Shut Up And Listen 95 The Hockey/Iraq Fight That Will End Us All For Good The US is gearing for war and elsewhere, people are making fun of them for their imperialistic ways, and the simple ease with which their citizens are taught to accept what the Authorities say without question (or at least to silence any questions that would actually mean something). Here in Canada, there’s a nice mix of opinions. See, we’re right in the middle of various sources of propaganda. We get Canadian propaganda, which has a different flavour from American propaganda, UN propaganda and European propaganda. Of course, each of these propagandas can be broken down into subsets of propaganda. Like there’s Canadian propaganda that comes from a more capitalist, “old school” source that divides the world into Good and Evil, and By God, those Arabs are Evil and the Americans are Good. Or the American propaganda that speaks of life, liberty and the fact (a fact from their point of view) that killing thousands of innocent Iraqis is what the Authorities say they’re fighting against. But then there’s North Korea to consider. Why don’t we worry about them: they have nuclear weapons? is the cry of many people. These people are ignorant fools who are either too stupid to realise the truth or just trying to make a point that has been beaten to death already. But for the purpose of a speedy by-pass of this subject, I will point out the obvious reasons why North Korea barely registers on the Authorities’ maps: they don’t have any oil and they already have nukes, while Iraq has the world’s second-largest source of oil and in a few years it might have some nukes. America runs on oil and it doesn’t want to fight anyone that actually has a chance of winning in any way. If they have nukes, that means they have nukes that can be used against America. No, North Korea and their nuclear weapons have just graduated from The Axis Of Evil to America’s Best Friends. The cry can be heard from Parliament Hill. It is the cry uniquely Canadian. Is it about Iraq? North Korea? Poverty? Slavery? Sodomy? A thousand times no! The cry comes from our Deputy Prime Minister and it is Save The Motherfucking Ottawa Senators! Yes, that’s right, the Ottawa Senators are in financial troubles (along with like every other Canadian hockey team except for Toronto) and Mr. Deputy Prime Minister and Financial Minister John Manley is here to tell the banks that they are to give the Sens as much money as they need to stay in our nation’s capital. Over the past ten years, we have lost two of our teams to the US. Now when you mention such names as the Winnipeg Jets and the Quebec Nordiques kids just stare at you blankly and wonder what you’re shooting into your body (same thing with the Vancouver Grizzlies, although their move was such a quiet thing that I didn’t realise it had happened until this season when the Raptors played them, but they were now from Memphis). Well, no more, we cry! Imagine the Green Bay Packers being moved to Regina or the New York Mets going to Fredericton and you begin to see the dilemma with which our government is faced with. By fuck, the president wouldn’t let American institutions like that move to Canada and we’ll be damned if we’re losing another hockey team (but we also do know that even though the vast majority of NHL teams are situated in the US, the majority of NHL players are still Canadian). It is rather amusing that our government’s seemingly top priority is staving banks off from hockey teams rather than other more pressing matters. There is a reason why this is happening though, and honestly, it’s a good reason: culture. I’ve often heard people bitch and moan about a lack of national culture in Canada, and that’s a fucking lie. Hockey is the staple of our culture, in a very strong way. Now, some may say that this is a rather trivial thing to base a culture on, but what isn’t? I am forced to remember last year and the Olympics. It was a Friday afternoon and it was Canada versus Belarus with the winner to go on to the gold medal game. This was game to be seen or else you were not a true Canadian. The three of us present at school planned what would happen. The game began at two o’clock sharp if I recall correctly. Fourth period lunch ended at 1:20 and during fifth period, I had a spare. Steve had law and Adam had history. There was to be an assembly where we would praise the some school teams and then watch the game until school ended at 2:37. The plan was for me to wait in the parking lot by Adam’s car and they would come immediately once let out for the assembly. Soon we were on the road in the Explorer to Delaware with Nirvana on loud and all ready to watch some fucking hockey. Of course, we needed chips, but all we could afford is one bag, but no matter for there were refreshments at Adam’s house. As the game played we mocked Belarus and the fact that obviously they had left their actual hockey players back in Europe. On Sunday, I watched in my room as Canada won the gold against the United States of America and the country came together in pride. What we have here though are the foci of two cultures. One is focused on killing innocent people for oil. The other is focused on keeping a hockey team in the country. That’s how seriously we take the war on terrorism. We don’t give a fuck. Our most interesting stories are about hockey and budgets and regular shit like that. We know that it isn’t about liberating anybody. If it was Afghanistan wouldn’t be the mess it is today. What happened to that whole rebuilding it and giving it democracy? Yes, for those who don’t know, it never happened. All Afghanistan got was a bunch of bombed-out buildings and a US puppet government that just went ahead to approve a plan to extrapolate oil from Afghanistan and neighbouring countries. Of course, at this point you’re saying to yourself “Holy shit! I forgot all about Afghanistan!” Don’t feel bad, you were meant to. All you saw were a few shots of people in Kabul watching movies and a dozen women coming to the US bashing the fundamental Islamic laws which treated them like less than humans. But here’s something you weren’t told: that shit still happens. Oh yes, don’t believe the hype: democracy and modern laws have not reached Afghanistan. Most Canadians don’t know that either, but only in a factual way, it seems. Most seem to know it in an instinctual way. They have a feeling that’s how it is, but don’t know for sure. That’s why we haven’t joined up with the Americans. We don’t fall prey to the propaganda as easily. We learned a lesson from viewing Vietnam that seems to have been lost on Americans. How can they honestly jump so easily into global conflicts like this after Vietnam? Usually suffering a defeat of such magnitude tends to make people rethink their policies, but oh no, not America. It would be funny if it weren’t so utterly sad, it really would be.