La Commission Des Droits De La Personne Du Québec Ma Faite Passer Un Sapin. . .
I did another lunch hour protest in front of the offices of the Quebec Human Rights Commission aka La Commission Des Droits De La Personne Du Québec this afternoon. Yesterday was such a beautiful warm and sunny day that I decided that it was just a bit *too* good to devote a couple of hours to my QHRC protest so I spent the time enjoying the sun in the Plateau Mont-Royal district of beautiful Montreal.
For a few weeks now I have thought of bringing a pine tree to my Quebec Human Rights Commission protest to referrence the very Québecois saying "Passe moi pas un sapin" which effectively means don't screw me over or, more politely, don't sell me a bill of goods. It seems that it's original meaning had to do with the practice of unethical lumber producers of substituting cheap pine wood for higher quality wood but "faire passer un sapin" now has a much more general meaning of cheating someone or otherwise jerking them around.
Just the other night I had rescued an ex-Xmas tree that was being thrown out for the garbage and stashed it away for future use in my Quebec Human Rights Commission protest but divine providence intervened on my behalf today. . . As I was protesting in Old Montreal in front of the old "skyscraper" that houses the offices of the Quebec Human Rights Commission I happened to notice that an ex-Xmas tree was being lowered to the sidewalk from a second story balcony of the Nordheimer Hotel across the street from my protest. This providential opportunity was just to good to miss! I mean "retired" Christmas trees quite literally descending from heaven right before my very eyes! What more could I possibly ask for? ;-)
After taking a few photos of the providential lowering of the retired Christmas trees I crossed the street and and asked the hotel maintenance people if I could borrow one of their no longer wanted Christmas trees for a bit. I explained to them that the Quebec Human Rights Commission, aka la Commission des droits de la personne et des droits de la jeunesse du Québec, ma fait passer un sapin et je veux le retourner. . . They were happy to oblige me and I carried one of the denuded pine trees across St. Jacques Street and deposited it on the left side of the entry into the office building for an impromptu photo opportunity. The office building's concierge was out in a flash and I explained to him that I was just going to take a few pictures of the tree with my picket signs on it and then the proverbial sapin would be promptly and appropriately disposed of. He seemed to be quite OK with that proposition and went back into the building.
A security guard came out almost immediately afterwards and I told the security guard that I was just going to take a few pictures and then get rid of the unwanted Christmas tree. He was pretty obliging and patiently waited while I spent a few minutes taking a bunch of photos of the QHRC's symbolic sapin with various configurations of picket signs resting on it. After all was said and done I took the proverbial sapin back to where it had providentialy come from and the janitor came out to sweep up the few pine needles that were left behind on the steps of the building.
There is not much else to report on the Quebec Human Rights Commission protest front other than I had a few chats with members of the general public that were all very positive, sympathetic, and supportive once I had explained to them what my protest was all about.
Comments
Those are great pictures. What a clever protest! That is really creative and must have been lots of fun.
I was glad to see your new comment in my e-mail. I'd love to attend church with you next time you're in Chicago. Again, however, your comment leads back to your blog, where you make personal attacks on people who've upset you. What if you commented just with your first name, or just your last? Or with a handle?
I'm sorry you've been hurt or upset. You've asked that I consider whether your words are justified. I have been considering it.
The thing I've come to is that even when someone hurts you, it's not okay to insult them. It's important to keep your temper and respond to them with kindness and love.
Obviously, people don't always respond to you with kindness and love. That's painful for everyone involved. I'm sorry that happens. And I'm sorry you're so upset that you can lose yours too.
I know I personally can lose my temper and say things I regret. I try really hard not to say them on the Internet, where they can't be taken back. If I do need to let my negative emotions show, I try to keep things very general and impersonal. I work at that really hard.
I really enjoy your photography. I write, but I'm no good at pictures. Do you know of any good Web sites or books I could check out for some introductory lessons? Holden recently got a digital camera, and she's offered to let me use it.
Thanks for commenting here. I will respond point by point below. Please don't take any critical remarks too personally. They are not intended to be "personal attacks" on you.
:Those are great pictures. What a clever protest! That is really creative and must have been lots of fun.
Well I like to think that most of my protest activities are reasonably clever and creative and indeed fun Ellis. ;-) Some of my picket sign slogans are definitely quite clever and someone entering the Unitarian Church of Montreal made a comment to that effect within the last few weeks. It is possible that the person was trying to deny, ignore and minimize the legitimacy of my picket sign slogans in saying that they were "clever" but I think that he was being quite forthright and sincere. I did not detect any sarcasm in his tone.
The fact of the matter is that there is an element of fun in my ongoing protest in front of the Unitarian Church of Montreal on any given Sunday. The fun usually comes in terms of various interactions with the public, including members of the Unitarian Church of Montreal entering their "church". Even some of the interactions with the police have been fun. One French speaking Montreal police officer burst out laughing when I explained my picket sign slogans to her and she wasn't laughing at me but rather with me. There was certainly an element of fun in successfully charging the misguided Queen's Counsel lawyer, Kenneth Howard QC, with theft and assault when he very foolishly stole two of my picket signs and technically assaulted me by shoving me in the commission of his petty crime. He subsequently confronted me in front of the church as I was protesting and I had a bit of fun by saying, "So how's my favorite petty criminal today?" Never saw him again. . . ;-)
The public respond very positively to my protest. Just today a car drove by blaring its horn with the driver enthusiastically giving me the thumbs up and several members of the Unitarian Church of Montreal were witnesses to this. I do not solicit honks on my picket signs but I do get a few.
Most ironically, when the Unitarian Church of Montreal launched its deeply misguided, to say nothing of outrageously hypocritical. . . "Positive Picketing" campaign of "positive" counterprotestors several years ago a few of them remarked about how fun it was to be outside the church protesting. I responded by pointing out that if it wasn't fun I wouldn't have been there for as long as I had which was about six years or so at the time. . . There is hardly an hour when I am protesting that doesn't have some element of fun in it. In fact I have said that there is hardly a half-hour period that passes that does not contain some kind of event or interaction that does not make that half-hour period of protesting worthwhile.
:I was glad to see your new comment in my e-mail. I'd love to attend church with you next time you're in Chicago.
Well I would love to come back to Chicago soonish so I just may take you up on that. I very much enjoyed my overnight stay this summer.
:Again, however, your comment leads back to your blog, where you make personal attacks on people who've upset you.
Usually any personal attacks I make are on people who have personally attacked me first or who are in positions of responsibility and have allowed intolerant, insulting and abusive U*U clergy personally attack me with complete impunity. I n any case I have noticed that U*Us tend to exercise rather hypocritical double standards when it comes to what constitutes "personal attacks". If a U*U minister insultingly and abusively personally attacks me by contemptuously dismissing my revelatory religious experience as "your psychotic experience", condemns my mootheistic religious belief as being nothing but "silliness and fantasy", and falsely and maliciously labels my religious activities as a "cult" of the "manipulative and secretive" (read Solar Temple, Heaven's Gate. . .) variety this egregiously insulting and defamatory, indeed outright hostile and abusive "personal attack" on me is complicitly rubber-stamped and endorsed as being "within the appropriate guidelines of ministerial leadership" by the UUA's aptly named Ministerial Fellowship Committee. If I then strongly criticize Rev. Diane Miller for her obviously negligent and effectively complicit mishandling of my clergy misconduct complaint against Rev. Ray Drennan this is characterized as a "personal attack" on Rev. Diane Miller and I am repeatedly censored , suppressed, "memory-holed", and banned from U*U internet list-serves and U*U controlled forums for perfectly legitimate criticism of U*U injustices, abuses and hypocrisy. I could go on a bit but I hope that this is sufficient to illustrate outrageoulsy hypocritical U*U double standards about what constitutes "personal attacks" on people.
:What if you commented just with your first name, or just your last? Or with a handle?
I think I already suggested that so in future I will do so.
:I'm sorry you've been hurt or upset.
It goes well beyond being hurt or upset. U*Us have done serious harm to me and, so far. . . have done absolutely nothing to acknowledge that harm and responsibly redress it with some genuine restorative justice. Au contraire, to date, the U*U response to my serious grievances has been to try to deny, ignore and minimize them and to go to extreme lengths to censor and suppress my ability to share what UUA President William G. Sinkford once rightly described as my "obviously deep concerns" with the U*U religious community and the general public.
:You've asked that I consider whether your words are justified. I have been considering it.
:The thing I've come to is that even when someone hurts you, it's not okay to insult them. It's important to keep your temper and respond to them with kindness and love.
Well, unfortunately that approach just plain does not work in many cases. I am actually one of the most even-tempered people you will ever meet. I do not get angry easily, indeed I am very slow to anger, far more so than most people. Even when I do get angry I generally express that anger in a controlled manner and almost never "fly off the handle". Anyone who knows me well can attest to this fact. I have been repeatedly insulted and abused by U*Us and those insults, injustices and abuses have been effectively condoned by the vast majority of U*Us who are aware of them. Very few U*Us have ever clearly and unequivocally spoken out against the injurious and untrue insulting and defamatory personal attacks and other injustices and abuses that I have been subjected to by U*Us. The proof is in the U*U pudding as it were.
:Obviously, people don't always respond to you with kindness and love.
Obviously. . .
:That's painful for everyone involved.
Oh I doubt it's very painful for the insulting and abusive U*Us, at least up until I return their favors. . .
:I'm sorry that happens. And I'm sorry you're so upset that you can lose yours too.
Actually I am not losing my temper. My policy of reserving the right of returning abuse for abuse is not done out of anger as out of providing an object lesson for abusive U*Us. When you see me engaging in any verbal abuse with someone you can be pretty sure that the person under attack attacked me first in a very similar manner. The main exception to that rule is strong criticism of U*Us who gom out of their way to deny, ignore and minimize the U*U injustices, abuses and hypocrisy that I am exposing and denouncing, especially if they are U*U clergy, UUA or CUC officials or other U*Us who are in positions of influence and authority.
:I know I personally can lose my temper and say things I regret.
We all can but quite frankly I don't regret very much of what I say because I don't usually say it unless it is highly justified. As long as U*Us persist in spreading insulting and damaging lies about me I will be spreading some rather unpleasant highly verifiable truths about U*Us. U*Us really would do well to live up to both the letter and the spirit of UUA President Rev. William G. Sinkford's Holiday Message for 2006 otherwise the war of words will continue unabated and may well significantly escalate in 2007.
:I try really hard not to say them on the Internet, where they can't be taken back.
You are obviously quite successful Ellis and that is a good thing. Of course insulting and abusive U*Us can take back their foolish words or simply hide the evidence of their insulting and defamatory language by "memory holing" their own insulting and defamatory blog posts. . .
:If I do need to let my negative emotions show, I try to keep things very general and impersonal. I work at that really hard.
Actually you are not the only U*U that does that and I don't think it's a very good practice. I think that it is far better to direct your negative emotions at the correct target, especially as appropriately expressing your well justified negative emotions can very often produce positive results.
:I really enjoy your photography. I write, but I'm no good at pictures. Do you know of any good Web sites or books I could check out for some introductory lessons?
Not really. Let me get back to you on that. I would be happy to give you a photography lesson or two if and when I get to Chicago again.
:Holden recently got a digital camera, and she's offered to let me use it.
I would suggest that you just start using it and then learn from your mistakes. Feel free to send me emails asking about problematic photos that don't turn out as you want. I will try to reply to them.
robinedgar59@yahoo.ca
Allah prochaine,
Robin Edgar