Longhouses and mitochondria

After, what seems like a direct channeling of distant memories of grade 11 biology combined with a recent visit to a reconstructed Iroquois [or more correctly, Haudenosaunee: People of the Longhouse] village, I had this thought: don’t the plans of a Iroquois village with its longhouses and surrounding palisade look remarkably similar to that of a biological cell?

Not to get too new-agey, but a village palisade looks just like a cell wall and the lozenge-shaped longhouses look like mitochondria, which as anyone who was awake in high school biology might remember, are the ‘the power plants of cells.’

Longhouse images

Archaeological plan of the remains of an Iroquoian longhouse

Archaeological plan of the remains of an Iroquoian longhouse (source: Royal Ontario Museum, Toronto, ON)

Iroquoian village with a palisade that surrounds the longhouses

Iroquoian village with a palisade that surrounds the longhouses (source: New York State Museum, Albany, NY)

Iroquoian village reconstruction with palisade and longhouses

Iroquoian village reconstruction with palisade and longhouses (source: Museum of Ontario Archaeology, London, ON)

Mitochondria images

A single mitochondrion showing its two membranes

A single mitochondrion showing its two membranes

Another mitochondrion

Another mitochondrion

Cell showing mitochondrion (the lozenge-shaped things labeled 'M')

Cell showing mitochondrion (the lozenge-shaped things labeled 'M')

A typical nucleated cell

A typical nucleated cell

 

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Canada to immigrants

Immigrants arriving in Canada

Immigrants arriving in Canada

In yesterday’s Globe and Mail was an article by Sarah Hampson called ‘The child of a revolution remembers.’ It is an article about an ex-revolutionary named Carmen Aguirre who is now a successful artist in Vancouver. Aguirre sounds very interesting and has had an unusually unconventional upbringing.

Contained within the article is a quote from Aguirre that is refreshingly open and unfiltered, which raises issues seldom seen in Canadian newspapers:

Despite the calm her life in Canada has, she doesn’t enjoy being an immigrant. “The main stereotype that I deal with is this notion that somehow this country is better than ours.” A burst of derision follows. “It’s ‘Oh, you must feel so lucky to be here.’” Another laugh. “That’s so incredibly insulting.” She shoots a withering look my way. “Within the immigrant community, we talk this way, but not outside. It’s the politically correct thing to say, ‘Oh, isn’t it beautiful here?’”

Clearly, Hampson is less than enthralled about such opinions and seems more interested in Aguirre’s clothing than her ideas, but Aguirre raises some interesting points.

Canadians expect to hear a conventional discourse from their immigrants. Canadians, like citizens of any other country, have constructed national beliefs about immigration, which inside its borders tend to be accepted uncritically. If Canadians hear something different, such as what Aguirre eludes to, then they might be taken aback.

This is not peculiar to Canada. All countries that are open to immigration tell similar stories about themselves. It is not that the content of Canadian stories is especially obnoxious or fanciful, but the fact that they are seldom critically examined and lack input from immigrants themselves that can be corrosive to the morale of some immigrants.

Canada appears to do well in most cases with its immigration policy and its immigrant experience. Many immigrants here appear to do quite well. However, it is the ‘edge’ conditions, for instance people like Aguirre, where the immigration discourse can falter.

Conventional Canadian thinking about immigration

Here are some of the stories that Canadians like to tell themselves:

Superiority of the new and inferiority of the old

  • When people move countries, the country the immigrant is moving into (e.g. Canada) is superior to the one they left behind (otherwise, why would they want to immigrate?).
  • Immigrants who manage to make it to Canada are lucky and the ones who don’t are unlucky.
  • Once you immigrate to Canada the chance that you might find some other country more attractive than Canada (with the possible exception of the USA or New Zealand) is remote. Therefore, when you move to Canada your journey has ended. Congratulations!
  • It should be immediately apparent to the newcomer that no matter where they might have come from, life is surely better in Canada. Therefore, immigrants should experience joy when they arrive in Canada.
  • After an expected period of adjustment, the overall quality of life will be better in Canada than the place the immigrant has left behind.

Immigration to Canada is generally seen as a journey that works in one direction only. Immigrants are not expected to move on from Canada. Canada is not seen as a way-point but as the final destination.

The fact that immigrants took all the trouble of moving from one country to another is thought of as proof that what they find in Canada is superior to that which they left behind.

Expectations of gratitude

Countries that allow immigration such as Canada expect that immigrants express some gratitude and humility towards their new country:

  • Since the new country is clearly superior, immigrants should be grateful to their new country.
  • It is considered bad form to complain too vocally about the new country, at least within earshot of citizens.
  • Adaptable immigrants will find a way to succeed and be happy in Canada. Their first step is to let go of their past and be thankful for their new situation.
  • Excessive complaints about their new home says more about the immigrant than about Canada and its treatment of immigrants.
  • If the newcomer finds things less than functional or advantageous to their situation, the immigrant should remain silent until that time they are able to figure out how their new country works.

Whenever an immigrant express discontent and disappointment in their new situation then the immigrant is heartily invited to return to where they came from. This appears to be the knee-jerk response from many who contribute comments to such stories in national newspapers: the proper role of immigrants is to not broach any hint of complaint. If they do, then they are breaking some unspoken rule.

Of course you will be happy!

Canada, being a North American country in which the pursuit of personal happiness is a prominent goal, expects its immigrants to be happy:

  • Immigrants may not expect to be happy the moment they arrive in Canada. However, they tend to expect that eventually they, or their children, will be happy.
  • There are no structural impediments that prevent immigrants from being happy.
  • If you’re an immigrant then hard work contributes directly to your future happiness.
  • If an immigrant is not willing to do work that is demanding or occasionally demeaning, then the immigrants lacks the personal resources needed to succeed in their new country.

Canada ranks highly in the places where residents profess to being happy. Therefore, Canadians tend to expect its immigrants to be as happy as they are, but without thinking too deeply about things that might make immigrants unhappy.

Canada the beautiful

Canada has the self-image of being a particularly beautiful place. This idea is reinforced by some foreigners who appear to believe the same thing. The idea that what attracts immigrants to move here involves the obvious beauty of Canada is a strong one in Canada:

  • Newcomers to Canada will find Canada to be a beautiful place. At minimum they are expected to find the natural aspects of the country beautiful.
  • The more resourceful of immigrants should also find the man-made aspects of Canada to be beautiful.
  • Canada is likely more beautiful than the countries that immigrants come from.
  • Beauty is something that attracts immigrants to Canada.
  • The beauty of Canada is something that will be a part of the lives of an immigrant. It is not just a PR device to attract outsiders, but is actually a national reality that can be experienced wherever the immigrant may travel.

Canada can in fact be a beautiful place but beauty is in the eye of the beholder. The idea that Canada is objectively-speaking a beautiful place tends to discount the notion that immigrants are frequently attached to the beauty of their own homelands.

Canadian forms of beauty may also be an acquired taste: not everyone finds endless wheat fields, softwood forests with no hint of human settlement, or even mountains beautiful at first. That which is considered beautiful by a society tends to be socially constructed. Immigrants initially may have quite different notions of beauty.

The things which Canadians usually present as being beautiful tend to be non-urban experiences often far removed from the daily immigrant experience, of say, waiting for the bus to get home.

Canadians are nice

One thing that you find in Canada is their pride in being ‘nice’ people–definitely nicer than usual. Canadians have this idea that they are nicer than most and that being proud about being nice is non-controversial–since it is so obviously true!

It is not only Canadians who feel this way. You sometimes hear Americans say this as well (a line of discourse that I like to quash as soon as it surfaces).

‘Niceness’ is similar to beauty. Just as Canada can in fact be beautiful, Canadians frequently are nice–even to immigrants.

However, the idea that Canadians can self-assess themselves as being nice is as suspect as the notion that Canadians can self-assess their own national beauty: it is a generalization that can quickly become oppressive, self-serving and contrary to everyday experience.

Whether Canadians are nicer than usual is beside the point–if in fact such a thing could ever be empirically established. What is more important is their attitude towards this belief. Is it really possible to be proud that you are nice and still be nice?

It is similar to the paradox of being proud that you are humble, which also entails an inherent contradiction: your humility surely ends when your pride begins. Does not your ‘niceness’ also end when your pride about it begins?

I think Canadians sometimes tell themselves that they are nice without considering what outsiders, such as immigrants, might think of this self-constructed belief.

This relates to Aguirre’s perception of being insulted about having to feel that she is lucky by being here. Lucky she well might be, but it is insulting to be expected to feel this way from people who may know nothing about your prior experiences.

My take on Canada

Canada is a good place for many immigrants. Many immigrants to Canada do in fact build lives, which are more agreeable and productive than lives they could expect to lead in their country of origin.

Canada can be a beautiful country in both its natural and man-made aspects. Canada’s history is surprisingly interesting. Canada can be a charming place with an agreeable culture.

However, the most prominent blight on the Canadian national experience and self-image is the shameful state of most of its aboriginal communities. Within these communities life can be very bleak indeed with sky-high rates of infant mortality, substance abuse, suicide and family disintegration.

This situation is dire yet seldom talked about. Canadians appear to consider the experience of its immigrants to be more important than the experiences of its aboriginal communities. Unfortunately, this is a black hole in the national consciousness that appears likely to remain.

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Battle of Stoney Creek 2011

Reenactors on the British side at the Battle of Stoney Creek

Reenactors on the British side at the Battle of Stoney Creek

Every year in Stoney Creek, Ontario for the last 30 years people have reenacted the Battle of Stoney Creek. This was a small but pivotal battle between the Americans and the British during the War of 1812.

The British at the time were a great European power while the US were destined to become a great North American power. The Americans were just establishing their nationhood, their standing army and their military capability. The British on the other hand had one of the most professional and disciplined armies in the world.

The War of 1812 is usually portrayed as a battle between two settler nations: the British (helped by Canadian militias and its native allies) and the Americans. Later in the 19th century, both the Americans and the British did rather well for themselves.

The natives were of essential help in helping the British defend itself against the American invasion. They knew the land much more intimately than the British. Their keen sense of how to survive in the northern woods was honed by thousands of years of settlement. Their dwellings and clothing appear the most suitable for warfare in northern forests. They were also known as fierce and skillful warriors who could terrorize their enemies.

Yet, as the actor portraying Chief Tecumseh at the reenactment explained, the native side did less well as result of the war than the British or the Americans. Despite their help in helping the British not lose the war, the natives were the only side that can be said to have ‘lost’ this war: their traditional way of life, their political autonomy and the hold on their territory was soon to be greatly diminished by the influx of mostly white settlers.

Southern Ontario and in particular the Niagara region, then as now, was an attractive target of invasion: a fruit-belt with a mild climate, with important centres of population, adjacent to impressive lakes and other natural waterways and with some of the most productive farmland in the region.

As luck would have it the War of 1812 was a draw and residents of Upper Canada remained British, later Canadian. As a result of the War of 1812 most of the current eastern boundaries between Canada and the US were defined.

Therefore, one of the war’s outcomes was the establishment of a stable frontier between two large countries. This has given the lands on either side of the border many years in which the inhabitants didn’t have to worry too much about the possibility of external invasion or other political or military calamities. Most other regions of the world cannot claim such stability of their frontiers so early in their political history.

This was a type of ‘peace dividend’ for the region, which unfortunately did not extend to its aboriginal population. Their history after this war was one of increasing marginalization – rather than stability and growth. The reverberations of this process of marginalization are still felt strongly in the region and have yet to be addressed adequately on either side of the border.

 

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Waterboarding may or may not have worked!

As we descent into a dark age that would make Pol Pot proud, we read this article “Waterboarding detainees yielded clues that helped find bin Laden: CIA

New York Republican congressman Mike King challenged those who say that “waterboarding doesn’t work.”

Congressman King, I don’t think the main issue is whether waterboarding worked or not, the main issue–which is as clear as day in almost all places, in all minds that have a molecule of rationality, sensibility or compassion–is whether waterboarding is morally reprehensible or not.

It is similar to arguing whether slavery ‘worked’ because it happened to raise the GDP of the confederate states.

Clearly, when it involves torture, in normal political discourse outside of Stalinist Russia or Khmer Rouge Cambodia, ends don’t justify the means.

It deserves a nanosecond of reflection to utterly reject such reasoning as that by King. No, make that less than a nanosecond.

I thought we were past all such nonsense–and it is complete nonsense–laughably so [read about it next in The Onion].

We live in an age in which headlines can be taken directly from mainstream newspapers, processed ever so slightly, then directly presented as satire. This is making satirists jobs so much easier! Isn’t there an app for that?

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Election second thoughts

After reading a few things I have reassessed some opinions regarding the recent Canadian election.

Clearly, what happened in Quebec was not a rejection of nationalism in favour of social democracy. It was just that Quebec voters got tired of the old guy Duceppe and wanted a change. They didn’t like what either the Conservatives or the Liberals had to offer–since both of these are tired brands at times–so chose the NDP. Their choice of the NDP is not the beginning of a committed relationship, it is more like a one night stand (that will last for four years). This romance could end at any time.

The Liberals are not dead. They will just lay dormant for awhile until they acquire a charismatic leader (Justin Trudeau anyone?).

The idea that the country as a whole is making a permanent shift to the right or the left is premature. Those from Alberta would like to think so but their political culture, which involves both a one party state and the unsavory anti-environmentalism of the resource extraction industries, cannot be easily applied to the other regions of Canada.

One of the great weaknesses of Harper is that his environmental record is absolutely pathetic. Conservative parties elsewhere in Western countries may even be bothered by what Harper appears to believe in: let’s do nothing and hope no one notices. Anti-environmentalism is not necessarily a left-wing issue. Conservatives, too, occasionally wish to conserve things.

Harper’s anti-environmentalism really makes us look bad overseas: you can dress him up but you can’t take him to Copenhagen. You may not want to become Copenhagen but you don’t want the people there to hate you.

International reputations for countries like Canada are worth big money. Squandering reputations waste money. This is an odd approach for a supposedly fiscally-responsible conservative government.

Anti-environmentalism is not a sustainable political strategy. Soon, voters will expect all parties to pay lip service to it. Canadians may or may not value social democracy but they do value environmental issues, if well presented.

Therefore, the party that could really do well in the next four years is the Greens. Their leader Elizabeth May sounds creative, intelligent and articulate.

Here are some things that all parties must become known for if they want to avoid ritualized Kim Campbell/Michael Ignatieff-style humiliations:

  1. Connect with immigrants and the youth. These people are the future of Canada.
  2. Be fiscally responsible and do not waste money on non-value producing programs (e.g. prisons).
  3. Address environmental issues such that money, resources and reputations are not wasted.
  4. Repair our international reputation such that Canada has real friendships not only with people with money (e.g. the Chinese) but also with people with moral integrity and courage (e.g. the people who began the revolutions in Tunisia and Egypt).
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The Killing of Osama bin Laden

The recent, unexpected killing of Osama bin Laden in Pakistan has raised several interesting points.

First, is this article from the Nation: With Osama bin Laden Dead, It’s Time to End the ‘War on Terror.’

Clearly, the war on terror has very little to do with the continued existence or not of Osama bin Laden, or his ilk. It appears to have much more to do with domestic politics in the USA. The war on terror was a war conceived for US domestic consumption, despite the undeniable hideousness and suffering of 9/11, and despite bin Laden’s almost certain complicity in that tragedy.

In order for this war to end, there must be a change in US domestic politics, which I can’t see happening anytime soon.

Operations such as the bin Laden killing are known as Black Ops. Obama is expected to do well politically as a result of this one. People dancing in Times Square is to be expected. Americans shouldn’t be surprised though if the dancing is more restrained outside of the US.

Another thing to consider is a comment I heard yesterday from an English phone-in caller to the CBC. He said something like this: even at the height of the IRA crisis in Britain, police there refrained from openly assassinating their enemies (not to say that they never did such a thing). But now it appears that in the US, Black Ops are the order of the day. He thought it odd that no one was talking about this. When did it become acceptable to brazenly assassinate your enemies–especially those in foreign countries? Is this really a good idea?

Of course of all the enemies the US has ever had, Osama is the one you would most likely want to kill. I bet even the Quakers would line up to get that guy.

One problem with Black Ops is that they’re black. This means they are illicit and that they derive a lot of their power because they aren’t talked about openly, in polite company. When they become a basic foreign policy technique–which a president proudly and openly announces at a press conference–then they get a little tawdry. It is like UFC cage matches suddenly becoming popular and then held in the Rose Garden of the White House. They might please the crowds but they also might diminish the respectability of the Presidency.

Black Ops are greatly effective in eliminating your enemies (when they work out as planned). They certainly serve to demonstrate the effectiveness and skill of the US military for targeted, Shin Bet style killings. What might be in question is the idea that physically eliminating your enemies is always wise.

Such operations must not only feel good, they must do something positive for the fortunes of the USA for them to be considered successful.

Bin Laden was demonized not only because he was a murderous terrorist, but also because he had the temerity to mount a private Black Op of his own against the sole remaining superpower.

Countries other than the USA are of course strongly discouraged from mounting their own Black Ops against their enemies. This is a form of American exceptionalism that the rest of the world may resent.

The Bin Laden killing reminds me of a widely circulated news item around the time of the start of the war in Afghanistan. A young man with a bellicose bent proudly announced that the the USA was the new ‘Roman Empire’ and that the world would just have to get used to that fact.

At the time I thought it was an odd thing to compare ones country–Land of the Free, Home of the Brave–to the Roman Empire.

Wasn’t this the same Roman Empire notable for its cruelty and decadence? And weren’t the Romans–who in addition to their military might and grand architecture–known as a civilization that eventually went into a long period of decline and eventually fell?

Yet, it appears this irony was lost on the man. He liked the sound of the empire idea–with a military that could kick butt with impunity–but without considering any of its potential downsides.

As the Romans clearly demonstrated, military power is only one aspect of power. Economic and moral power still count for something, and empires can sometimes become burdensome to their owners.

One of the downsides of being the sole superpower is that there is a tendency to pursue international relations as if their domestic political outcomes is the only thing that needs to be considered. It is like a Roman Empire frame of mind, but conceived by someone who has never left Peoria.

This attitude (also common in Canada under Harper) is short-sighted, parochial and often counter-productive to national interests. It works directly against seeing the ‘big picture,’ which you would think would be needed to maintain superpower status for long.

It comes as no surprise that Osama was hiding away in a secure compound in a garrison town in Pakistan. If he were hiding behind the Burger King in McLean, Virginia, now that would have been a surprise.

Finally, what struck me as really odd is the fact that Osama’s body was buried at sea. Now, how do we know if anything really happened in Abbottabad? Conspiracy theorists: start your engines!

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Canadian Election Results 2011: Neo-Cons vs. the Social Democrats

This morning we woke up to a new political map in Canada. The Conservative Party, led by Stephen Harper, won a decisive majority while the Liberals under Michael Ignatieff were routed. These two events are not hugely surprising given the political strengths of Harper and the political weaknesses of Ignatieff. But what was dumbfounding was the dramatic success of the left-most mainstream party: the New Democratic Party (NDP) under the personable Jack Layton.

What was also quite unexpected–until the last couple weeks of the campaign–is how in Quebec the nationalist Bloc Québécois (BQ) was largely replaced by the federalist NDP. This is a seismic event in Canadian politics, even more significant perhaps than the success of the NDP overall.

What this means is that in Quebec voters are willing to support a federalist party–that is, one not devoted to making Quebec a separate country. The Québécois are now willing to participate in Canadian politics at the national level. They had a choice between social democracy and nationalism and they chose social democracy. This is very surprising.

Previously, when the BQ held a substantial number of seats in Canada’s Parliament, the center-left vote in Canada was split between three parties: the BQ (which the rest of the country was not able to support since they ran no candidates outside of Quebec), the Liberals and the NDP.

This split enabled the consolidated right under Harper to assume power.

This election now has had the effect of consolidating the left in Canada under the NDP. This has never happened before in Canadian politics.

During this election, the electorate was polarized. Voters could either follow Harper and his brand of western-based conservatism, or they could support a party whose left-wing, worker-friendly values have never been in question: the NDP.

The Conservatives and the NDP involve two distinct visions of Canada’s future: either a US-influenced neo-conservative vision, or a European-influenced social democratic vision.

In Canada, if you are conservative you will never vote for the NDP, and if you are a lefty you will never vote for the Conservatives under Harper. With these election results the political polarization is now almost comically complete. It is unclear whether this is a good thing or a bad thing.

But what it does enable is an opportunity for both the left and the right to fully define their positions and to articulate the implications they have for the future of Canada.

On reason the Liberals were routed because it was unclear which side of this fence they were situated. Did they believe in the immigrant-friendly welfare state–which their party largely created–or did they not?

Ignatieff muddied this issue and made it difficult for many voters to support him. It was not only his political acumen and personality that was at issue, it was the clarity of his basic political position.

The Liberal Party experience in Canada could be compared to that of the Obama Democrats in the USA.

Obama is not liberal enough to appeal to the traditional urban Democratic base, nor is he credible as a centre-right politician who can appeal convincingly to US nationalism and the projection of American power around the globe.

In other words, Obama is not left enough for the lefties, yet not right enough to appeal to a suburban electorate. If he is not careful Obama may face a similar fate to that of Ignatieff.

In Canada, though, if any party is to assume the mantle of the curious Canadian concept of the ‘Natural Governing Party’ they must be both immigrant-friendly in a convincing, non-patronizing way and they must manage the country is an economically sound manner. Canadians wisely see their immigrants as their future, and prefer to be rich rather than poor.

It is too early to tell whether the right or the left will be able to convince the electorate of their skills in these two areas.

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RIM and its new PlayBook

RIM PlayBook

RIM PlayBook

This week the RIM PlayBook tablet computer was launched. It is probably a decent machine with some compelling design features but it has received some scathing reviews.

Tablet makers are currently in a frenzied catch-up mode to Apple. They are trying to duplicate the stunning success of the iPad. If a tablet manufacturer is to be successful in this fight they have to come up with some truly innovative ideas that create real buzz, as opposed to say, ridicule.

One thing that stuck out with the RIM PlayBook is its lack of an email program. Not including an email program in a tablet computer is comparable to launching a new car without windows that roll down or a radio that turns on.

When I read about that deficiency I scratched my head and chuckled. What were they thinking? Were they actually trying to make the front page of The Onion, or perhaps there is some structural deficiency in their design thinking.

I think it might be a good time to explore some aspects of the RIM model and provide some cultural context.

RIM is located in the small southern Ontario city of Waterloo. Waterloo is about one and a half hours drive west of Toronto.

Southern Ontario is a part of Canada that some of us view as the natural economic, educational and cultural heartland of English Canada. This smug feeling of superiority the rest of Canada naturally detests.

Waterloo is usually portrayed as the science and technological hub of Canada. RIM has its headquarters there, as do other successful tech companies such as OpenText.

RIM grew out of work done at the University of Waterloo, which is one of Canada’s prime research universities. This university is renowned for the excellence of its research in many fields including math, computer science and engineering. It has the reputation of being young, smart and ambitious.

Similar to how Stanford is the reason why Silicon Valley is where it is, the Waterloo technology hub exists because of its proximity to the University of Waterloo.

If some of the smartest people are in Waterloo and RIM is the wunderkind of Canadian technology, then why would they launch a tablet with such obvious and laughable deficiencies?

No one would claim that they aren’t smart up in Waterloo. But maybe being smart is not enough, or perhaps they are smart but in a particularly unhelpful way.

I have some history with Waterloo but I admit they I have little direct knowledge of Waterloo’s current culture except having driving through it several times and stopping on occasion at its impressive Perimeter Institute. I am sure that many nice people live and work in Waterloo.

Waterloo is an attractive place, but in a white-bread, buttoned-down, suburban kind of way. If you are looking for gritty urban living of a kind found in Brooklyn, East-end London or Istanbul, you would be well-advised to look elsewhere.

The nearby city of Kitchener seems to have more historical buildings than Waterloo and has a grungier, more working class appeal. Kitchener is renovating some of its old factories to attract the hipster crowd. This appeal to sustainability and historical preservation seems to be working out well and is creating substantial interest in the business community.

Yet, Waterloo is stuck in a corporate-campus type setting in which truly urban attractions and experiences are less prevalent.

There is something just a hit nerdy about Waterloo. It has traditionally attracted the pocket-protector set: those with more skills in mathematics than in art or socially disruptive thinking.

Maybe RIM and its PlayBook suffers from this approach to technology.

RIM has the reputation being a darling of corporate types. Its main competitive advantage is the interoperability of its devices within secure corporate data networks. To many, this is a key advantage.

But to those outside the corporate or business realm this is much less of a compelling feature. In fact, it works against being seen as ‘cool.’

Data security is a good thing but it is not the only thing. Security should not trump all other concerns. Usability, openness and overall innovation must also be important design considerations.

Many view the recent global recession as somehow engineered or caused by the excesses of western capitalism. For a company that hopes to design devices with some broad consumer appeal, being allied with multinationals and their preference for secure data is not necessarily an advantageous position.

There are only so many corporate types in the world, whereas there are huge numbers of non-corporate types. It is this broader-based consumer market that the likes of Apple and Google are in a much better position to exploit.

RIM is left on the sidelines serving a privileged corporate culture. RIM is further marginalized by its obscure Canadian origins, in a world where Canadian multinationals are not seen as being particularly progressive or innovative.

Compare the engineering-driven culture of Waterloo with that of Silicon Valley in California.

One of the reasons that the Bay Area is such a great success is that the engineer-driven culture of Silicon Valley is balanced by the artistic anarchism and free-spirit of nearby San Francisco and Berkeley. It is the land both of Stanford and its straight A students, but also of the Black Panthers and of environmental activism.

There is something electric in the air of the Bay Area, which seems missing in a place like Waterloo. Waterloo appears to have all the nerdiness of Silicon Valley but without the inspiring counterpoint of free-love and of new ways of organizing society.

This makes Waterloo an attractive place of employment for some but not a sympathetic place to live as a free-spirited artist or even as an open-source programmer.

If one has some interest is those kinds of alternative lifestyles then one should explore the downtown districts of Toronto, or even Hamilton, rather than Waterloo.

Exploration of social alternatives is necessary to come to a point where real innovation is possible. Innovation and social conformity do not always make great bedfellows.

RIM and Waterloo have the reputation of being steady and reliable places in which to produce conventional work. However, what is now required is unconventional work.

If RIM is to become a success in fields such as the design of consumer-friendly devices, it must ditch its joined-at-the-hip connection to the corporate world and explore its inner anarchist.

RIM, in short, must either innovate or die.

Posted in Design, Software | 3 Comments

This pesky coalition business

Stephen Harper

Stephen Harper

One of the most prominent issues of the current Canadian election campaign is the idea of coalitions. Stephen Harper, the right wing Conservative leader, presents them as an affront to Canadian values and all that is right about our democracy. The absurd position, which has no historical foundation, is not countered in any substantial way by the other parties.

In Canada, the left is splintered while the right is unified under Stephen Harper. The only way that the left will assume power is to become as unified as the right. This is made a little more difficult in the Canadian context because one of the parties on the left is the Bloc Québécois, a Quebec-only party that promotes sovereignty for Quebec.

Therefore, for the left to unify in a formal way, as a single party, would be a difficult or impossible. The only way to unify it is to do so in a virtual way–as some kind of coalition. This is not unusual in other countries but is presented as something to be avoided at all costs by Harper.

Harper presents a coalition of the right as a natural phenomenon, while a coalition of the left as an unholy alliance. All evidence seems to point to Harper getting away with this misrepresentation.

Let’s just cut out the left entirely

In the USA there exists a two party system. Hard right is now represented by the Republican Party, while the center right, by the Democrats. Both these parties are tireless in their efforts to support corporate interests, with little or no regard to political concerns to their left.

In the USA, the left is not unified under the umbrella of the Democratic Party. It is simply absent from the political party system entirely.

This ‘democratic deficit’ and limited range of political options in the USA makes it an anomaly compared to many other western democracies, where leftist parties do exist and sometimes have real influence in the political sphere.

Harper wants Canadians to believe they live under a similar political construct, in which the right assumes a natural right to govern while the left is effectively disenfranchised.

What favors Harper in the popular imagination is a basic misunderstanding of the parliamentary system.

This is not the USA

In a republican system as found in the USA voters elect a president directly. The candidate who gets the most votes gets to be president.

In a parliamentary system, you elect your local member of parliament. You do not elect the prime minister directly. The prime minister is the person who manages to acquire the ‘confidence of the house.’ This is usually, but not always, the leader of the dominant political party in parliament.

In the USA, there are profound checks and balances on the power of a president. In Canada such checks do not exist because the role of a president does not exist.

Harper wants to be a president, but one with few checks and balances. The Canadian system is not set up to accommodate such a position. In fact, the US system is not set up for such a position either.

A parliamentary system is not necessarily superior or more democratic than a republican one, it is simply structured in a profoundly different way. It is the misunderstandings of the these differences by the voting public that Harper hopes to exploit.

Working with others

In a parliamentary system, a leader in a minority situation must work with the members of other parties to get things done. If a ruling party lacks the confidence of others, the government will fall and another election will be called. This has happened to Harper several times.

Harper has difficulty in gaining the confidence of those with opposing political views. He does not work well with others–especially with parties to his left, which includes all other parties in Canada’s parliament.

Harper is greatly offended by the idea that when he is in a minority position, he must work with members of other parties. He would prefer not to have to do this, but when in he’s in a minority he has no other choice.

He proposes that the only sensible option is for Canadians to elect him to a majority, which would allow him to escape the ‘bickering’ and rule in a way unconstrained by consensus-building protocols. He wants a majority in order to centralize all political power in himself and to ignore all others.

Judging by his recent record, he clearly wants to set himself up as a petty dictator, but one who supposedly derives his legitimacy within the parliamentary system.

Harper wants to be a father figure, whose authority is unquestioned either by the voting public or by other members of parliament–even those within his own party. Such an overtly authoritarian and patriarchal politician is rare in Canadian history.

Conclusion

When Stephen Harper rails against coalitions, he misrepresents the basic structure of the parliamentary system under which he works. He is, in fact, making it up as he goes along.

Many Canadians find this political tactic disingenuous in the extreme. They are rightfully worried about the fragile state of our democracy.

Clearly, Canadians need to learn a little bit about the basic structure of our parliamentary system. Without this knowledge they will be victims to well-spoken demagogues like Harper who are willing and able to subvert the system under which they work in strikingly undemocratic ways.

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Update on Colborne St South in Brantford

One of the more distressing events of 2010 was the demolition in Brantford of a heritage streetscape on the south side of Colborne St. What was once a canal-side assemblage of interesting, historic buildings is now a steep gradient covered in dark mulch. Apparently, the steepness of the slope makes constructing new buildings on this site more expensive than usual. The city awaits for new ideas about what to do with this prominent site.

Before demolition: 1

Before demolition 1 (looking south-east)

Before demolition: 1

Before demolition 2 (looking south-west)

Before demolition: 3 (canal-side)

Before demolition 3 (canal-side; looking north-east)

After: 1

After demolition 1 (looking east)

After: 2

After demolition 2 (looking west)

View of the demolished site

After demolition 3; view of the demolished site, showing the exposed north side of Colborne St (looking north)

Last week I attended a lecture by Dr. Karen Dearlove who described the site in greater detail and reflected on its relationship to the [now filled-in] canal at its base. This part of the core of Brantford was the western end of a canal that ended directly below where Colborne St hits the Grand River. This short canal (called the ‘Brantford Cut’) improved navigation along the Grand River by avoiding a great meander in the river downstream of Brantford. The Grand River Canal, of which the Cut was a part, became obsolete with the building of the railways in the 1860’s.

The canal system fed an impressive industrial complex that manufactured farm machinery, in a part of town now known as the Greenwich-Mohawk Brownfield Site. There are development proposals to maintain some of its remaining industrial buildings and infill with new buildings in the style of the old. This site is a about a kilometer from the Colborne St site.

The question remains why Brantford councilors felt in 2010 that it was a good idea to demolish such a large quantity of urban heritage architecture on the south side of Colborne St.

One theory that hadn’t occurred to me is the de-industrialization trauma theory, which goes something like this: Brantford experienced rapid de-industrialization with the closing of several large factories in the early 1980’s. The citizens of Brantford saw their city turn quickly from an industrial giant into a relatively unimportant city. Many thousands of people became unemployed and were therefore traumatized. They expressed this trauma by devaluing the remnants of the old, such as heritage streetscapes in the core. The future of the new Brantford was not to include things that reminded the citizens of the old order; if they removed evidence of this past then it became easier to cope with their sudden loss of status.

I’m not sure I buy this theory, since Brantford has managed to retain many fine heritage buildings. Indeed, Brantford is currently experiencing a mini-boom as a regional educational hub, which appears on the whole to be beneficial to the preservation of its core.

But the Colborne St destruction still resonates strongly in the minds of those who fought to prevent it. Brantford lives on, but in a diminished state.

Rehabilitation of the the Greenwich-Mohawk site and of the adjacent canal system, which seems like such a promising development, will have to do without the prominent landmark provided by the south side of Colborne St at its western terminus.

Posted in Cities | 5 Comments