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Politics : Impeach George W. Bush -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Peter Dierks who wrote (35092)	6/30/2005 1:24:47 PM
From: paret	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 93284

Let's Not Let the Art World Politicize Sept. 11 at Ground Zero [James Lileks] Newhouse News ^ \| June 29, 2005 \| James Lileks Given the ugliness of the proposed replacement for the World Trade Center, it's no surprise that the Ground Zero museum is also marred with the usual modern moral chancres. Early reports on the planned International Freedom Center noted that some exhibits would hammer America for its historical sins, and include art from institutions that produced the usual tendentious agitprop. Gov. George Pataki spoke out. And he said no. From the New York Daily News: "`Sure, there can be debate,' Pataki said when asked if his tough stance jeopardized free-speech rights. `But I don't want that debate to be occurring at Ground Zero."' Oh dear. Monsieur guv, this is precisely the place it should be occurring. Unless hallowed spots are debased by the crankling mewlings of wise art-school grads, freedom of speech means nothing. Quick! Someone draw a falling body in a tank of urine. Quick! Commission a large mural showing a chimp-footed George W. Bush having relations with a hook-nose forelocked camel who's eating a Palestinian baby. Get one of those artists who do "installations" to feed Jell-O into a fan to simulate the rain of body parts. Float a Macy's Parade-sized balloon of Michael Moore in the plaza. Anything. Please, just don't make it another solemn monument to a grave day. Since many believe the government planned Sept. 11, perhaps the museum could blow itself up twice daily like Old Faithful. A New York Times editorial noted that Pataki and his knuckle-dragging ilk want "censorship in advance -- for political oversight of an artistic process that has only begun to evolve." Well, the likelihood that the evolution will end up with a statue of Uncle Sam spearing Darth bin Laden with a flagpole is rather small. Self-hatred for the West goes so deep among the urban-arts class that any artist who wants to make his reputation will assume a fashionable globalist stance. If Sept. 11 isn't an ideal opportunity to show how Che would have reacted to the global AIDS crisis better than Ronald Reagan did, well, then the hijackers died in vain. Of course, Sept. 11 has already been sanctified in artworks, but it's the sort of patriotic kitsch that horrifies the art world. Big hard-eyed eagles superimposed on the World Trade Center, collectible plates with a painting of the flag raised at Ground Zero, cast-iron models of the towers with "Never Forget" written in lovely script on the base. That sort of thing. Heart-tugging stuff for the Norman Rockwell fans. You could fill the entire museum with this sort of material, and it would be a more accurate account of the culture's reaction than some tiresome artist's 12-foot collage of Abu Ghraib pictures run through a few Photoshop filters. In fact, tourists might actually go to a kitsch-stuffed museum. No one's going to fly from Peoria to see a gigantic picture of George Washington with a Saddam moustache ordering his slaves to kick Salvador Allende in the pants. O.K., we get it. We're the worst. Bad us. Whatever. Let's make a deal. The internationalist demographic gets the theaters, the movie houses, the art galleries, the schools, the ateliers, the lecture halls; they're free to fill the air with as many Contradictions and Uncomfortable Truths and Provocative Reinterpretations as they like. But would it be too much to ask that whatever is built at Ground Zero simply recalls that horrible day, and honors the dead? For some, yes. For some, the refusal to politicize an event is a political act. For some, Sept. 11 has already become something more potent than a day of murder and fear: It has become a metaphor. It is something to be interpreted, filtered, parsed, a box of white bones that need the flesh of explication and context. For others, for the Franklin Mint demographic, Sept. 11 was the day when a secretary looked out the window and saw the end of her days screaming toward her. Build a memorial to her. Or build nothing at all. June 29, 2005

To: Peter Dierks who wrote (35092)	6/30/2005 1:41:02 PM
From: paret	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 93284

Ontario Human Rights Commission: Everything Is Racism CBC News Online ^ \| Tue, 28 Jun 2005 Ontario commission tackles subtle racism 28 Jun 2005 CBC News The Ontario Human Rights Commission has issued a new racism policy stressing the evils of subtle and systemic forms of discrimination. It says discrimination may be detected "in organizational and government policies, practices, and procedures and 'normal ways of doing things'" as well as in overt acts of bigotry. "It is time organizations and institutions acknowledge the reality of racism" It says such practices "may directly or indirectly, consciously or unwittingly, promote, sustain, or entrench" advantages for some people over others. It also says racist behaviour cannot be hidden from trained observers. "Individual acts themselves may be ambiguous or explained away, but when viewed as part of the larger picture and with an appropriate understanding of how racial discrimination takes place, may lead to an inference that racial discrimination was a factor in the treatment an individual received." The new document, titled Policy and Guidelines on Racism and Racial Discrimination, is not binding on judges or human rights tribunal members but represents the commission's current interpretation of the Ontario Human Rights Code. "It is time organizations and institutions acknowledge the reality of racism," Chief Commissioner Keith Norton said in a statement announcing it on Tuesday. They should "be prepared to act against subtle and sometimes subconscious prejudices and stereotypes that too often result in discrimination," he said. The new policy says the following types of treatment may indicate racial discrimination in work situations: Exclusion from formal or informal networks. Denial of mentoring or developmental opportunities such as secondments and training that was made available to others. Differential management practices such as excessive monitoring and documentation or deviation from written policies or standard practices. Disproportionate blame for an incident. Assignment to less desirable positions or job duties. Treating normal differences of opinion as confrontational or insubordinate. Characterizing normal communication as rude or aggressive. Penalizing a person for failing to get along with someone else, e.g. a co-worker or manager, when one of the reasons for the tension is racially discriminatory attitudes or behaviour of the co-worker or manager. It retires the term "minority group" in favour of "racialized persons," a category that goes beyond skin colour and ethnic background. "Racialization extends to people in general but also to specific traits and attributes, which are connected in some way to racialized people and are deemed to be 'abnormal' and of less worth,'" it says. "Individuals may have prejudices related to various racialized characteristics." Those characteristics may include name, accent or manner of speech, clothing and grooming, diet, beliefs and practices, leisure preferences, places of origin and citizenship, it says.