the resources to grow that allowed a reformed version of caplitalism to flourish in the 20th century. It's difficult at this stage to figure out if these are all lost causes or there are really things worth fighting for! But, if we don't try to do anything, it will definitely be a lost cause!

[Rue]

I don't agree with your arguements WIP but I think you express them very well and I appreciate your arguements. I actually don't have much disagreement with you or Besty on certain points. Where I obviously disagree with you as how we both perceive consumerism.

My criticism of western economic activity you are right is based lol I say this a bit tongue in cheek on David Suzuki yes or what you call green b.s.

See for me and many like me we question our own role as individuals and consumers. We just do not point the finger at a bunch of alleged fat white men hiding in some dark club planning world domination. I find that a lazy assed way of avoiding responsibility for my own behaviour.Yah I read the conspiracy and illuminati theories and the conspiracy theories. My problem with them is that they depict you and I as not responsible at all for any cause and effect. We supposedly have no say or effect and anything we do is meaningless.. Its all run by a few fat white guys. Sorry you can wallow in that defeatist rationalization not me. I am no victim.

No thanks. No one is forcing me to go to Walmart. No one is forcing me to buy a large SUV and drive everywhere. No one is forcing me to buy non recyclable and toxic materials and dump them when they are done. No one. I am no victim.

No I am not some helpless dupe controlled by evil capitalist stooges or commies. I am an individual. My day starts and ends with me. There is no illusion to that. Each moment I breath I make decisions. No one is forcing me to breath.

I am trying to make choices. I am trying no matter how insignificant you think it is to try change destructive behaviours. Some of us are. You may find them futile and meaningless I do not. I embrace people who seek positive change.

No not all of us believe we are helpless like you. Some of us are looking at how we buy and dispose things and questioning ourselves.

No I do not buy your attempt to depict us unwashed masses and ignorant fools who no nothing about currency manipulation. No one is isolating me or forcing me to divide and conquer. I call bull shit on that. No I am not brainwashed. Speak for yourself with those sweeping elitist observations, stereotypes and assumptions where the entire world is a blob of mush except the enlightened few such as yourselves come to save the rest of us from our ignorance. Give me a break with that elitism. Who died and made you the enlightened one. Come on.

I also totally disagree with your unsubstantiated assumption that the activism of Ralph Nader is impossible today and/or he suggested that.. Bull shit. Because of him there are transparency laws, occupational health and safety laws and numerous consumer and legal associations who each day go to court and demand accountability and win law suits.

We also have an inter-net that offers information to people who in the past would never have been able to access it.

We have inter-net opening us to the world not isolating it.

To suggest people can not be activists and question dangerous consumer products or pollution or tyranny and challenge it as you are suggesting is nothing more than a pretense to rationalize doing nothing but crying woe is me I am helpless. You are not. I am not.

I do not know about you but my ancestors could only dream of a life where people like me could write as I do sharing my beliefs on an inter-net and challenging the opinions of others just like you.

Your very act of being able to debate me proves your argument defective. Where there is an exchange of views there is hope-there is hope we can change by challenging ourselves to change and that is what I urge people to do.

We most certainly can get off your asses-question consumer products-question the need and contents of the products we buy-question consumer spending habits, use of credit cards, dependence on certain technology, lack of exercise, dependence on cars..cut back on waste-you want to write that off-go ahead-however your pronouncement, your sweeping pronouncement that people like me who question and seek change are wasting our time because we want to leave this planet with hope for the next generation will not stop us.

No I will not sit and see the next generation diwn in toxic waste without a fight. I will fight and believe me I am used to people like you dismissing people like me with a quick elitist wave of your hand.

I am inspired by not just Suzuki but Pinball Clements, Mike Holmes and so many others who come from all walks of life and political views and choose to say yes we can do something.

Mike Holmes has rebuilt homes for the needy. Because of a simple think he has asked-both he and David Suzuki I am putting solar panels on my house and will help them be used to monitor consumption of electricity so that in the future all homes will have them. No I will not sit back and tell my children and their children I sat on my fat ass and did nothing for them and just accepted my lot in life.

I come from a long line of people who fought hard to come to Canada to enjoy what it offers. I will not dismiss it and take it for granted. I will use the gift if free speech and the life it has given me in the brief time I have to try do something positive no matter how futile you think it may be. For me it is as simple as welcoming and hosting summer students from all over the world and goiing out to parks with them cleaning up garbage and talking about their concerns as to what life holds for them.

No I will not sit and stew in my juices and tell them its hopeless. I drink prune juice to avoid that kind of behaviour.

Edited January 9, 2013 by Rue

[betsy]

Most Canadians hardly blinked 30 years ago, when textiles became the first manufacturing industry to leave the country. Even a lot of blue collar workers reasoned that those were lousy jobs that payed crap wages....let em go! But, outsourcing has challenged all manufacturing, even forcing wages lower in the first nations like Mexico who were the ones who originally benefited by outsourcing. As we are learning from this disastrous fire at Tazreen in Bangladesh - the supplier to Walmart - Walmart and other buyers who set these companies up at arms length, weren't satisfied with even 37c per hour with no pay for overtime....they were still demanding that the company make the products cheaper, even if it was at the cost of safety and health....and even looking the other way on the issue of child labour. The youngest victim of the Tazreen fire was a 12 year old girl! Would that situation be tolerated in this country? But, even that wasn't enough, in the brave new globalized business environment. They were threatening to pack up and move to Sri Lanka.

The law of supply and demand.

And you're right, those working conditions wouldn't be tolerated in Canada - so why is their goverment (third world nations) tolerating such to be committed to their own? They should make the effort to protect the rights of their own citizens.

Those citizens should demand such from their own government.....same way that the west demanded for change, decades ago.

Why does it seems it's always the big firms and the civilized west that's being demonized or blamed for practically everything that happens over there?

Edited January 9, 2013 by betsy

[betsy]

I am inspired by not just Suzuki but Pinball Clements, Mike Holmes and so many others who come from all walks of life and political views and choose to say yes we can do something.

Mike Holmes has rebuilt homes for the needy. Because of a simple think he has asked-both he and David Suzuki I am putting solar panels on my house and will help them be used to monitor consumption of electricity so that in the future all homes will have them. No I will not sit back and tell my children and their children I sat on my fat ass and did nothing for them and just accepted my lot in life.

Of course not all of us have a positive comment or view of Suzuki. But that's you. And there's nothing wrong with that. As long as you don't expect that everybody should agree with what Suzuki - and his followers - has to say!

I come from a long line of people who fought hard to come to Canada to enjoy what it offers. I will not dismiss it and take it for granted. I will use the gift if free speech and the life it has given me in the brief time I have to try do something positive no matter how futile you think it may be.

Good for you. As long as you don't try to control the way I choose to live my life....after all, I too came to Canada for the freedom!

Edited January 9, 2013 by betsy

[WIP]

I don't agree with your arguements WIP but I think you express them very well and I appreciate your arguements. I actually don't have much disagreement with you or Besty on certain points. Where I obviously disagree with you as how we both perceive consumerism.

My criticism of western economic activity you are right is based lol I say this a bit tongue in cheek on David Suzuki yes or what you call green b.s.

See for me and many like me we question our own role as individuals and consumers. We just do not point the finger at a bunch of alleged fat white men hiding in some dark club planning world domination. I find that a lazy assed way of avoiding responsibility for my own behaviour.Yah I read the conspiracy and illuminati theories and the conspiracy theories. My problem with them is that they depict you and I as not responsible at all for any cause and effect. We supposedly have no say or effect and anything we do is meaningless.. Its all run by a few fat white guys. Sorry you can wallow in that defeatist rationalization not me. I am no victim.

It's not just about the b.s. Green Capitalism story! Green Capitalism, advanced by Suzuki, Al Gore, and the majority of environmentalists with easy access to mainstream media, is a compromise position for regular straight 100 proof capitalism that is pushed as the elixir for all that ails us by conservatives, libertarians, and everyone who has no social conscience and has some sort of ideology to justify their narcissism. So, on the environment front, the public is presented with only two alternative visions that cannot provide longterm solutions: one that denies global warming and widespread evidence of environmental degradation, or choice two is a moderate position that merely tries to shift present economic theory towards environmentally friendly ends.

At best, these solutions, from electric cars to carbon caps and carbon offset markets, can only slow down the increase in carbon and degradation of the environment, not stop the increase, or return to the CO2 target level of 350ppm (identified by James Hansen as the maximum level to maintain the polar ice) and made the rallying point of Bill McKibben's activist organization 350.org.. Our present economic system demands continuous growth, or it will collapse. Nobody in mainstream media asks how the two can be resolved, nor mentions the futility of tightening auto emission standards, since the improvements over the last 40 years have been negated by the increase in cars on the road and the fact that people respond to a perceived benefit of greater fuel efficiency by driving more miles than they would when they had their old gas guzzler.

No thanks. No one is forcing me to go to Walmart. No one is forcing me to buy a large SUV and drive everywhere. No one is forcing me to buy non recyclable and toxic materials and dump them when they are done. No one. I am no victim.

No I am not some helpless dupe controlled by evil capitalist stooges or commies. I am an individual. My day starts and ends with me. There is no illusion to that. Each moment I breath I make decisions. No one is forcing me to breath.

I am trying to make choices. I am trying no matter how insignificant you think it is to try change destructive behaviours. Some of us are. You may find them futile and meaningless I do not. I embrace people who seek positive change.

No not all of us believe we are helpless like you. Some of us are looking at how we buy and dispose things and questioning ourselves.

No I do not buy your attempt to depict us unwashed masses and ignorant fools who no nothing about currency manipulation. No one is isolating me or forcing me to divide and conquer. I call bull shit on that. No I am not brainwashed. Speak for yourself with those sweeping elitist observations, stereotypes and assumptions where the entire world is a blob of mush except the enlightened few such as yourselves come to save the rest of us from our ignorance. Give me a break with that elitism. Who died and made you the enlightened one. Come on.

When Walmart becomes a monopoly, or near monopoly in many locales, individual choice is a joke! And it is dependent on income, as those of us who refuse to shop at Walmart have to pay a premium price on many items that those who are struggling financially cannot afford to do. So, in the real world, your degree of choice depends on how much your discretionary income is and you can't pretend otherwise! Your day may "starts and ends with me" if you have the income that makes it possible. Those who don't, have their choices severely restricted by their lack of economic power. And I haven't even gotten to the pernicious effects of sophisticated marketing combined with new, increasingly absorbing personal technologies that have increased levels of social isolation ever since the first TV's arrived in the average home.

I also totally disagree with your unsubstantiated assumption that the activism of Ralph Nader is impossible today and/or he suggested that.. Bull shit. Because of him there are transparency laws, occupational health and safety laws and numerous consumer and legal associations who each day go to court and demand accountability and win law suits.

Nader said himself that the gains made through consumer activism were being eroded in the 80's and his organization was being shut out by both political parties because the U.S. was changing and becoming less democratic in practice as politicians were more concerned with the interests of powerful elites:

In the 1980’s, with the election of President Reagan, powerful corporate interests gathered momentum and became increasingly assertive in the pursuit of their narrow interests, throwing up roadblocks to Nader’s efforts to advance the well-being of the American people.

With the two major parties dialing for the same dollars, their differences dwindled on most major issues (single-payer healthcare, living wage, replacing fossil fuels and nuclear with many practical variants of solar power, and a foreign policy that wages peace instead of war).

After working for 40 years on behalf of the health, safety and economic well being of the American people, Nader took stock of the situation: “I don’t like citizen groups being shut out by both parties in this city — corporate occupied territory — not having a chance to improve their country.”

Never one to be stymied, Nader responded to the declining influence of civil society over elected representatives by entering the electoral arena himself, and is now on his third major presidential campaign aimed at reinvigorating America’s democracy, in the best traditions of the suffragettes, labor party, and abolitionists of the 19th and early 20th century.

http://votenader.org/about/

We also have an inter-net that offers information to people who in the past would never have been able to access it.

We have inter-net opening us to the world not isolating it.

You must be aware that the internet is a difficult place to find accurate information in the midst of all the noise. And as Net Neutrality disappears and is being replaced by a new ethos where money buys influence, it becomes harder and harder to wade through the corporate-sponsored bullshit to find the truth on more and more issues. Eventually, as the screws tighten, I expect that marginal voices, who don't have money behind them or attract generous amounts of cash from advertisers and sponsors, will become like trying to find a needle in a haystack. The Borg will eventually rule the internet, and reign in the degrees of free expression and content available to most subscribers.

To suggest people can not be activists and question dangerous consumer products or pollution or tyranny and challenge it as you are suggesting is nothing more than a pretense to rationalize doing nothing but crying woe is me I am helpless. You are not. I am not.

Since you seem to be at least as old as I am, compare what is happening now to activism with what happened in the 60's into the early 70's! Today's Occupy movements were attacked in coordinated strategies by (in the U.S.) FBI, Homeland Security with local law enforcement) and efforts by MSM (including NPR and PBS) to first, ignore them, and then to disparage their goals and shift attention away from the issue of economic inequality. Today, Occupy Wall Street is still an active organization, but you wouldn't know it if you only go to liberal or conservative media, and is doing more to assist those New Yorkers in the most damaged districts after Hurricane Sandy than FEMA or the Red Cross have done....and needless to say, they are providing relief with a lot less money than these organizations. The MSM has pretty much moved on from the issue entirely, once Wall Street had their power back on and the subways were running again, while there are still areas without power and running water.

Here in Canada, from what little I've learned so far of the Idle No More movements, they have begun from the grassroots as a challenge to many of the chiefs, the umbrella organization - Assembly of First Nations and especially the Harper Government, which has accelerated the process of defunding reserves. Idle No More looks similar to Occupy in that it has not begun with coordinated leadership, and it has also benefited by using the internet to network together and coordinate demonstrations. And it is more likely that natives will maintain the kind of solidarity needed to make a populist movement a success, since they have much more shared interests than disaffected college students who have recently realized that the promises made to them about what they would receive through their educations will never be realized.

I do not know about you but my ancestors could only dream of a life where people like me could write as I do sharing my beliefs on an inter-net and challenging the opinions of others just like you.

Your very act of being able to debate me proves your argument defective. Where there is an exchange of views there is hope-there is hope we can change by challenging ourselves to change and that is what I urge people to do.

We most certainly can get off your asses-question consumer products-question the need and contents of the products we buy-question consumer spending habits, use of credit cards, dependence on certain technology, lack of exercise, dependence on cars..cut back on waste-you want to write that off-go ahead-however your pronouncement, your sweeping pronouncement that people like me who question and seek change are wasting our time because we want to leave this planet with hope for the next generation will not stop us.

No I will not sit and see the next generation diwn in toxic waste without a fight. I will fight and believe me I am used to people like you dismissing people like me with a quick elitist wave of your hand.

I am inspired by not just Suzuki but Pinball Clements, Mike Holmes and so many others who come from all walks of life

And, once again, our little side debate here I have to ask: what the hell lot of good to these individual feel good stories do in dealing with problems that are getting worse. Mike Holmes can build as many houses as he wants in the third world, and poverty and food scarcity is still increasing, and as world grain reserves have declined this year, is expected to be even worse this summer. There is no getting around the fact that civilization is facing collapse...likely by the middle of this century, and nothing of substance will be done to prevent collapse or environmental degradation, because it is almost impossible to advance the case for radical change to economics and demilitarization of world affairs.

[bush_cheney2004]

....There is no getting around the fact that civilization is facing collapse...

Civilization has always faced collapse, as that is the nature of the construct. Proclaiming the "end of civilization" was also popular in 50's, 60's, and 70's America, from thermonuclear war to DDT. None of these things came to be.

[Bonam]

Proclaiming the "end of civilization" was also popular in 50's, 60's, and 70's America...

And at all other times and in all other places. Most people ignore the doom prophets and go about their daily lives. The one sure way to see the end of civilization is to assume its coming and sit down in resignation waiting for it.

[GostHacked]

I've been fired from 5 different companies for being too hot.

Not because you were wiping your thingy while at work?