Look on my Works, ye Mighty, and despair! wrote Percy Bysshe Shelley in his 1817 poem, Ozymandias, the ancient king who called himself in the poem, the ” king of kings.” I was thinking about that poem as I watched the news that an AR-15-wielding, fellow MAGA Repugnican had shot
Continue readingAuthor: Ian Chadwick
Scripturient: Council Screws Collingwood Residents. Again.
Like many other residents in council chamber yesterday, I was deeply disappointed but not surprised by our council’s decision yesterday to continue with staff’s anti-resident/anti-environment plan to deforest Sixth Street to make it a better speedway for cars passing through town. The council chamber was full to capacity with people
Continue readingScripturient: The Very Model of Bureaucratic Inefficiency
Here is the textbook model of bureaucratic inefficiency and council sluggishness that deserves a satirical Gilbert and Sullivan song of its own: Collingwood is conducting a “speed limit survey” through its user-hostile website. What’s inefficient about that, you ask… well, first consider the timeline. This survey is so complicated, so
Continue readingScripturient: Review: The Design of Books
Like with so many other technologies in our lives — computers, cars, bread machines, flushing toilets, DVD players, convection ovens — most consumers don’t know or appreciate how books are made, or why they are made in such familiar shapes and structure. In more than four millennia since humans invented
Continue readingScripturient: Christofascists Make Their Move in Oklahoma
The MAGA pseudo-Christians in the USA have recently been making bold moves toward implementing their oppressive theocracy and making Gilead a reality in their states. Louisiana required one of the two biblical Ten Commandments to be posted in every classroom (albeit without identifying which of the two even though they
Continue readingScripturient: The Litter That’s Killing Everything and Everyone
Four and a half trillion. That’s how many cigarette butts are estimated to be littered every year on our streets, sidewalks, parks, downtowns, parking lots, lawns, and everywhere else smokers feel entitled to leave them. That’s 4,500,000,000,000 pieces of toxic, non-biodegradable, chemical-soaked plastic waste that smokers — and smokers alone
Continue readingScripturient: Donald Trump and the Art of Victimhood
Persecution. It’s a deeply-ingrained core component of the myth of Christian history, and well-weaponized in modern times by rightwing politicians who depend on the support from both the faithful and the pseudo-Christian Talibangelists. We’re under attack, they claim, justifying their own attacks on other faiths and non-believers. They use the
Continue readingScripturient: Pro-Car Planning is Destroying Collingwood’s Environment
I warned you: Council would support the anti-resident/anti-environment/pro-vehicle attitude that pervades town hall. I warned you they would deforest Sixth Street to make it a bigger, faster speedway for vehicles. I warned you they would add more pollution, more noise, and more traffic on Sixth Street. I warned you that
Continue readingScripturient: A 30-Year-Old Warning About Rising Fascism
Convicted felon and insurrection supporter Donald Trump claimed in a media conference after his trial that, because the justice system works, Americans are “living in a fascist state.” It’s not the first time Trump has used the term to describe opponents or their accomplishments. Last month he told donors Biden
Continue readingScripturient: May 30: The Day Justice Prevailed
O frabjous day! Callooh! Callay! He chortled in his joy. Thirty-four criminal charges and found guilty for every one of them. Thirty four! Of course, I don’t have to tell you the name of the person, since the whole world knows whose recent court case I’m writing about. And have
Continue readingScripturient: Traffic Calming: Not My Job Say Town Staff
No residents have been successful in three years in meeting all the town’s absurdly stringent requirements for investigation of the installation of even rudimentary traffic calming in their neighbourhoods. That’s what Peggy Slama, Collingwood’s director of public works, engineering and environmental services, told council last April. According to the recent
Continue readingScripturient: The Anti-Environmentalists in Town Hall are at it Again
WTF is wrong with town hall these days? Why do they dislike trees so much? Last week town staff presented another plan to make Sixth Street even more of a speedway than it already is, and in doing so they want to remove three dozen mature trees along the north
Continue readingScripturient: The Rise of the New Fascists and Their Threat to Democracy
I wonder if this was how my father felt in England, watching the rise of fascism in Europe in the 1920s and ’30s. By the time of my father’s 20th birthday, Mussolini had already secured his one-party-state in Italy; Hitler was elected and appointed chancellor. He would do the same
Continue readingScripturient: The Death of Truth in the Trump Era
The ongoing criminal trial of Donald Trump (the first one; others are to follow) continues to expose the difference between what he and his followers believe and anything related to evidence, truth, or facts. Trump lies. Blatantly, shamelessly, openly, and frequently. He lies so often that quite literally nothing he
Continue readingScripturient: On the Bay’s Libertarian Piffle
Less (sic) taxes is, for On the Bay‘s publisher David Loopstra, a “solution” for the problems of inflation. It’s certainly not the solution for correct grammar, where he should have written fewer taxes or the phrase “less in taxes.” You can only get away with saying less if the noun
Continue readingScripturient: Why Are Canada’s Conservatives Opposed to Everything Good?
Canada used to be known worldwide as a nation of nice people. Canadians were thought of as polite, cheerful, compassionate, caring, respectful, honest, and helpful. We said please and thank you. We opened doors for people. We opened our homes and took in people in trouble. We gave aid to
Continue readingScripturient: Review: Dungeons & Dragons: Honor Among Thieves
Maybe I’m just old and jaded, but after watching the 2023 movie, Dungeons & Dragons: Honor Among Thieves, I couldn’t figure out why the film wasn’t in WalMart’s $5 bin rather than on the racks at $15. This is from a fan not only of fantasy novels and movies, but
Continue readingScripturient: CBC Strives for Supermarket Tabloid Status
As a source of credible journalism, CBC used to be one of the standards by which other media measured themselves. It was reliable, honest, and responsible. Oh, how far CBC has fallen from that perch. Decades of (mostly CONservative-implemented) cuts to reporting and editing staff, egregious layoffs too often in
Continue readingScripturient: Aptos vs Calibri
Did you notice the change? Microsoft has made the typeface Aptos the new default for its Office programs, replacing the venerable Calibri after 17 years. Aptos has been rolled out to users since December, 2023, and, at least for me, finally made it to my versions of Office in February.
Continue readingScripturient: Mayor Meets Premier: We Have Questions
In a municipal announcement, led with a screaming all-caps headline like a toddler in a toy store tantrum, the Town of Collingwood published a short statement from Mayor Hamlin about her recent meeting with Premier Doug Ford. Wait, you didn’t know about that meeting? Apparently, few in Collingwood did (and
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