As we move closer to the end of time (December 21:-) some thoughts

What is Love ?
As we move into the year that many are afraid is the last year, perhaps we should consider what December 21, 2012 means.  First, as I understand this  the Mayan Doomsday Prophecy is purely based on a calendar which scientist believe hasn’t been designed to calculate dates beyond 2012. Mayan archaeo-astronomers are even in debate as to whether the Long Count is designed to be reset to 0.0.0.0.0 after 13.0.0.0.0, or whether the calendar simply continues to 20.0.0.0.0 (approximately 8000 AD) and then reset. As Karl Kruszelnicki wrote:

“…when a calendar comes to the end of a cycle, it just rolls over into the next cycle. In our Western society, every year 31 December is followed, not by the End of the World, but by 1 January. So 13.0.0.0.0 in the Mayan calendar will be followed by 0.0.0.0.1 – or good-ol’ 22 December 2012, with only a few shopping days left to Christmas.” – Excerpt from Dr Karl’s “Great Moments in Science“.  Sources: Dr Karl’s Great Moments in Science, IHT, 2012 Wiki

However, if you choose to believe the end is this year then it may be in your best interest to rediscover what love is and what it means to humankind.

Is love as a principle of the universe, not the love we humans have cheapened to a ridiculous degree confusing love and lust?  Is there such thing as love? What do people mean by such phrases: 'love is everything', 'love is life', 'God is love'? Are they just words or do they point to a deeper existential truth?

Buddha says that Craving, attachment, and want are the seed to misery and that the law of nature is that matter and energy are constantly changing.

Is love merely another word for craving, leaving attachment, and want a breeding ground for the seeds of misery?

It is funny that on one hand, we live in a universe where life is sustained by everything eating everything and on the other hand, people tell us that love is what keeps everything going.

What is the relation between those two in terms of matter and energy? Christianity draws a sort of parallel between eating and loving in the idea of 'the bread and the wine', implying that the supreme love is to 'let yourself be eaten' for others, so that what you love can grow. Simone Weil had a similar idea. Unconditional love that leads to sacrifice is, in a sense, the reverse of eating. Another definition of unconditional is to accept the flaws and talents of the loved one.

This acceptance may ensure that there is no disappointment. I suggest that perhaps the only way no disappointment could be achieved is that one would have to be well on the way to enlightenment.

On the other hand, love as a procreative force (love between sexes) creates a temporary unity that does not destroy identity.

The euphoria at the beginning of a relationship that is regarded as "one falling in love" is really an overload of endorphins so basically it’s a drug induced altered state of mind that will change, sometimes for the good, sometimes not.

n the other hand, perhaps this state of mind is a glimpse of what enlightenment would feel like. So have we invented   love to give us hope of living a consistent and blissful life the way we  have invented religions to give us hope that there is an beautiful heaven awaiting us in order not to fear death and the end of time as we know it.

Silencing the critics

 Mr. Harper does not like those who speak against him and who question his decisions. Are you an enemy of Canada if you oppose the Northern Gateway plan. Harper seems to think so and has taken steps to silence his critics. The following is interesting reading:

Prime Minister’s Office Tries to Silence Pipeline Critics; Labels Environmental Group“Enemy of the Government of Canada” and “Enemy of the people of Canada.” For the full letter follow the link

 A Whistleblower’s Open Letter to the Citizens of Canada

 

My name is Andrew Frank. I grew up in a small town in the Okanagan valley of BritishColumbia. My granddad taught me how to fish. My father was a well‐respected lawyerknown for his unwavering integrity, and my mother was a favourite kindergarten teacher. Both have always impressed upon me the importance of telling the truth.Today, I am taking the extraordinary step of risking my career, my reputation and mypersonal friendships, to act as a whistleblower and expose the undemocratic andpotentially illegal pressure the Harper government has apparently applied to silence critics of the Enbridge Northern Gateway oil tanker/pipeline plan

Harper Cons again move to silence critics

Interesting story by Jorge Barrera in the APTN National News

Federal official wanted emails deleted outlining plan to stonewall on residential school genocide questions

National News | 13. Jan, 2012 by APTN National News |                     

By Jorge Barrera
APTN National News

Federal Aboriginal Affairs officials planned to stonewall and avoid public questions about comments made by their minister, emails obtained by APTN National News show.

The internal government documents also show a communications manager wanted to delete those emails, which discussed the department’s plan on dealing with fallout from controversial comments Minister John Duncan made about Indian residential schools.

Duncan ignited outrage last fall among many former residential school students when he said the system was the result of an “education policy gone wrong.”

He also said he didn’t believe the residential school system was an act of genocide, but admitted that if continued it would have been “lethal” to First Nations culture.

“I don’t view it that way (as an act of cultural genocide), but it was certainly very negative to the retention of culture and if it had extended for another generation or two it might have been lethal, yes,” said Duncan.

Duncan made the comments in October while announcing his government would be commissioning a stained-glass window in honour of residential school students and install it on Parliament Hill.
Duncan’s comments on residential schools and genocide, however, overshadowed the announcement.
Duncan’s constituency and ministerial offices received numerous outraged emails from the public over the comments, documents obtained under the Access to Information Act show.

Federal communications officials at Aboriginal Affairs, however, decided they would not respond to any questions on the issue, the documents show.

“There will be no messaging prepared to address this issue,” according to text contained in an email from Dianne Clarke, director general for communications. “The minister and all spokespersons know they are not to speak to it.”

Clarke’s email followed one sent earlier in the day by Katelin Peltier, acting manager for communications, to Aideen Nabigon, director general for the department’s residential school settlement agreement policy and partnership section.
“I have been advised that if spokespersons are approached to not speak or answer… I am sure we won’t see a ‘line’ on this,” wrote Peltier.
At the end of the Oct. 28, 2011, email string discussing the issue, Peltier requested the emails be deleted.
“Can you guys delete these emails?” wrote Peltier, to three other officials, including Clarke, and Sylvie Mercier, a director for the department’s public affairs directorate.

A federal Aboriginal Affairs spokesperson said department officials follow set guidelines on handling internal emails.

“(The department’s) directive on electronic mail management requires employees to document decisions and decision making processes,” said the spokesperson in an emailed statement. “(The department) recommends saving business records to meet record keeping requirements and…deleting personal and transitory messages from the account as quickly as possible.”

The documents show that department officials realized they had a sensitive issue on their hands after APTN National News aired Duncan’s comments along with the reaction from residential school students.

The response from the public proved them right.

“It is appalling that a representative of the Crown…and a federal cabinet minister who is mandated with a critical fiduciary responsibility to the First Nations people of this country would deny that the genocidal intent of Canada in collusion with the churches and RCMP happened,” said one email sent to Duncan’s office, the prime minister’s office and the office of Conservative Senator Patrick Brazeau. “The United Nations definition of genocide is very clear and the residential school systems meet that criteria.”

The name of the email’s author is blacked-out under privacy laws that cover the release of all emails originating from the public.

“I demand an apology and explanation on national television that Canada did in fact purposefully employ genocide as a tactic to ‘to kill the Indian in the child,’” said another email to Duncan. “You have done great harm to my people with your hurtful comment. You have driven a verbal knife into old wounds only freshly healing.”

One writer called on Duncan to quit.

“Please ask Minister John Duncan to resign,” said another email addressed to Duncan that came from a University of Calgary email account. “The minister’s actions are violation of the Charter…his position mandates knowledge and sensitivity, not object denial of the truth.”
Another email writer said Duncan’s comments undercut Prime Minister Stephen Harper’s 2008 apology to residential school students.

“The clear contradiction between(Harper’s) words in Canada’s official apology and (Duncan’s) words while making a formal announcement…is a clear example of insincerity, hollow words and blatant political indemnification on Canada’s part in issuing this apology.”
The email includes a section of the UN convention on genocide which includes “forcibly transferring children of the group to another group.”

University of Manitoba professor Christopher Powell recently published a book arguing that Indian residential schools fit the UN definition of an act of genocide because the aim was to wipe out a culture.

“Canadians like to think we are a moral country, that we are good guys. A lot of Canadians recognize that the residential schools were painful, that there was abuse,” said Powell, in a recent interview. “But there isn’t still a widespread recognition that they were part of a systematic attempt to eliminate by force Aboriginal culture.”

In 1920, Duncan Campbell Scott, the deputy superintendent for the formerly named Indian Affairs department, said the aim of residential schools was to “get rid of the Indian problem” in Canada forever.

“I want to get rid of the Indian problem,” said Scott. “Our objective is to continue until there is not a single Indian in Canada that has not been absorbed into the body politic and there is no Indian question and no Indian department.”

Under Scott, it became mandatory for all children between seven and 15 to attend residential schools.
The federal government, with the help of the RCMP, forcibly seized Aboriginal children away from their parents and put them into church-run residential schools where they were forbidden to speak their own languages and often faced physical and sexual abuse.

Some of the children died at the schools, mostly from sickness and disease, but also from beatings.
Research done by professor John Milloy on behalf of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission suggests that many of these children’s bodies were buried in unmarked graves

Ontario Employment Law: Wrongful Dismissal and Retirement Benefits

On Sunday, November 13, 2011, WiseLaw published this finding  written by Robert Tanha, Toronto which discussed an important question for those who may have lost their jobs. This decision of the Appeal Court of Ontario,should also have ramifications for all of us in Canada.

In Reinzo v. Washington Mills Electro Minerals Corporations, the Court of Appeal for Ontario answers an important question as concerns an employee's entitlement to benefits during the notice period in a wrongful dismissal action: Do they include employer contributions to the Canada Pension Plan and any employer contributions to Registered Retirement Savings Plan?

The Court's answer: A resounding "yes". After awarding a wrongfully dismissed middle manager with 32 years of service 24 months of pay, the Court turned to benefits, holding as follows:

The appellant [employee] is also entitled to the value of all benefits that would have been available to him during this 24 month period but for the termination of his employment, including all applicable dental and health benefits, employer contributions to the Canada Pension Plan, employer contributions to the appellant’s Registered Retirement Savings Plan and wage increases.

Even though this is a 2005 judicial decision of the Court, it is noteworthy that the Court of Appeal for Ontario's holding on a wrongfully dismissed employee's entitlement to benefits has not been overturned. This means that employers cannot "cherry pick" which benefits to pay a wrongfully dismissed employee; it must pay the value of all benefits that would have been available to the employee during the notice period but for the termination of employment without exception.

If you believe you have been wrongfully dismissed, please contact a lawyer who can advise as to your rights and entitlements both under the Ontario Employment Standards Act and at common law.                

Visit our Toronto Law Firm website: www.wiselaw.net