Canadian Fascism: How do we like it so far?

Image from mronline: "Fascism is identified by [Georgi] Dimitrov as having its ideological origins in the middle class (that is, the petty bourgeoisie), but only becomes dominant by receiving political support from the capitalist class."


Canadian Fascism: How do we like it so far?

It's taxing, to say the least ...

TheStar: Justin Trudeau is giving taxpayers’ money to Mastercard, Loblaws and BlackBerry. What gives?

• We heard it loud and clear when, before the last election, the Liberals gave $12 million to Loblaws to retrofit their fridges. We heard it again when they gave BlackBerry $40 million a year ago now to boost development of software for autonomous vehicles. We hear it increasingly around the $950 million spent on the “superclusters” strategy to foster a competitive buzz in some industries.
• Now, Conservative MPs and the various candidates positioning themselves to lead the party, are crying foul over the federal move to partner with Mastercard [$50 milliion] to open a cyber security research centre in Vancouver.

I find the bit about Mastercard bemusing. Maybe they need compensation for my recently having closed my account with them.  They didn't want to take goodbye for an answer when I emailed them; they fibbed and said I would have to telephone them as they needed verbal confirmation to close an account. I guess that's how they talk people out of abandoning them. So I emailed them a scanned image of my cut-up card and advised them I was closing the email account they were using to send me invoices, and that they would have to write to me at my physical address from here on in.

That did the trick. But I did start thinking about how bossily devious these corporations can be, and how corporate power is a form of fascism.

One really needs to read Umberto Eco on that subject:

OpenCulture: Umberto Eco Makes A List of the 14 Common Features of Fascism

You may not recognize our society in some of the points Eco provides, but a shocking number of them does describe current trends, with Number 6 being especially prophetic in that Canada has, for the first time, a Minister of Middle Class Prosperity who nevertheless acknowledges:

• "Canada has no official statistical measure of what constitutes the middle class."
• Without any official statistical measure for that group, it's unclear how her ministry plans to know whether that group has grown in size or whose quality of life she is measuring. CTV News

Here are the most obviously relevant indications in Eco's list:

#2  Rejection of Modernism -- synonyms for Modernism being reason, tolerance, understanding: there's not much of those criteria in evidence nowadays.

#4  Disagreement is treason: those who question vaccines and "climate change" take note.

#6  Appeal to a frustrated middle class (as per CTV news item above).

#7  (How eerie is this, considering the coronavirus panic?) The obsession with a plot: “The followers must feel besieged. The easiest way to solve the plot is the appeal to xenophobia.”

Right now, it's Blame China; tomorrow, perhaps, some other entity. Is it the Chinese "wet markets"? is it Chinese snakes? Is it Chinese Bat Soup ...????  Nobody's blaming the virus itself, although viruses do mutate. Which is why the flu vaccine is a pig in a poke, literally -- that being blamed on China as well:

From Quora:

• They are tearing down old villages and putting in high rise apartments, and moving the former villagers into the apartments, but the villagers kept trying to move their pigs into the apartments with them.

#8  The enemy is both strong and weak: This defines the on/off Western attitudes toward Russia, China, N. Korea, and the Middle East.

#11 Everybody is educated to become a hero.  Popular culture says you can be anything you want to be, and everybody wants to be beautiful, even if it requires surgery; wealthy, even if it involves thievery; famous rather than self-respecting.

#12 stands out as a description of the views held by the growing Far Right Christian movement.

#14 Impoverished vocabulary.  This is a pet peeve for me because I was strictly schooled in spelling and grammar, and it's always difficult for me to read the news because I know I will come across a lapse in grammar by professionals who ought to know better. "The media is", for example: though "media" is a plural word and "medium" is the singular. TV is a medium, film is a medium, TV and film together are media.

Doctors say "a bacteria" though the word "bacteria" is plural and "bacterium" is singular. People say "none are going to attend", though the word "none" is short for "not one" or "no one" which demands the word "is" rather than "are".

I could provide many more examples, but I do realize this is something I have to learn to accept because the education system is dumbing down and I can't do nuthin about it.

The following is not so much a change of topic as perhaps yet another sign of the times:

NatPost: Canada Revenue Agency still giving incorrect information on tax issues

• The government found call centre agents were giving the wrong information 13% of the time to personal tax filers and 17% of the time for benefit inquires (sic).

Not to mention the long waits on hold, and the automaton who finally answers and then rapidly finishes your sentences (incorrectly) for you. Been there, done that. Thanks, but no thanks.

I raise that issue, however, because I received my "tax package" this week and fully plan to do my taxes myself, as always, if CRA manages to also mail me my T4's -- but there's an ominous attachment to the bundle entitled, "Let us help you with your taxes!  You can do it by telephone!

It's true, and I've had a personal invitation!

From CRA website:

• Those who are eligible will receive an invitation letter in the mail by February 2020, to use our automated phone service called File my Return, you may be able to complete and file your return for free by phone.

The invitation letter says that all one has to do is "confirm that the following information is correct" and third on the list is this: "Your address at the top of this letter has not changed".

The top of the page is about 2-1/2 inches of blank space!  My address is nowhere to be seen.

It's becoming all too apparent that the CRA can't help itself, let alone the tax payer.

​We are obviously living in "interesting times" wished upon us by the dastardly Chinese (or not, depending on your bias).