My Page

CJH


Class of '86

Jan 12 21

I finished a Bachelor of Independent Studies degree researching the background of a specific legal case that determined the division of powers in labour matters in Canada; so broadly speaking, I studied labour history, labour relations, economic history and political ideology of the Left. Between that and being a denizen (and later champion – see dumontpressgraphix.blogspot.com) of the House of Zonk, Dumont was a logical next step. It was 1985.

In one year I saw a Dumont that was going backwards technologically, economically unsustainable and ideologically misguided.

After we put Dumont out of its misery in 1986, Deb Connors rescued Alternatives: Perspectives on Society, Technology and Environment, moved it to the Faculty of Environmental Studies at UW, and within a year had a grant to ease it into the digital age of “desktop publishing”. I was lucky to get in on the second year of this. The skills I learned in my six years of Alternatives – proofing, editing, design, marketing, grant applications, financial and business management – I still use today. But it was because of my experience at Dumont – under/unpaid, ruthless hours, denial of the financial acumen needed to run the business and pay the workers (months behind invoicing major projects that had already been expensed; paying people who no longer worked there to make up for their not being paid when they worked there, contributing to the people working there not getting paid…..) that I made sure that we earned a decent wage at Alternatives, got a modest paid vacation and dental benefit, didn’t work for free “because it was a good cause”, and kept on top of the technology of our industry.

Alternatives was stripped down to its core value – its copy – and was freed from all the dead weight of Dumont so it could be reinvented. It didn’t need the VIP, the SIM, not the “new” blind boards we got for cheap, the camera, dark room and chemistry, light tables, not the press in the back or the kitchen with its coffee grinder mounted really low so everyone would be equally disadvantaged using it, not the garlic drying on the desks, the countless elastics that broke bundling tapes, “check in”, personal politics, the good graces of Steve Izma to come and fix the VIP (“in my copious free time”) and general clutter and disorganization.

In retrospect, the Dumont of 1986 collided with the Dumont of 1971 and faced the same scale of technological revolution in 15 years that, like our lead-typesetting predecessors, we were unable or unwilling to navigate. We did not have the tech savvy of early members, nor was it available to us, or the vision that went with it. Without these, no amount of ideology could run the shop. And Dumont needed someone like me who understood that running a business effectively - even profitably - and having a social agenda, do not have to be in conflict.

Lasting influence of Dumont: I was cured of the Left and politics forever, and rediscovered plants – who have no ideology - for my enjoyment, inspiration, and eventual livelihood. Amor fati.

War Measures Act revisited

Feb 16 22

Imagine my surprise when I looked up from my plant world a month ago and realized that somehow in the intervening 35 years since I decided to be disinterested in politics, that I am on the right! Maybe even the far right!

Why? Because I support the Freedom Convoy for vaccine choice and to end mandates. Why? Because I support the truckers peaceful protest in Ottawa. Why? Because I have felt from the get go of this public health event that government was going too far by mandating what goes into our bodies. A long way from “the state has no place in the bedrooms of the nation”, the 1968 upgrade to the Canadian Criminal Code that, among other measures, decriminalized homosexuality, contraceptives and made therapeutic abortions legal. That was Trudeau Sr as Minister of Justice.

You all are old enough to remember when the same elder Trudeau invoked the War Measures Act during the “October Crisis”. Back then, in the now famous “Just watch me” news clip, the left, and the mainstream media (even), questioned on behalf of Canadians the abrogation of civil liberties.

And here we all are, about 50 years later with the illegal invocation of the Emergencies Act (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K3PAZDinO2o), with full complicity by what we used to call “the instrument of the state”, i.e. the CBC and its private sector cronies - Global and CTV - smearing peaceful protesters, spinning the narrative, supporting Justin Trudeau and the the corrupt state of the Liberal Party.

Oh and by the way, the NDP, since the last time I looked 35 years ago, seems to have lost sight of their roots as the party of labour, with their leader also condemning the blue collar truckers.

Today the organizing committee for the truckers is calling for, what we used to call, a general strike. (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=57qon3Ud5b0) They are calling it “Freedom Week”, starting February 21. Call in sick. Withdraw your money from the banks before your funds are frozen without a court order, as is allowed under the Emergencies Act. Prepay fixed expenses.

You guys. Don’t rest on your laurels. If you haven’t already reached outside the Trusted News Initiative (https://cbc.radio-canada.ca/en/media-centre/trusted-news-initiative-plan-disinformation-coronavirus) i.e. censorship of discussion and differing opinions, then do so now. Do what you did best back in the heyday of Dumont: question authority, own the press, write, analyze, think critically, organize and fight for the rights and freedoms embedded in our Constitution so that our kids and grandkids can enjoy them as we have. The labels have changed from 50 years ago, but the corruption is still corruption, and fairness, community and family, and all the rights and freedoms we value and have taken for granted, are still something to stand up for.