JULY 20, 1969 (THE FINAL FRONTIER INTO THE BIG UNKNOWN)

The impetus for the Apollo space program came from aviation: invented by the Wright bros. & then accelerated by aerial combat in 2 world wars. Within a decade after 1945, the USA in harnessing flying technology, would lead the world into the jet age & from there, push the boundaries into space (inspite of both the diplomatic arms race & Sputnik satellite by the Russians) as a result of the unstoppable move to push faster & further into unchartered territory -- an extension demonstrated through the weaponry of warfare when in 1959, the first US intercontinental ballistic missile was launched which could travel 3500 miles & destroy cities. Then in May 1960, a U2 spy plane was shot down over the Soviet Union followed by the Cuban Missile Crisis stand-off in Oct 1962. Suddenly, nuclear war seemed inevitable. A more positive project of non-destructive armaggedonish capability was sought echoing the May 25, 1961 famous appeal made by President JFK to a special joint session of Congress in which he called upon American efforts to put a man on the Moon. The goal of rockets & spacecraft would be the ultimate testimony to the progress of humanity thus signifying the impatient drive onward to new oppurtunities. The ensuing labor-intensive venture involved an estimated 400,000 Americans working directly on Apollo XI from flight controllers, technicians & engineers to scientists and seamtresses; all costing $24 billion (about $100 billion today). By 1969, NASA was ready for the big one! The timeline planned down to the last second involved 17,000 people in Cape Canaveral,Florida to handle the take-off & 131 people manning the mission control room in Houston,Texas. 3000 tons of metal & 3 astronauts (Neil Armstrong, Edwin 'Buzz' Aldrin & Michael Collins) then made their journey, taking the hopes of the world with them by setting their sights to conquer the impossible. Apollo XI featured more power than all of the waterfalls in North America combined, was 60ft taller than the statue of liberty & carried a million gallons of fuel enough to drive a car around the globe 400 times. Still, all the teamwork & discipline left the astronauts to face the unknown alone. When they approached the Moon, they did a burn to slow the command module down so they could go into lunar orbit & had that not worked, they would've shot past the Moon into the distant solar system never to be seen again. When the landing craft finally touched down 40yrs ago today, less than 30 seconds of fuel was left. And then came the broadcast pictures from the installed tv cameras, back to mission control with Armstrong's statement, "Houston, Tranquility base here. The Eagle has landed" followed by his triumphant endeavor to echo the historical defining moment: "That's one small step for man, one giant leap for mankind." The beautiful desolate landscape & the view from the Moon looking at the Earth 240,000 miles away, could only be summed up with the planting of the stars n' stripes. In those minutes for that lone glorious achievement on that summer night, the whole world stared up at the heavens. The lunar landing united the country & was the nation's greatest accomplishment to forever stand as a metaphor in any dream to climb higher & ascend forward. Apollo XI became the first of 9 rockets that went to the Moon, landing 6 out of 7 times with 24 astronauts who would walk the surface.
The mission had set off on Jul 16 at 9:32AM with an estimated 1 million people gathered from all over Florida to see the giant rocket depart. The 3 astronauts having already flown in space during the Gemini program missions, wound up travelling at increased speeds of 24,545mph just under 3hrs into their flight. US Vice-President Spiro Agnew marked the launch as a "new era of civilization entering a new age of discovery". Armstrong set foot onto the Moon as the first human to do so on Jul 21, 20min. after first opening the landing craft hatch (parked near a crater about a foot deep). He described the surface as being like powdered charcoal and spent his first few minutes taking photographs & soil samples in case the mission had to be aborted suddenly. Aldrin followed him onto the surface nearly 20min. later helping to collect data & performing various exercises such as jumping across the landscape before planting the American flag. Both spent a total of 21hrs on the Moon, 2.5 of them outside the landing module. Collins remained in the command module and told mission control he had successfully orbited the Moon in the mother ship Columbia & take-off to return home would be on schedule. The entire event was watched (and Armstrong's words heard) by a live audience of more than a billion people around the world (185 million of them American viewers). Before leaving, the astronauts unveiled a plaque bearing President Richard Nixon's signature and an inscription reading: "Here men from the planet Earth first set foot upon the Moon, July 1969 AD. We came in peace for all mankind." After filming their experience, they received a message from Nixon in the White House who spoke of the pride of the American people & said, "This certainly has to be the most historic telephone call ever made." After rejoining the Columbia mothership, all 3 left the Moon's orbit on Jul 22 and safely returned to Earth on July 24. The 3 men spent the next 21 days in quarantine at an American military base as a common inspection procedure to make sure no alien organisms were found. The Moon landing marked the pinnacle of the space race & American investment in the space programme declined accordingly with the last lunar module, Apollo 17, landing in Dec 1972. After Armstrong had set foot on the big, round celestial body & uttered his famous memorable phrase, he & Aldrin went on to collect 47lbs of surface material for research analysis. Aside from Apollo 11 (and also Apollo 1's never making it off the launchpad due to the fire in the command module that tragically killed the 3 astronauts on board in Jan 1967), there were 5 other lunar missions in the Apollo program. the one most people remember is the Apollo 13 "Houston, we have a problem" mission in Apr 1970 during which a malfunction on the ship (an exploded oxygen tank) nearly caused the crew to be stranded in space and after the onset of limited power, loss of cabin heat & shortage of water, the crew managed to fix the damage and safely returned to Earth with a succesful splashdown in the South Pacific Ocean. Apollo manned-missions 7 through 10 were never supposed to land on the moon; instead they orbited it and tested the command & lunar modules used by the other flights. Of those that did land on the moon, they conducted experiments on solar wind, soil, meteoroids, seismic activity & heat flow. The significance was not only for historical importance but also for the data gathered, enabling scientists to speculate about the moon's formation & composition.

WHO'S YOUR DADDY?
No debates, no arguments & no doubt about it: the US space program was built upon nazi-technology as the work of captured German rocket scientist, the gifted Werner Von Braun, was key to putting Americans on the moon. If NASA has a singular founding father, it's him. Von Braun set the template for future rockets travelling at supersonic speed as the man behind the V1 flying terror bombs (a crude precursor to the cruise missile beginning in May 1944) and the V2 ballistic missiles (Sept 1944) meant to hit London & Paris but his disturbing, highly controversial background cannot be overlooked: as a Major in the SS, he was deeply implicated in the complicity of using over 20,000 slave laborers who were worked to death in hellish inhuman conditions to build the missiles (accounting for more deaths than the weapon ever killed - even before they became operational). Although the cruel policy was endorsed & overseen by SS Gen. Hans Kammler (who supervised the construction of Auschwitz) & another V2 chief engineer, Arthur Rudolph, Von Braun accepted the prisoners without question. His advanced & secretive but very experimental work was still years ahead of the Americans as WWII drew to a close and after Germany's defeat, he was hunted by the Americans, British & Russians for his expertise in the manufacture n' development of propulsion boosters & guidance systems. As a boy, he had once dreamed of rockets to travel to the stars & instead perfected instruments to obliterate civilians indiscriminately, that arrived without warning & were impervious to counter-measures. But he proved to have an ace up his sleeve and traded his knowledge & research in exchange for immunity from war crimes prosecution. Gambling that his worth would outweigh any charges of imprisonment or execution, as extra insurance, he had hidden 14 tons of precious technical drawings, plans, blueprints & data in an abandonned mine as a bargaining chip for his future. On May 2, 1945, Von Braun along with anonther prominent rocket engineer & 5 others surrendered to an American patrol. Stalin was furious that much of the V2 equipment & German personnel had been snatched from right under his nose despite his army's occupation of Berlin at war's end. By mid Jun, 1000 ex-nazi scientists from various German weapons programs had been hastily moved into the safety of the American zone - deliberately shielded to be kept from facing trial. In helping to finish the war against Japan (ironically enough, their allies), their previous accountability would instead be covered up & their lives allowed to begin again in the USA.

In Jul 1945, the US Joint Chiefs of Staff on orders from President Truman authorized 'Operation Paperclip' to evacuate the best nazi brains to America to continue their work unhindered. Ostensibly the enemy & prisoners just weeks before, these men now in reality had contracts & fees negotiated for them as well as being promised that their families would join them later. Von Braun was among the immediate first of an initial 120 carefully selected scientists. He & several of his V2 team were setteled in Texas, including one-time colleague Rudolph. They were employed on converting the V2 into an American missile. By Feb 1946, the last of the V2 scientists was on US soil. In 1947 when the former nazi scientists' work were exposed nationally, the scandalous revelation threatened to undermine the whole US missile program but luckily a PR counter-offensive was readily available with the perfect excuse at hand of being locked in the Cold War with the Russians. And so began a concerted image overhaul into the 1950's as Von Braun & the others were trumpeted as luminaries safeguarding the West with necessary armaments - the country needed him as a protector(!) By early 1955 & now an official US citizen, He & 115 others including Rudolph had moved to Alabama where they unveiled 2 new rocket systems (one anti-aircraft & the other a direct descendent of the V2). Having reached a whole new level, the Soviet Sputnik satellite success on Oct 4, 1957 made him even more crucial as the humiliated American govt, faced with the obvious enemy supremacy in the nascent space-race, looked to the former nazi rocketeer. In Apr 1958, President Eisenhower proposed the creation of NASA & Von Braun lobbied hard to be at the heart of the agency. By 1960, he was director of the newly inaugurated George C. Marshall Space Flight Center. In 1961 after huge investment, the Saturn rocket was perfected to carry a human crew but again there was disappointment as that same year in Apr saw Russian cosmonaut Yuri Gagarin become the first man launched into space to successfully orbit the earth. It was a bitter pill for the Americans to swallow & that summer (after JFK's challenge), 'Project Apollo' was born with $4 billion set aside to finance Von Braun's work at NASA. After a number of spectacularly disastrous & fatal failures (such as the Jan 27, 1967 launch pad fire during a test which killed 3 astronauts in just 30 seconds after faulty electrical wiring ignited & ruptured the fuel tanks causing a toxic leak resulting in death by suffocation from noxious fumes) - and even more money given to him - by 1969, his mother-of-all achievements had emerged with the production of the Saturn 5 rocket. It was 8 times taller & 30 times greater the power of the V2.

On Jul 20, 1969, the smuggled out of Germany scientist had played a huge part in one of the proudest chapters in all of American history as he & 100 others of the original Paperclip staff were still with the Apollo team that momentous day. Across the country & around the world (with the Soviets in particular, in a gloomy funk & viewing the day through a solemn filter of national loss n' mourning), the Apollo XI astronauts were welcomed back, hailed as conquering heroes & Von Braun was the man of the hour going on to be heaped with awards & honors including the national medal for science. The allied WWII hunt that began in late 1944 had paid off magnificently for the victors that sought not retribution but exploitation and yet, the looming spectre of the remaining nazi stain with its dark deeds of decades previous would not disappear: Rudolph had retired with a distinguished career in NASA in 1969 but suspicions of his nazi past raised by holocaust survivors led to a 1982 investigation by the OSI. Questioned about his use of slave labor, he protested his innocence but in the end, agreed to renounce his US citizenship & slipped quietly back to West Germany in 1984. His name would be linked to several conspiracy theories involving UFO's & Area 51 and he died in Hamburg in Jan 1996. Von Braun died in Jun 1977 in Virginia, much fated & celebrated with his nazi past almost completely forgotten. Lastly, that same year saw another Paperclip colleague, Hubertus Strughold (who had designed the astronauts' spacesuits & instructed them on gravity) have an aeromedical library named after him as well as induction into New Mexico's Museum of Space History Hall of Fame. During the war however, while in the Luftwaffe as a physician & medical researcher of aviation medicine, he conducted tests in Dachau where prisoners drowned from exposure to freezing temperatures & subjected to excruciatingly painful pressure experiments. Strughold's nazi past caught up to him when a museum visitor recognized his picture on the wall. Having escaped prosecution, he died in Sept 1986 in Texas & by the 1990's, his reputation had been greatly diminished resulting in his name subsequently being removed from the museum in May 2006.

And after the triumph of stepping onto that big white nightlight in the sky, the conspiracy nuts say it was all a hoax (from doctored photographs to an Alabama backlot movie studio) faked by NASA. Have we been duped by the biggest deception of the 20th century?

1. The alchemy of astronomical lie?


2. Ground Control to Major Kubrick







3. O.J. Simpson & Kojak in space


Full movie. click here

Damn! sign me up. Alterno-goth babe with bad-ass tatts and rockin' the nerd/geek glasses look. What's not to love?

BOOTY CALL

Not long ago a new museum in Athens opened overlooking the Parthenon temple. On display were plastercast copies of the Elgin marbles - a sculpted ornamental band that once covered the temple's 2 sides. These deliberate replicas are meant to draw attention to the Greeks calling for the repatriation of the original marbles which reside in the British Museum & have since 1816. So many questions & arguments have arisen: do globally significant monuments belong to modern day states or the whole world? If the artifacts are returned what precedent does this set for Italy, Egypt, Turkey & China who also call for the return of treasures that they consider their national property? London on the one hand can't use the old excuse that Athens doesn't have the housing with suittable light or climate control but can/should they refuse the loan request because of Greek non-acknowledgment of British ownership? The British Museum is free of charge & hosts more visitors than any other in the world whereas display in Greece would be viewed as part of that country's history so if we go by the accessibility claim, would moving the marbles to the Heathrow airport be more prudent? The controversy first began with the Parthenon first used as a mosque & later as an ammunition dump. As a garrison it was in fragile ruins & by the time Napoleon sent agents to gather relics, the locals were using it as a quarry where travellers n' collectors were helping themselves to various-size pieces of sculpture. Greece says a return of the marbles could restore 85% of the original but the British refute this citing more than half the remainders of both Parthenon ends are long lost to time with bits n' pieces scattered in other Euro museums. The British Lord who ultimately took the marbles said that Greek ingratitude & indifference to them meant they didn't deserve them. After court permission for removal by his workmen with no opposition, a number of inner panels, life-sized figures & outer sculptures were chiselled, hacked off or simply lifted off the ground for transport. In 1816 he finally sold the works to the British govt at half the cost of what he initially had to pay in bribes & expenses. So was this protection or plunder? Rescue from decay or imperialist theft? While some academic contemporaries of the day condemened the Lord, the present overwhelming consensus is that his actions saved the treasure from neglect, acid rain & pollution thus allowing for another 200yrs of preservation. If we believe in the value of the collection, does the way the material was acquired overall become secondary to the fundamental purpose, however dubious the circumstances? One argument suggests ancient artifacts as evidence of the world's origins belong to no particular modern nation as this compromises antiquity which in turn knows no borders. But the 'property of the world' idea can be countered in that proper appreciation for antiquity by everyone is just cynical bullshit reeking of crass globalism. From the archaeological perspective a monument should stay in its location where first produced - meant as an entire entity not to be moved from its setting. But the current heritage viewpoint is that while this may be so, objects should be spread around the world to help expose n' explain different cultures. So new politics vs. 9/10ths possession; importance hasn't diminished but inherited right in the context of a classic civilization's art has heightened in contention. Long story short: who owns the past?

EULOGY BEFORE THE DEATH CERTIFICATE

Is there such a thing as bystander nations guilty of murder by complicity? If so, forgotten Africa should deliver the verdict & pass sentence. After centuries of subjection to exploitation & slavery, consider its long suffering, impoverished legacy -- drought, famine & starvation in Ethiopia and Somalia; civil war in the Congo & Burundi; genocide in Rwanda & Darfur in the Sudan; conflict diamonds from Sierra Leone; the AIDS pandemic in South Africa & Zimbabwe; sanctioned murder to stifle anti-oil protests & dissent in Nigeria; kid soldiers, rebel factions, tyrranical armies, warlords, mercenaries & systematic corrupt officials; rape; sexual violence against children & infants; land reform; piracy; terrorism... from so-called explorers & discoverers, missionaries, colonialism to apartheid and Idi Amin to Angola, this blood-filled continent has known its share of enduring misery playing out like some absurd tragi-comic opera. Something is morally & profoundly wrong in our priorities that billions of dollars can continue being spent on Iraq & Afghanistan in the name of democracy & infrastructure yet oppressive policies, inhumane economics, industrial racism & staggering hypocrisy refuses to address properly the still continuing psychological/pathological inequality issues that exacerbate n' further ravage what is already a shambles of endless struggle. Sorry Bono, God forbid the uber-rich West cancel the debt of dark-skinned people. Even with disaster capiltalism elsewhere in the world, every African crisis seems to disturbingly dwarf its predecessor. Misfortune has its emaciated hand out & humanity is on holiday.

THAT'S THE WAY IT WAS

1916-2009. Legendary news anchor Walter Cronkite died today at 92. It's staggering to reflect on how much of a witness to history he was. An icon to broadcast journalists, he reported on: World War II, the Nuremberg trials, combat in the Vietnam War (to which a disillusioned editorial allegedly made President Lyndon Johnson remark, "If I've lost Cronkite, I've lost Middle America"), Watergate, the Iran Hostage Crisis, JFK's assassination, Martin Luther King, The Beatles & John Lennon, the Moon Landings, the 1960 Winter Olympics (the first-ever televising of the event in the USA), the 1968 Chicago Democratic National Convention (which became overshadowed by the infamous riot) and helping set up the landmark meeting between Israeli Prime Minister Menachem Begin & Egyptian President Anwar Sadat to name just a highly impressive few. Spiro Agnew denounced him as a "nattering nabob of negativism" & Archie Bunker referred to him as 'Pinko Cronkite' but his dignified demeanor remains with him forever being heralded as 'the most trusted figure in America'. R.I.P Walter.

FAILURE, GRASSHOPPER

In 1979, Robert Williams became the 1st-ever documented person to be killed by a robot due to an industrial accident. Who'd have thought 4 decades later (however ominous one would imagine such a trend for the future) in a twisted reversal, a human would sacrifice themself for a piece of technology that could never be placed at a higher level of very life itself? Well, crazy true story out of China early this morning... 25yr old Sun Danyong, an employee at a factory that makes iphones, killed himself after reporting a prototype for Apple Inc. went missing. Because of high-level secrecy with traditional launch amid great suspense viewed by competition & the big marketing buzz from customers, he apparently was interviewed about the circumstances involving the loss but angry accusations have surfaced by his friends that he infact was interrogated and had security guards search his apartment, detain him & beat him for not believing he was being truthful. Distraught, Sun committed suicide by jumping from the 12th floor of his apartment building... Ok, tragic as this death is, I don't care how many people on the globe say they couldn't live without their smartphone, blackberry, digital organizer or whatever other item of over-dependant e-gadgetry - none of it whatsoever & no matter where in the world inspite of desirability, importance or necessity is ever gonna be worth fuckin' dying over. We've come to a terrible & pathetic state if individuals have been conditioned to really believe that brandname product has more meaning than actual people & existence.

APPLAUD THE SUFFERING

Following on cue from the famed Jewish girl (with many a detour), victimization sees hero worship because of what we interpret n' translate as achievement through betterness of great lessons learned inspite of flaws n' faults. Commanders die in battle on secret missions meant in the defense of freedom (or expansionism) that result in posthumous combat medals (or historical accolades long after). From samurai to sportsmen, we regard warriors past as courageous having fought for honor n' glory. They are godlike because of emphasis on our own ordinariness & in putting them on pedestals, we aren't above knocking them off it. Alexander the Great, Lawrence of Arabia & Nelson Mandela (whether soldiers or statesmen) were contemporary men with extraordinary personalities capable of supreme feats in unusual circumstances. We portray our heroes as deity in martyrdom and messianic as enshrined by novelists, playwrights & painters but even supreme beings can be grounded in downplayed traditional nobility of domestic archetypes. NFL player Pat Tillman served as a US Ranger in Afghanistan & is remembered for his sacrifice in the line of duty (killed by friendly fire). CFL player Jeff Nicklin served as a paratrooper during WWII & was killed in action weeks away from surrender. Oddly, lionized more for not what they did but what happened to them which still shouldn't reduce their commitment thus lessening value. Culturally, the upliftment of those who've overcome adversity with unquenchable spirit allow for excessive/obsessive attitudes: seeing, touching, studying, weeping. Viewing the personal n' private has long been merciless thus the barrier is built & a seperation further re-inforced of superiority. Heroes aren't supposed to think too much of themselves & yet they are rife to embody infinite selfishness in the pursuit of splendor at the cost of peace, happiness & love. Achilles turned his back on his comrades with the rage of his actions shattering society, challenging the Gods & mocking death. Today's reaction is probably more awe than envy because of tragic falls that see divinity as infact vanity where magnificence to push limits rersults in the shameful folly of hubris. Real bravery is a better substitute for perpetual megalomania. Julius Caesar & Napoleon were grandly intoxicant but driven to bold creation just as Leonardo Da Vinci or Michelangelo but in the centuries that have passed since their rule, it isn't difficult to see how unhealthy longing can produce the next tyrant. We need to be careful in our present day of producing miniature heroes out of old, dangerous elitist fantasies because when man becomes more than man on this foundation, we tame exceptional quality at risk to the diminishment of ourselves.

FUROR OVER FUHRERS IN THE CHATROOMS

It was a clever attorney who drew up the observance that the longer an online discussion develops, the more likely it is that someone will compare somebody else to a Nazi or Hitler. Hardly surprising that blogofascism makes people nuts (just look at comment threads on youtube & does anyone else remember the Jade Tree Records messageboards)? But getting upset has its tendency to leave people in too much of an infantile state for hotheaded invective. Reckless playground-like bullying that polarizes in a strange manner, trying to sustain who we are by what we hate. Instead of persuading the adversary (which isn't necessarily to have them join your side) we're pushing a more stigmatizing rhetoric that while it tries to solicit like-minded approval, the expression of proving a point somehow never amounts to fighting the good fight when the argument is reduced to nothing other than dissing & inane meandering. What could be serious reflection is just deliberate shit-stirring to push buttons so smug sentiment & rage just ends up being futile. It works all the more when you consider uptight antagonists are always braver wearing masks of anonymity & if it's a self-revealing introduction, provocation always points to rightwing rumbling (and rambling) said elsewhere first. The status quo has long become a dumping ground for extremist fantasy, idiotic n' ignorant cowardly herding. No need for eloquence or people power. People scream because they can't focus.

SO MUCH FOR GETTING PAST THE HUMP

DEADLIEST DAY FOR SUICIDES: WEDNESDAYS
Surprise findings suggest job stress may be behind midweek spike
(by By Linda Carroll)

If you listen to popular songs, you might conclude there’s no day as depressing as a Monday. But a new study shows that lyricists (sorry Bob Geldof) may have gotten it all wrong & that infact Wednesday is really the darkest day of the week. The study, published in Social Psychiatry and Psychiatric Epidemiology, found that people are far more likely to kill themselves in the middle of the week than in the beginning or the end: almost 25 percent of suicides occur on Wednesdays as compared to 14 percent on Mondays or Saturdays, the 2 days tied for second-highest suicide rates. The study also found if you make it through Wednesday, your risk for suicide plummets by more than half the following day whereas Thursdays have the lowest rate, with only 11 percent of suicides. Research up until now has pointed a finger at Mondays, said the new report’s lead author, Augustine J. Kposowa, a professor of sociology at the University of California, Riverside. He added: "Everyone talks about the Monday blues but if you look at more recent data, it looks like things have shifted & now it’s the middle of the week that’s the problem." More study is needed to fully understand the findings but researchers suspect that we may be seeing a positive impact of technology on suicide & depression. With the advent of e-mail, internet discussion groups & text messaging, people can now stay in touch with the outside world even if they are holed up by themselves at home the entire weekend. As for the spike in suicides in the middle of the week, Kposowa suggested that the increase may indicate job stress, adding: "People may be fed up & stressed by their jobs by the middle of the week. By Wednesday, the traffic has gotten to be too much, their co-workers are getting on their nerves & they can’t figure out how they’re going to make it to the end of the week." Kposowa & his co-author examined data on deaths in people over the age of 18 for 5yrs — 2000 through 2004 — from all 50 states. On average, the researchers found that there were about 30,000 suicides per year in this group. The researchers detected another interesting change in the suicide data.

Contrary to earlier studies that showed an increased rate of suicides in winter & spring, the new data showed almost no seasonal effect on suicide rates. Slightly more occurred in the summer — 26 percent — while the fewest occurred in the winter at 23.8 percent. Kposowa again looks to the nation’s higher connectedness — through the internet & cell phones — to explain the lack of a seasonal effect. He said: "Winter just doesn’t isolate people as much as it used to. According to Dr. Alan Manevitz, a psychiatrist at NewYork-Presbyterian Hospital/Weill Cornell Medical Center: "The new study is intriguing & provocative. It goes against a lot of what we take as lore. We think about the classic problems people have on Sunday nights thinking about going back to school or work & the winter blues, especially in people with Seasonal Affective Disorder." The strength of the new study is that it looked at the entire country over 5yrs, said Alexandre Y. Dombrovski, a research assistant professor in the department of psychiatry at the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center. But Dombrovski cautioned against reading too much into the Wednesday effect, saying: "While it’s tempting to conclude that people choose Wednesday because it’s the most stressful day, you have to remember that many suicides are premeditated & they don’t necessarily occur as a result of the events on the day the suicide occurred." Still, it is possible that a particularly stressful day can push someone into implementing previously devised plans, Dombrovski allowed. Manevitz cautions: "One important message people should take from this study is that there is no day or season when someone can be considered to be safe from suicide. If someone you know is showing warning signs, don’t take for granted that it’s not something to worry about because of the day of the week or the season of the year. Friends & family need to take suicidal ideation seriously at all times. Any time someone sounds preoccupied with death or seems particularly depressed about their lives, you need to follow up even if you think they’re just focusing on small things. You should never be afraid to ask questions like, ‘Are you feeling so badly that you’re thinking about suicide?’ because evidence shows that intervention by friends & family members can work immensely when it comes to the prevention of someone killing themself. If you’re worried about suicide, don’t leave the person alone. Don’t let him/her isolate themmself."

BEAVER UBER ALLES! FOREVER THE MAPLE LEAF

(with thanks and apologies to SLAM fanzine)



Don't fuck with the Mounties! click here
Glowing hearts, far n' wide. click here

Previously I wrote about provocative Canadians & gangster Americans invading each other. Seeing as both our national holidays of Confederation practically trip over each other, I've drawn up what I feel is the most accurate n' complete scenario of a Canadian attack on the USA leading to our ultimate domination. Speculative fiction in a month. Gather round, Lucifer is fallen ---

DAY 1
Canadian troops cross the border with no weapons or uniforms & considering the size of our army is the same as the number of people crossing the Canada-US border everyday, our entire force is on American soil & fanning out all over the country before anyone notices.

DAY 2
The Canadians begin arming themselves & equipped with traveller's cheques hit every gun shop in the USA. Taking advantage of sales & bulk discounts, we are completely armed to the teeth for less money than we spent in the first place.

DAY 5
By now the USA realizes they are under attack & their military mobilizes. The Canadians are told to shoot all foreigners & tens of thousands of American citizens are shot. Denver, Minneapolis, St. Louis & Chicago negotiate ceasefires and then a permanent truce.

DAY 8
Canadian troops suffer their only defeat at the Battle of New York City. Here the Americans are told to shoot every armed person who is polite & the Canadians are massacred. The setback is shortlived as Buffalo, Boston, Philadelphia & Detroit fall.

DAY 11
The most controversial & alternative attempt from citizen resistance to fend off the Canadians comes from Seattle n' Portland. Americans try to entice the Canadians to stop fighting by supplying primo weed, putting on basement punk shows & recommending organic collectives. Although breifly distracted by bud, bongs, bands, brownies & rain, the Canadians prove immune due to years of partaking in the same but stronger-in-quality indulgences in our own backyard homeland. Embarrased by the partisan activists, the US Federal govt puts hundreds its of locals on trial for aiding the enemy & treason and ships them off to Guantanamo Bay.

DAY 15
The Canadian army reaches Washington,DC & our leaders announce that occupation will result in affordable post-secondary education & free healthcare. American attempts to rally citizens to repel the Canadians suffer n' fail when they realize this our their only chance to get any healthcare & improved education at all. Another severe moral blow is dealt when the towering bastions of Hawaii, Puerto Rico & Alaska declare immediate cessation, independence & neutrality.

DAY 19
The Americans launch 'Operation Stay Focused' as a 2pronged/2front objective in Las Vegas & New Orleans to stem the Canadian tide. The mission is a complete disaster when intelligence reports that with the 1st phase of the plan, half the US soldiers went AWOL & then were arrested en masse during Mardi Gras celebrations. The 2nd phase is shamefully squandered due to abnormally sharp spikes in casinos, escort agencies & prostitutes claiming brisk, much higher than regular business. From here, Phoenix & Atlanta fair no better in halting the Canadian advance.

DAY 20
American attempts to launch a retaliatory strike at Canada fails when Canadians remove all country names from all maps & they can't find Canada. Further problems with direction result in the bulk of US Marines invading Mexico. They are sent home by Mexican immigration officials.

DAY 22
Huge propaganda victories are scored by the Canadian launch of 'Operation Holy Trinity' -- California capitulates on the mere mention of the threat of being sawed off & set adrift in the Pacific ocean along with burning Los Angeles & exporting Hollywood to Europe; Texas tumbles when rodeos & all cowboy gear are banned, blockades & embargos of meat are rumored and mandatory gay sensitivty training seminars are enforced and lastly, Florida folds seeing as they are owned by Canadians anyway when it comes to Spring Break. Real fear spreads through the nation & it's apparent the Canucks cannot be stopped.

DAY 24
The US governemnt re-organizes under the recently exhumed & resurrected former President Ronald Reagan. In a televised address from the White House he says "uh.. what?.. where's Bonzo?.. is it time for my scene yet?.. just say no, Nancy." This is pretty much considered an unconditional surrender.

DAY 25
The USA appeals to the United Nations for aid to stop the next to bloodless Canadian campaign. The UN reminds them that as people who don't pay their UN dues they shouldn't expect any special favors. As a compromise however, the UN agrees to send several thousand peacekeepers & Americans are less than pleased to learn that these blue helmeted warriors are all Canadian.

FIREWORKS FOR ALL THE FUCKING FLAGGOTS



Jokes in stride, Happy birthday Yanks. As a genius once put it...
"Only a bunch of unenlightened half-wits could have taken this beautiful nation, which we stole from the Mexicans and Indians, and turned it into what it is today - a big, fucking, coast-to-coast shopping mall. They put the mini malls in between the major malls, and in between the mini malls they put the mini marts. And in between the mini marts you got the car lots, gas stations, muffler shops, laundry mats, cheap motels, strip joints and dirty bookstores. We’re just huge piles of redundant protoplasm committing slow death by fast food. America the beautiful - this place is one big, transcontinental commercial cesspool."
- GEORGE CARLIN

MAPLE SYRUP VS. APPLE PIE

Happy Canada Day. Seeing how our neighbour the USA remains between Iraq & a hard place, I found some articles about both us & the Americans having covert, one-time plans to invade each other in defence of freedom(!) Documents & dossiers of top-secret operations aside, whether it's boiling over the melting pot to unseat Uncle Sam or raiding the icebox to conquer the Canucks, it's kinda funny to think how we could each view the other as such a menace. Canadian revenge to star strangle the banner for the war of 1812? Imagine stripes being stripped. Can you picture the red, white, n' blue flying upside down in distress? Sometimes I think if Americans weren't the USA, Americans would EASILY be the first people to say the USA should be invaded (admit it, they like to take credit for everything). So it seems funnier still & fittingly appropriate that regardless of who started all of this (admit it, it's the Americans), we both should be eating crow knowing that our same sentiment is born out of someone elses vision of imperial foresight. Sorry Yanks, Kate Smith can sing as proudly as she wants & jingo all the weigh but the potency is lost when everyone else says God's blessing applies to them more instead.



I
"Defence Scheme No. 1" was a Canadian plan developed by the country's director of military operations & intelligence, a WWI hero named James Sutherland "Buster" Brown in 1921 -- 9yrs before their American counterparts created "War Plan Red". Apparently Buster believed that the best defense was a good offense: (his reconnaissance came from entering the US in civilian clothes taking pictures & picking up free maps at gas stations). DS1 called for a surprise attack in which Canadian troops would be sent to seize Albany, Minneapolis, Seattle & Great Falls, MT. at the first signs of a possible U.S. invasion. In case of heavy resistance, the Canadians would retreat blowing up bridges & tearing up railroad tracks to slow the Americans down & hinder their retaliation. The further purpose of these measures would allow for Canada to buy time in mounting her war effort by Britain coming to her aid thus limiting American advance before the U.S. government could opt to discontinue its incursions.

II
Invading Canada is an old American tradition. Invading Canada successfully is not. During the American Revolution, Benedict Arnold (in his pre-traitor days) led an invasion of Canada from Maine which failed. In the War of 1812, American troops invaded Canada several times only to be driven back. In 1839, Americans again from Maine confronted Canadians in a border dispute known as the Aroostook War and while no shots were fired an American cow & Canadian pig were injured. In 1866, about 800 Irish Americans in the Fenian Brotherhood decided to strike a blow for Irish independence by invading Canada. They crossed the Niagara River into Ontario where they defeated a Canadian militia but when British troops approached, the Fenians fled back to the U.S. where many were arrested. After that, Americans stopped invading Canada but the dream lives on in the American psyche, occasionally manifesting itself in bizarre ways (Canadian Bacon & the South Park movie). The United States has long planned war on Canada: An 1888 key point of invasion looked at the Upper St. Lawrence (Kingston to Cornwall) as a strategic target while an 1893 attack plan recommended a sudden winter offensive & a crossing of the St. Lawrence to eventually capture Ottawa. In 1896, the U.S. Secretary of the Navy ordered a spy mission of Canadian defenses & a preparation for invasion recommending a surprise attack well before a declaration of war (a proto-Pearl Harbour). U.S. Prez Teddy Roosevelt threatened military action against Canada during the 1895 Venezuela crisis & again in the 1897 Alaska border dispute. Invasion plans for 1909 emphasized a rapid strike across the St. Lawrence; in 1912 to attack Kingston (then Canada's most strategic city) & a crossing at Cornwall where there was a bridge; in 1913 for an invasion force to muster from New York and in 1914, empasis again on the Kingston region. Just 2yrs into WWI, a 1916 plan had the U.S. crossing at the St. Lawrence & capturing Kingston. (Particularly cowardly with Canadian concentration on the Western trenches and the Americans having not yet entered the Great War).

In 1921, yet still another American plan called for an invasion of Canada to begin with a crossing of (surprise surprise) the St. Lawrence to cut east-west transportation routes. When U.S. Prez Harding visited Vancouver in 1923 he said, "the great bugaboo of the United States scheming to Annex Canada disappeared from all of our minds years and years ago". The next year however saw 'Army Strategic Plan Red' detailing the conquest of Canada by 4 armies concluding that provinces & territories would be prepared for statehood and the Dominion government abolished. This plan was expanded, refined & finally accepted by the US Secretaries of War & the Navy on May 10, 1930 (it would be declassified 44yrs later). Now known as "War Plan Red", it focused on the capture of Halifax, entry into Vancouver & the seizure of power plants at Niagara Falls. Invasions on 3 fronts to follow -- marching from Vermont to take Montreal & Quebec; charging out of North Dakota to grab the train center at Winnipeg & storming out of the Midwest to capture the strategic nickel mines of Sudbury. meanwhile, the U.S. navy seizes the Great Lakes blockading Canada's Atlantic & Pacific ports. Curiously, the 1930 Plan (originally designed for war against England - with black for Germany, green for Mexico & orange for Japan) presumed that American interference with British Commonwealth trade would result in war & militarily the only theatre of operations for the U.S. (blue) was Canada (originally crimson) as a logical launching pad with eventual plans to take Jamaica, Barbados & Bermuda as a means of weaking British power. (Coloring book aside) in preserving economic & commercial interests, the objective was to seize key cities, hydro-electric development & the St. Lawrence-Lake Ontario waterways. The fears of Buffalo, Detroit & Albany under threat as well as the potentail for black troops to be regarded as seriously formidable, amphibious landings on various American beaches & the loss of Alaska prompted mobilization preparations to begin in 1931 and in November 1934, the Plan was amended to authorize the first use of nerve gas(!) against Canadians & updated further in 1935.

In 1935, a funding bill was put to Congress for 10 new airbases, 3 of which to be built on the Canadian border in the Great Lakes region for pre-emptive strikes on Canadian airfields. Disguised as civilian airports meant for military plane refueling stops, secret testimony of the scheme by 2 Generals was leaked to Congress & printed by mistake appearing on the front pages of the New York Times on May 1st. When the Canadian goverment protested the, U.S. Prez FDR reassured that he wasn't contemplating war. The Globe and Mail called it a "yarn" & The Montreal Gazette wrote that Canadians "did not take the episode seriously and were inclined rather to laugh heartily at the absurdity of the whole affair". The US prepared a 'critical atlas' showing the disposition of all Canadian forces with the largest peacetime maneuvers in their history held as 36,000 troops mobilized with another 15,000 in strategic reserve in Pennsylvania. The scenario called for motorized attack across the border with defensive forces holding out only to be eventually overwhelmed by reinforcements. With the outbreak of WWII, a 1939 plan for war on Canada (allies? says who?) focused again on the capture of Halifax. Although no plans for the invasion of Canada have been declassified since 1940, there is evidence that the US miltary has made similar preparations. Some no doubt stemming from the Cold War hysteria in the 1950's and the 1960's U.S. Army's Special Operations & Research Office study on Quebec (along with Latin American countries) to understand how to suppress social revolutions. In October 1970, American soldiers were sent to the border threatening to occupy Ottawa & Montreal (atleast according to Canada's Director of RCMP Counter-Intelligence in a 1973 interview to The Toronto Star with an anonymous Canadian military officer confirming the story). There were even rumors that the U.S. put Army & Naval forces on alert for the 1980 sovereignty-association referendum in Quebec, but since then, all quiet on the front (for all we suspect, anyway).

MORE THAN JUST TOUQUES AND SUPERIOR BEER, EH

And now (drumroll please), The top 10 Canadian riots to show that fighting the police is indeed a pastime ---

(with thanks and apologies to VICE magazine)
10
GASTOWN SMOKE-IN / Vancouver,BC / Aug 7,1971Vancouver cops declared war on the hippies while Mounties with billysticks took on almost 2000 potheads after a smoke-in staged by local merchants. 38 were charged & a dozen more hospitalized. The following weekend resulted in 20,000 attending a love-in. Flower power mixed with weed and free sex.
The Gastown Riot, (aka 'Grasstown Smoke-In' or 'The Battle of Maple Tree Square') occurred as a Yippie street party (known as 'Operation Whirlwind') in response to following weeks of arrests in a sustained campaign of police harassment (known as 'Operation Dustpan') by undercover drug squad members in Vancouver as part of their special operation - directed by Mayor Tom Campbell - designed to sweep up the “hippie problem” in Vancouver’s trendy Gastown district neighborhood. Police attacked a peaceful protest Smoke-In which was organized by the Youth International Party (Vancouver Yippies) against the use of surveillance by the agents & in favour of promoting the legalization of marijuana. The confrontation between police & demonstrators lasted more than 2hrs, and of around nearly 2000 protesters, 79 were arrested and another 38 were charged with various infractions while more than a dozen were sent to hospital. Police were accused of heavy-handed tactics including indiscriminate beatings with their newly issued riot batons which pummeled many. Some of the cops led horse-back charges on crowds of onlookers & tourists (at one point, knocking over a baby carriage). With the aid of a Yippie media campaign afterwards, the brutality became a national scandal & was the beginning of the end for (what was regarded by many) the far-right city government. Mayor Campbell left office in disgrace the following year. A commission of inquiry into the incident was headed by a Supreme Court Justice which cited the Yippies as instigators of the Smoke-In, denouncing them as “intelligent & dangerous individuals” who further conspired and were bound n' determined to overthrow all recognized authority. The inquiry however, was also highly critical of the police's conduct & described the incident as a police riot.

9
WINNIPEG GENERAL STRIKE / Winnipeg,MB / May-July 1919Labor unrest grew with bosses (Fat cat capitalist bastards) getting fatter as the workers starved (and begin thinking maybe this Marxist-Leninist-Socialism thing could be a cool thing after all). 30,000 take to the streets for 6 weeks turning over street cars & beating the shit out of govt deployed 'special constables' (lackeys of the system). On Sat Jun 21st, Mounties (literally seeing red - or "Reds") go apeshit killing 2 strikers & arresting numerous more. The strikers cry had been "We are going to ruin this city".

8
LUSITANIA / Victoria,BC / May 8,1915After a German sub sinks the Lusitania luxury liner off the coast of Ireland resulting in 1195 fatalities, outraged Victorians lash out at local sausage eaters with soldiers gathering in a beer hall to display the Union Jack. After the rowdies destroy the bar (after generous 'free self-serving of alcohol') they engage in some good old-fashioned looting of German owned shops. When word spread that some German cityfolk were celebrating the sinking, the angry crowds swelled & smashed up German-owned businesses while non-interfering police watched and proceeded not to end the destruction of property. Non-rioting soldiers eventually come in to stop all the fun.
ANTI-GERMAN LOOTING ROCKED YOUNG VICTORIA'S QUIET REPUTATION
(by Dave Obee / Victoria Times)
It was May 1915. The Great War had been raging in Europe for several months, and two prominent Victorians -- two members of the Dunsmuir family -- were committed to helping as much as they could. Kathleen Dunsmuir (daughter of the former Lt. Gov. & by this time known as Mrs. Selden Humphreys) was running a canteen in Le Havre, France, using her own funds to attend to the comforts of Canadian & British soldiers passing through France on their way to or from the front. Her brother James, also known as "Boy", was on his way to England to enlist with a regiment there. He was determined to get to the front as quickly as possible, so he had resigned from a Victoria regiment to make his own way to the action. On Thursday evening, May 6, a group of actors & musicians and some other musicians from Victoria & Vancouver gathered at the Royal Victoria Theatre to stage 'Stop, Look and Listen'. The production was designed to raise money for Kathleen Dunsmuir's canteen and to provide tobacco for our boys at the front. It was by all accounts, a successful affair. The Daily Times reported the following day: "It is quite within the truth to say that very many an attraction has come here with professionals from Broadway which had not a tithe of the merit or the finish of the bright little show. Each and every one of those who took part did their best, and once more the women demonstrated that they can on occasion dispense with the aid of mankind -- or very nearly so." The Times noted several highlights, with little Miss Suzanne Sicklemore at the top of the list. Suzanne's dancing showed dainty grace & wonderful skill, and she floated about the stage like a fairy. Muriel Dunsmuir & Theresa Mesher were gracefully attractive in their gavotte, and the Times reported that Phyllis Davis was "her own inimitable self," whatever that means. For one number, 'Sister Susie', the curtain rose on half a dozen girls treading furiously on their sewing machines. Then, Miss D. Leighton sang an alliterative & tongue-twisting chorus about sewing shirts of soldiers. About 100 people provided the entertainment and when the gala evening came to an end, there were bouquets & baskets of blooms for all. It was a pleasant reminder that even as a war raged in Europe, life in Victoria could go on as normal. That sense of serenity lasted only a few hours. By early Friday morning, the telegraph wires were buzzing with tragic news from the waters off Ireland.

The British ocean liner, RMS Lusitania, had been sunk by a German torpedo. Almost 1200 passengers & crew died when the ship, bound for Liverpool from New York City, went down. On board were 15 people from Victoria, including "Boy" Dunsmuir. His strong desire to serve his country gave him nothing more than a watery grave. The deaths of so many civilians sparked outrage throughout England, with the worst rioting in the ship's home port of Liverpool. In Canada, the worst rioting was in Victoria,B.C. It started on Saturday, the day after the sinking. Angry crowds, including off-duty soldiers, attacked businesses & buildings with German-sounding names, or whose owners were known to be of German descent. The businesses hit by the mob included the Blanshard Hotel, which had formerly been known as the Kaiserhof; the Victoria Phoenix Brewery; the wholesale company owned by Moses Lenz; the Pither and Leiser store; E.J. Geiger's plumbing business and the New England Hotel, which was owned by someone who had been born in Bavaria. The rioters smashed windows to gain entry to the businesses, and then looted whatever they could. The mayhem continued on Sunday, with the worst looting at 721 Fort Street, where Ernest Schaper and W.W. Glass ran a tailoring shop. Reported the following day: "The crowd made a fierce attack on the place, smashed every pane of glass in the shop and walked off with practically everything in it that could be carried off. Bolts of cloth were borne away openly & boldly under the eyes of the police, and any civilians who suggested that this was stealing were told to mind their own business. Goods were thrust into the motor cars of people who had been attracted to the scene, and in one case where a protest was made, the man who threw the goods in, remarked facetiously how one would find this better than any dollar day they could have." Both daily newspapers ran stories defending the stores that had been attacked, noting that many shareholders were not German & that the German-born individuals involved had proven their dedication to Victoria's community. Businesses ran advertisements to stress their support for the English flag & the Union Jack was displayed prominently. On Sunday evening, Mayor Alexander Stewart stood in front of the New England Hotel & read the Riot Act. The unruly mob responded by singing patriotic songs and continuing to throw stones at the buildings. In time, however, tempers cooled and the crowd dispersed, leaving the business owners to clean up the mess & tally up the damages. A shameful chapter was over. Kathleen Dunsmuir came to Victoria for a visit in May 1916. She was humble & tried to deflect praise for her war efforts. In an interview with the Colonist, she said: "I have only done my duty to the cause as I saw it. There are lots & lots of women right here in Victoria who have done far more in proportion to their opportunities than have. Dunsmuir was living in Switzerland when the Second World War broke out in 1939. She immediately returned to England and helped with the Red Cross & a mobile canteen for the troops. On March 8, 1941, she was killed in a German air raid.

7
PARKSVILLE SANDCASTLE / Parksville,BC / July 19,1997This annual sandcastle competition reached new heights when a crowd of 1000 liberated a liquor store. Then came spontaneous shopping & re-decorating of other businesses. In the midst of the drunken revelry, cops set off impromptu fireworks by way of gas grenades and later provided free room & board to 100 partiers. Some blamed volunteers for shoddy organization & even senior citiizens for serving alcohol all day. $30,000 in damages later, saw the sandcastle fest subsequently cancelled.
(from the Seattle Times)
PARKSVILLE, British Columbia -- A town's peaceful image crumbled this weekend and an ensuing riot by 600 to 1,000 young people in this holiday beach town, may cost the Vancouver Island community its annual sand castle contest, said the event president, Al Kaairo. Community leaders will discuss the evening's youthful rampage in a debriefing with police, and they could decide to end the white-sand competition which brings up to 40,000 visitors to this town of 10,000. Some rowdiness is always expected at a large summer event but the disruption by hundreds of mostly young people who broke into and looted some 20 local businesses, was the worst in the event's 16-year history, and the majority of attendees were out-of-towners who don't participate in event functions, Kaario said. More than 100 people were arrested as police fired tear gas to disperse the crowd. The broken glass strewn throughout downtown and a beach-side park was cleaned up before most people got up on the following morning. Kaairo added: "You wouldn't know anything happened. Everything is tidy again and the beach is packed." Royal Canadian Mounted Police from the nearby communities of Nanaimo, Courtenay and Port Alberni helped local police calm the disturbance. An operator of the beach-front Island Hall Beach Resort said all festival events featuring alcohol, such as the Saturday-night dance and the beer gardens, should be canceled, and that it should just be a family affair. Said the woman (who wouldn't give her name): "They should just have the event on Sunday (castle building) and get rid of the alcohol events." Kaario doesn't think those activities add to the problem, which he said is caused by party-going visitors. He said: "The RCMP know the local trouble makers. This was caused by little gangs of punks who travelled up here." It is hoped that the shameful incident, won't give Parksville a black eye, since summer tourism is its No. 1 industry.

OTTAWA TREK FROM REGINA,SK / Ottawa,ON / July 1,1935And a Happy Canada Day it was with the depths of the Depression showing no sign of relief. The country's lifeblood - exports of natural resources like wheat, lumber, fish & minerals had plummeted in value and 1 out of 4 men was jobless. After valiant but unsuccessful struggling for union wages, 2000 disgruntled men hopped train cars to the Nation's capitol to protest both miserable workcamp conditions (under the auspices of the DND - Department of National Defense) & Prime Minister R.B. "Iron Heel" Bennett's Conservative government. With the journey having picked up more zealous recruits from hobo jungles along the way, the much-anticipated showdown began as a prolonged stalemate between the trekkers & cops, lasting over 2 weeks. Faring no better to resolve the standoff, was an invited delegation of trek leaders & Cabinet ministers who met but failed to reach any kind of agreement or concessions for improved salaries and relief provisions. With both sides in gridlock, the RCMP (believing Commie ringleaders were pulling the strings behind everything), decided on a mass arrest complete with baseball bats, billy clubs, gas grenades, bricks to the head & overturned baby carriages. 100 were arrested & another hospitalized in the chaos. With overturned cars meant to barricade the streets, 2 people were killed including a cop after 3 men used a wooden board to smash his skull. Another cop was hospitalized after being drilled in the head with a horseshoe. The RCMP revenged their own by firing into the crowd & hitting over a dozen. After the trouble & the downtown core looking like a warzone, Ottawa was still nice enough to pick up the tab & send the railriders back home by train. That Oct, the hated Bennett was soundly defeated in the federal election by William Lyon Mackenzie King.
(from the Toronto Daily Star)
REGINA -- When the trek leaders returned to Regina from Ottawa they knew the march was over. On July 1 they made several proposals to end the excursion. First they approached the federal government and then,when Ottawa refused, they turned to Saskatchewan's Liberal Premier James " Jimmy " Garfield Gardiner. They asked to be returned to their respective camps in British Columbia and have individuals sent back to their homes. They also requested to be dispensed under direction of their own organization, but failing this, to be dispersed by the Saskatchewan government. Finally, with the exception of organizer Arthur Herbert " Slim " Evans, the men wanted to be exempt from prosecution for their activities up to June 30. The one thing they rejected was being sent to a federal holding camp at Lumsden, 20 miles north of Regina. As dusk was descending on the warm Dominion Day evening, the 5'4" barrel-chested Gardiner & his ministers gathered to consider the men's offer. Shortly after 8:00PM, the Premier was called out of the cabinet meeting to take the phone. The caller informed him that trouble had just started downtown & a city policeman was dead. What had happened in the Market Square rally and what would follow in the city of Regina for several hours was certainly not the proudest moment in Canadian history. According to dozens of eyewitnesses, at 8:00PM. the shriek of a whistle caused over 30 city police to form a flying wedge & converge on a makeshift stage in the middle of the open square. Meanwhile a larger force of Mounties surrounded the square. On the back of a truck, Evans and George Black, a speaker and representative of the WESL (Working Class Ex-Service men's League), were addressing about 400 trekkers, 1000 holidaying citizens - including many women & children, and several undercover constables. The local police quickly cleared a path and plainclothes men arrested Evans & Black. However, the authorities' action triggered pandemonium and within 5 minutes, fighting ensued in the square which quickly unfolded into a full-on riot. In the confusion, uniformed officers fought with trekkers, bystanders & even some of their own undercover agents. City Detective Charles Millar, who was on duty in the nearby police station, impulsively joined the fray in the square and the 15-year veteran was fatally bludgeoned. Soon violence spread to the downtown. On one side of the pitched battle were blue clad city police and steel-helmeted RCMP officers on foot & horseback. Against them were angry rock-throwing trekkers aided at times by local citizens including women & young teenage boys. The confrontation lasted until after 11:00PM and resulted in Millar's death; injuries to scores of locals, police & trekkers; arrests of over 100 individuals; and extensive damage to public & private property estimated at tens of thousands of dollars in cost. By the end of a night filled with hand-to-hand fighting, tear gas grenades, overturned cars, horseback charges, and shooting by police, many downtown storefronts were in shambles. Over 200 plate glass windows were broken. By midnight some 1500 trekkers were penned in by rifle carrying Mounties at Exhibition Stadium.

5
M.C. HAMMER CONCERT / Penticton,BC / July 27,1991Cops shouted 'can't touch this' as 2000 hooligans looted and destroyed a resort community, smashing windows and running wild in downtown department & liquor stores, shortly after a concert by one, Stanley Kirk Burrell. Faced with the confrontation, the pigs lobbed in tear gas to quell the brouhaha & 20 teens retaliate by chucking rocks at a bewildered traffic cop. The Mayor blames the turmoil on invading ruffians in town for the express purpose of shitdisturbing. After he is showered with rocks & bottles (barely escaping harm) and after the disorder, he faces the wrath of business owners whose shops are wrecked. Numerous arrests, 90 jailed & 60 injuries later, both sides still remember a shamed n' confused rapper in dork-ass, oversized purple jumpsuit.
DECADES DON'T DIMINISH MEMORIES OF RIOT
(by Kristi Patton / Penticton Western News)
During a tumultuous summer night, smoke wafted across the lake from tear gas as car alarms wailed and projectiles could be seen flying through the air over a crowd of thousands. Summer in Penticton hasn’t been quite the same since. Hot temperatures mixed with a surge of young people in town for Peachfest and the province-sponsored Music 91 festival -featuring big name performer at the time, MC Hammer -brought a crush of people to the city. Recalls then-Mayor, Jake Kimberley (who was at the concert at King's Park with his family): "I remember it so well. I went home and was in bed when I got a phone call. It was 12 minutes after midnight and it was the administrator saying you better come to the RCMP detachment, we got problems downtown." Huddled at the RCMP station, Kimberley, Insp. Trevor Thompsett, city staff, the fire chief and a few councillors were briefed on how a sea of people blanketed the downtown core where fights had broken out, windows were being smashed and looting had begun. It was on Kimberley’s shoulders to decide if the riot act was to be read. He adds: "That declaration of course has to be read within the vicinity of the activity. I went down to the corner, which is now the City Centre block of Wade & Main, because that is as far as the inspector could get his car in. I had to open the window and use a bullhorn and the time I was reading the act (12:41AM), I was being pounded with bottles, bricks and rocks. The car was getting pounded. Thompsett told me I had to wind the window down and he said 'hurry up, read it and let’s get out of here.' It’s kind of moronic when you think about it. Drunken kids standing there and you are saying (reciting from official reading) 'in the name of the Queen.' Bottles and rocks were been thrown at the car. Kids were kicking the car. Was I ever nervous." Meanwhile up the street a few blocks, Brad Haugli, 6 months on the job at his first posting at the Penticton RCMP detachment, was suited in riot gear with a single line of about 20 officers across Main Street. He remembers: "There we are, a few of us in a line with a huge mass of people at the other end. What I do remember is walking down Main Street looking at those people thinking geez, I sure hope they don’t rush us because we are definitely outnumbered." Haugli (who is now the Inspector at the Penticton detachment) had been on bicycle patrol earlier that evening with Const. Rick Dellebuur, who is now a Sargeant in Penticton. Dellebuur said he was at King’s Park before the concert started, monitoring the crowd and was told to take some officers downtown. He says: "We could tell things weren’t going good. It was just bubbling, with the amount of people and vehicles it was just hopping. We get out and it is wall-to-wall people downtown. If you had some troublemakers you couldn’t arrest them and take them away because you couldn’t get police cars down there. It was so jammed up."

Technology at the time was nothing what it is today. RCMP who were at the MC Hammer concert were given special event radios, on a different frequency so not to interfere with the general duty members, making it difficult for the 2 units to communicate. The city and RCMP, based on previous years numbers, had expected the following B.C. Day weekend to bring in a crowd of 30,000 and had prepared to have riot squads and more police officers from around the province to bolster the Penticton detachment. They were not prepared for things to escalate the weekend before. By around 10PM, Dellebuur and a group of 6-8 officers were located near the downtown Tim Horton’s, standing with their backs against the wall watching the immense crowd begin to boil over. He says: "We are hearing things are starting to go crazy and they say on the radio they are going to get the tac troop ready. About this same time, people in the crowd start breaking off chunks of brick from the planter by the CIBC and they are lobbing it at us." As the tactical troop begin pushing the crowd down Main Street towards the beach, Dellebuur said some people started running, breaking windows as they went. The wave of people hit Lakeshore Drive. What is now apartment buildings, was an empty lot in 1991. A crowd gathered here and it is where Kimberley believes those who deliberately started fights to incite the crowd were stationed. Jodie Gastel was 19 in the summer of ‘91 and working at the Peach concession along Lakeshore. Back then the concession stayed open late into the evening. Now living in Victoria, she remembers: "It was busy out. Peachfest was happening and there was a concert going on down the way — which I remember being fairly upset about not being able to attend. It was MC Hammer and that doesn’t happen in Penticton. All of sudden there was this low rumble. If you can imagine what a stampede sounds like but in the distance. Then, a throng of people ran past us at the Peach. It was really loud and a lot of chaos it seemed like. Gastel looked at her younger co-worker and told him to call his mom to get picked up right away. She said they started cleaning and locked everything up. She says: "I felt bad when I left because one of our duties was cleaning the hot dog machine and I didn’t stay and clean it because it was a 15-20 minute job. I found out that after I left the Peach, about 10 minutes later the mob came back and started rolling it. I could have been in it(!)" Tired from the 2 jobs she had been working that summer, Gastel went home and to bed not knowing the stampeding crowd was now walking around with boxes of ice cream treats and doling out Peachfest T-shirts that had been looted from beach concessions and the Jubilee Pavilion. Much less did she know the iconic little Peach concession she worked at was getting rolled into Okanagan Lake by rioters. Or, that they rampaged downtown breaking windows and smashing decorative lamps along Lakeshore Drive while homeowners on that same strip provided police with water and snacks as they watched rioters urinate on their lawns. Says Gastel with a tinge of anger still in her voice 20yrs later: "I remember this feeling of disbelief and I felt violated. This is my home, this is where I live. I grew up in Penticton and for something like that to happen, it was just so foreign. I guess now one of my claims is that I was the very last person to ever set foot in the Peach - featured in the 1985 movie, My American Cousin.”

Aftermath

Mayor Kimberley stayed awake for 72hrs following his reading of the riot act. His first call from the press looking for an interview and information came from China(!) It was clear the riot that gripped the city was going to have an impact on the perception of Penticton and its tourism economy. The following B.C. day long weekend was just as tense. Kimberley said a police helicopter took him up to the Coquihalla. He recalls: "As far as the eye could see there was lights. A stream of car lights coming all the way into the Valley and into Penticton. It was scary that next weekend because they were coming in with axes and baseball bats with nails through them. It was horrific. It was all seized and stored in the RCMP detachment and the whole garage was full of weapons including bricks and rocks — boxes of them." But, with more RCMP in place and the decision to put roadblocks up at the entrance into town, they averted any major problems. Dellebuur said out of the riot, the idea of bringing CrimeStoppers emerged. Seized video and photos from the press helped identify some of the marauders. Images of people causing disturbances in the news also assisted in bringing charges forward. Said Dellebuur: "We were getting grandmother phoning in saying 'hey, that was my grandson.' That really planted the seed for myself and Cpl. Larry Babcock for CrimeStoppers because we didn’t have that here yet. We realized the response we got by publicizing the people was something we could build on." The riot in 1991 brings a unique experience for Haugli, who started his career here and moved back as a result of his promotion last year. He says: "Things are much safer. It’s a way different environment here and obviously me as chief of police, I am extremely happy to see that." He is right, times have changed. In the summer of 1991, city council had only just passed a bylaw that forbid people from riding in the cargo areas of vehicles — the result of seeing a number of injuries in the emergency ward from drunk people falling out of the back of trucks. Local liquor stores would run out of beer, which they only sold in cans during the tourist season, and Kimberley recalled people crossing the border to Oroville to buy beer to sell at the local beaches for $40 a dozen. A much sturdier Peach concession has been built since then. Today, mostly families dot the sandy beaches and tourists track down their next winery. And, although it falls on different dates, Peach Festival, as the Mayor assured the media and community in 1991, "stays intact."

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FETE NATIONALE / Montreal & Quebec City,PQ / Jun 24,1996 (with summer encores in 1997 & 1998)What began as a boisterous street party with a free concert and many draped in Quebec flags, chanting nationalist slogans, quickly turns sour after convergence at a public square spills over into several fights. Uppity punks & gutter crusties bond with drunken loonies and do their best to revive the St. Jean Baptiste Day riots that plagued the 60's & 70's by smashing store windows, stealing booze and chucking a hailstorm of rocks at (you guessed it) more bewildered cops. The most ambitious & daring event of the night culminates in an attempt to burn down the National Assembly and while the provincial legislature is set afire, the torching proves a let down. After the shit in '96 & '97, some punks had a change of heart in '98. One punk was filmed amidst the mayhem with tears streaming down his face & pleading with the unruly mob to stay calm. Even the girls laugh at him & he is regarded as an anti-riot sissy by his collegues as the bedlam ensues.
5 police officers were hurt & at least 80 people arrested after the Quebec rioting - it's 5th consecutuive year of disturbances by revellers. Police in trying to disperse the crowds were outnumbered about 3 to 1 and resorted to using tear gas & water cannons as reinforcements were brought in. Premier Lucien Bouchard tired to rule out any direct link between the rioters & traditional outpouring of nationalism, saying the celebration getting out of hand was the blame of isolated rowdy individuals intent on vandalization more than peaceful rejoicing. Residents & merchants however, blamed police and politicians for the overwhelming violence. Even with its colorful floats & thousands lining city streets for parades, St.Jean Baptiste Day (named after a patron saint commemorating the historic Plains of Abraham, where in the mid-18th century French troops lost to the English) has been no stranger to disorder with previous incidents resulting in one man stabbed to death & another who was allegedly so high on mescaline that he died after walking into a bonfire. As the clearing of damage & broken glass got underway, many citizens fretted over future festivities and the impact on holiday tourism.

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GUNS N' ROSES & METALLICA CONCERT / Montreal,PQ / Aug 8,1992The ruckus began after Hetfield stood too near to pyrotechnics on stage at Olympic Stadium suffering 2nd-dregree burns to his face, arms & hands when a stage prop exploded. Exit Metallicrap (with Hetfield taken to a hospital & released that night) as a disinterested GNR takes the stage. 55 minutes later, they quit some 6 songs into their set after Axl complains of voice problems & kicks at fans. With both bands cutting short their performances, scattered headbangers in the 53,000+ audience tear off GNR t-shirts lighting them ablaze in a bonfire & figure "why not torch some seats as well?" With both bands secure & safe backstage and bouncers unable to contain destruction, 10,000 raged thru the stadium smashing at windows & everything around and looting souvenir booths only to be met by 300 cops with ever-ready billyclubs. Metalheads outside uprooted a street lamp, flipped over a cruiser & damaged 30 others. After the heshers set dozens of small fires, the cops decided they had enough. They sealed off the area, shutdown nearby subway stations & doused everybody with tear gas to regain control. 12 arrests and 8 injured fuzz later, the following Toronto concert (with Faith No More) was postponed and lotsa angry poutine n' peasoup parents would demand their skid-kids cut their stupid mullets & lose the 'devil music'.
No stranger to tempermental outbursts & prior to Axl's Montreal hissyfit, GNR's then most infamous onstage incident had occured just a year before during their St. Louis concert in Jul 1991: Axl got into an altercation with a fan who was taking pictures of the band. Infuriated, he tried to order security to confiscate the camera but when they seemingly didn't act quickly enough, Axl dove off the stage into the crowd, took the camera and began throwing punches resulting in several members of both the audience & security team being struck. After bandmates pulled Axl out of the melee & back onto the stage, he said, "Well, thanks to the lame-ass security, I'm going home!" Visibly enraged, he then slammed his microphone to the ground & briskly walked off the stage. Immediately on leaving, guitarist Slash then quickly told the now booing & obviously hostile audience, "We're outta here" with the rest of the band following. The angry crowd boiled over into full-scale rioting & dozens of people were injured. Axl was charged with inciting the riot but as GNR went overseas continuing their tour, he wasn't arrested until almost a year later. Charges were filed but later dropped by the Judge. In later interviews & documentaries, Axl stated that the GNR security team had made 4 separate requests to the venue's security staff to remove the camera to which all were ignored. He also said that other bandmates had reported being hit by bottles thrown from the audience and that the venue's security had been negligently lax, allowing weapons into the arena & refusing to enforce a drinking limit.
(from the Montreal Gazette)
MONTREAL -- After the last police cruiser had been rolled back upright, the last broken chair folded & long after Axl Rose had staggered from the debris of Olympic Stadium, Montreal was left to look for an answer. And when the smoke cleared after the Guns N' Roses/Metallica double bill, what was clearer than ever was the schism that exists between the workaday adult world & the world of rock 'n' roll. Riot? To anyone who believes rock 'n' roll is more than a tool for selling hamburgers, Saturday night's outburst of pent-up anger reaffirmed the music's enduring importance. It was the latest chapter in a history that stretches back past Altamont in Dec 1969 to rockabilly riots in the 1950s. In a violent society, things get broken sometimes, but rock music has its own internal code and most of the time can police itself. Still, the concert has left accusations flying in its wake, most directed at the bands and their fans by people who haven't been to a rock concert in 20 years. We had Mayor Jean Dore reading his version of the riot act & reassuring folks that the big bad band was banned from the Big O forever. Parents everywhere were shaking their heads at youth gone wrong. So what really happened? Some (most of whom were not there) saw scary TV news footage of kids throwing rocks & jousting with police, heard tales of teens trashing concession stands and stealing Expos caps. Others saw a reaffirmation, albeit a twisted one, of the very power that makes rock 'n' roll music our truest, realest art form. You play with fire & you get burned sometimes. Strip away the layers of corporate gloss and FM radio calcification, the Muzak and the "classic rock" legitimization, and rock 'n' roll remains a primal thing at its heart. Rock music is still strong enough to rattle the rafters. To some, that's a frightening notion. Like every generation of parents, this one looks at kids & wonders why they can't listen to something pleasant. And like every generation of kids, this one wonders how parents can be so out of it. Everybody agrees singer Axl Rose is to blame for what happened last Saturday, that his early exit triggered the outburst. But for the purposes of argument, we will separate these people into 2 camps: the ones for whom Axl is a bogeyman (read: parents) and those for whom Axl is either a troubled hero or just a jerk (the fans). Of the 2, the latter has a better understanding of Axl Rose's place in rock tradition.

Anyone out there remember Bill Haley? Few who attended the Gunners show do, but back in 1955, Haley inspired riots wherever he went. Seen through the sepia mist of nostalgia, film footage of 1950s kids trashing concert halls is quaint, but it is evidence that rock 'n' roll had a violent birth. Rock around the clock to 1992 and we have Axl, who in a more brutal age & circumstances, has to be proportionately more obvious, angry and ugly in order to stir people up. Still, people who grew up with Haley & his Comets can't make the Axl connection. The anti-Axl editorializing, head-shaking and tut-tutting carries a not-so-subtle anti-rock bias. To parental detractors, Axl Rose & his gang are vicious, irresponsible, greedhead punks. Axl is the bogeyman; his lyrics are quoted out of context to prove it. But to someone with any knowledge of rock, Axl is an angry, volatile, charismatic, spoiled, egocentric, selfish, talented singer. Or maybe just a jerk. But the kids do not fear him. They know Axl's horrid history of child abuse at the hands of his parents. They know he's unbalanced, that he's in deep psychotherapy, trying to bring his rage under control. They know the context. They've grown up in a world where sex is death (AIDS), where rain is poison, where the sun gives you cancer. If they fear anyone, rightfully so, it's the people who built that world. Give kids credit for their comprehension. They know that, no matter how many times Axl writes "turn around bitch" or "squeeze your head tight in my vise," he is no more likely to rape anyone than, say, Arnold Schwarzenegger is to grab a bazooka and level a city. They know those lyrics are intended to offend mom n' pop, and to express inchoate rage. Those in the anti-Axl cadre might defend themselves by suggesting the riot would never have happened if kids could like nicer music. Nothing would have happened at a Phil Collins concert. Absoluteyly right. "NOTHING" would have happened at a Phil Collins concert. No, you play with fire when you cram some 57,000 young people into a concrete toilet bowl, fire them up with 126 decibels of unsanitized aggression, and leave them hanging - twice - on the edge of rockus interruptus. In the wake of the Guns disaster, the miracles are that nobody was really hurt & that this sort of thing doesn't happen more often. Why not? Because rock usually takes care of itself. How about a band from Guns N' Roses's own genre? How about Metallica? 2 hours before Axl bailed, Metallica's set was cut short when James Hetfield was burned in a pyrotechnics accident. The band explained to fans - 3 times - why they were cutting the show, that they would return soon to make up the date. No riot. There is a moral code to rock 'n' roll. The code is strict enough to insist bands live up to the promises they make to fans, but loose enough to tolerate Guns N' Roses's bursts of nihilism & anarchy. Metallica lived up to it. GNR didn't. That's the real tragedy - that gap or distance between performer & worshipper - but it could be set right. How? Axl can do what Aerosmith did a few years back. When a few fans were busted for drug possession at an Aerosmith show, band members bailed them out. It's part of the rock 'n' roll lifestyle and part of the code. Likewise, Axl should hold a news conference right now and tell the world how he supports his fans enough to open his very large wallet & pay Big O damages of $250,000 - tip money to an Axl Rose. Like every fan, Rose knows the knocks against him & his band are part of a tradition of parents bashing their kids' tastes that goes back to Sinatra and Elvis.

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ROBSON STREET / Vancouver,BC / Jun 14,1994Move over Montreal 1955, Montreal 1986 and Montreal 1993... Up to 75,000 hockey fans loiter downtown after their Canucks lose the Stanley Cup to the NY Rangers in the 7th game, touching off one of the ugliest-ever riots in hockey history. The mood of the crowd was initially upbeat but things quickly went downhill when drunken brawls broke out. With the streets jammed, cops cut off all public transit & barricade stranded people into the downtown core accompanied with complimentary gas grenades. The pandemonium sees atleast 50 plate glass windows at an Eaton's store alone, smashed & one angry idiot scaling telephone post electrical wires. As the cops rush in, the crowd pushes back. The pigs re-inforce with more tear gas, pepper spray & dogs and hit anything n' everything within arm's length. Dozens are arrested & over 200 are injured. Helicopters do dick to stop the fracas & the hicks continue having a blast, causing damage estimated at $1.1 million. Order is restored several hours later with the help of the RCMP. One teenager was close to death after being shot in the head with a rubber bullet. He spent nearly a month in a coma, suffered permanent brain damage, spent 9 months in jail for rioting and had his civil suit against Vancouver & it's police force, dismissed 7yrs later in Dec 2001.
STUPIDVILLE
(by John Masters / Georgia Straight)
"The Night We Disgraced Ourselves" began, for me, at 9:30PM as I was walking along Granville Street. Two girls, about 14, trudged by and one of them without breaking step, hurled a beer bottle to the pavement. They didn't look happy, they didn't look mad; she just smashed the thing without any look at all on her face & they kept trudging. My office is at the corner of Robson & Granville. Tuesday night, after the hockey game, I went downtown to do some work thinking that things would be quiet. We had after all, lost to the NY Rangers. There would be a Canucks-appreciation afternoon 2 days later at B.C. Place and fans who wanted to cheer the home team one more time could do it then. There was, to my mind, no good reason to party that night. But soon after 8 o'clock the first revellers hit the streets, honking & whooping. 4hrs later at midnight, about 150 stores mostly along Robson, Granville, Georgia, Seymour, Alberni, and Thurlow, had been looted or had their windows staved in for the sheer joy of it. The streets were filled with broken glass and strung-out rolls of toilet paper, the stench of beer n' piss & tear gas. We had become Stupidville. A week later, new glass & short memories have already all but erased the blemish of that night. But the riot pointed up a problem that requires more than cosmetic attention, a few clucks over rowdy youths, and inquiry into whether or not the police should have used tear gas. The events of Jun 14 laid bare some fundamental shortcomings of how we do things here. I believe there are fingers to be usefully pointed & the first one is at ourselves. What, exactly is Vancouver? Say what you will about Toronto, it's a city with a very firm idea of what it is and a great many people take pride in its achievements as a city... It believes itself to be a compassionate city & more important, it has a long tradition of its inhabitants getting involved in civic politics because they care about the city and want to do their bit to make it a better place. We in Vancouver can define ourselves by our geography & our weather but not by very much else, not in positive terms. Yes, we have some fine arts festivals; yes, there's some outstanding architecture; yes, there are some lovely neighbourhoods but although they're good components, there's no bedrock they're built on, no irreducible ur-Vancouver. We're more of a staging area than a city - a place people start from to go skiing or sailing or hiking or to make money to take somewhere else. Part of the reason for this has to do with media reinforcement. In Toronto, the daily media & especially the Toronto Star, have a love for the city that is conveyed every day to its citizens. I've never gotten much sense of that here. The Vancouver Sun is an accurate gauge of the city only insofar as it reflects & amplifies the polarities of the citizens. Too often, its voice is appallingly negative... When the Globe and Mail commissioned a study recently to see what people in the Lower Mainland thought of the local newspapers (the Globe was thinking of launching its own West Coast edition), it discovered to its surprise, that many of us don't even think of the Sun or the Province when we're asked how we feel about "our" newspapers. We think of the Courier or the West Ender or any of a dozen other weeklies. Those are the papers that speak for us. But they speak only to their neighbourhoods. The big picture is missing.

The Saturday after the riot, the Sun's top page-one story was the irrational behaviour of former football star O.J. Simpson, charged with the death of his ex-wife & her male friend. An unusual story, certainly, and on another day perhaps the top news story, but not 4 days after a major riot in downtown Vancouver. At the bottom of the page was a puff piece on how Robson Street is still a swell place to shop. Pushed back to page 4 was the first story we should have been reading and thinking about over croissants & cappuccinos. In it, [B.C. Supreme Court] Justice [Wallace] Oppal is quoted as saying that anyone who feels he or she was a victim of police heavy-handedness Tuesday night will have a hard time getting a fair inquiry into the matter, since the cops investigate themselves. Oppal told the Sun: "Let's assume you are down there and you are roughed up by the police; You would go to the police station & complain. You can ask yourself: How objective is that?" How objective, indeed? The Sun — and everyone else in town — should be all over this story & should stay on it until fundamental changes are made. Here is a good quotation from social critic Paul Goodman, the author of Growing Up Absurd -- "The society in which I live is mine, open to my voice & action, or I do not live there at all. The government, the school board, the church, the university, the world of publishing and communications, are my agencies as a citizen. To the extent that they are not my agencies... I am entirely in revolutionary opposition to them." The crowd Tuesday night had by no means thought things through enough to call itself "in revolutionary opposition" to anything, but when the cops moved in and the looting started, its reaction to these events seems to me to speak clearly of a large group of citizens who don't feel that the society in which they live is theirs, open to their voices & actions. For many, I think, when the party turned ugly Tuesday, the fleeting feeling of having belonged to something was lost. The crowd that remained, broke into 2 groups: those who merely feel disconnected from the city and can stand by to watch its stores being looted while its police fires tear gas, and those — a much smaller number but not insignificant — whose simmering opposition easily becomes pronounced, and who respond to an overt display of authority by saying "Fuck you!" with a wrench through a window. When the lawlessness started Tuesday night, there were 3 sides: the vandals, the police & the audience. A 4th one said: "Hey, this is our city you're destroying. How dare you? What's your problem? Stop it!" It was minuscule to nonexistent. My argument is that if we had taken a healthier interest in our city all along, there would have been no sides at all & very conceivably, no riot. When the official inquiries are made into the causes of our Jun 14th disgrace, Mayor Philip Owen and Police Chief Ray Canuel had better look seriously at ways to make the cops a part of the community instead of apart from it. And the rest of us had better decide what we want this community to be about, besides pretty vistas when it doesn't rain. What shared tasks can we undertake whose achievement will fill us with civic pride? What conditions are needed to come to unconditionally love this place, not for where it is but for what it is? "We are all reflected in what we see" was the elegant observation painted on the plywood covering the windows at Second Skin on Robson the day after the riot. It would be wonderful to find a way to repair the glass so the next time we look at it as we march en masse through our downtown streets what we see reflected back is something nobler than a mob heading to Stupidville.

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CHRISTIE PITS / Toronto,ON / Aug 16,1933Inspired by racism & sport, long-simmering tensions over harassment of the Jews in the city's parks & beaches by Nazi sympathizers could no longer be contained. A neighborhood softball game between a Jewish & Christian team goes haywire when a member of the anti-semitic 'Pit Gang' unfurls a large swastika banner to a rousing chorus of "Heil Hitlers" complete with salutes. Jewish gangs make haste to tear the offensive blanket down. As thousands of spectators had turned out and a number of skirmishes had already occured while the game was still in progress, everything immediately goes berserk after the final out with both sides equipping themselves with lead pipes, chains, fence pickets & handy enough baseball bats. Word quickly speads around the neighborhood of the massive brawl & the battle is reinforced on both sides by truckloads of supporters eager for sandlot combat. Toronto's Chief Constable, Dennis Draper, would moronically blame the riot on the Jews for attempting to shred the flag (only bolstering existing bias & derogatory attitudes) instead of his force's slow response to the mayhem or the scumbag members of the Swastika Club who had been hurling non-stop racial abuse throughout play (and who were probably responsible for painting a swastika on a clubhouse roof with the words "Hail Hitler" sometime in the night just 2 days before on Aug 14). While Jewish pride and determination to fight back was behind many a pool cue & tire iron, ironically, many of the same anti-semitic assholes would volunteer to go to Europe to fight who they initially sighted as their 'Aryan brethren'.