National Day of Remembrance and Action on Violence Against Women

15 years ago today a man murdered 14 female engineering students at the Ecole Polytechnique in Montreal.

I remember it very vividly -- I was 16 years old and in Grade 12 at the time. I remember thinking, that could have been me -- me and any 13 of my classmates, shot in a classroom by some man screaming "You're all a bunch of feminists!", someone who hated us not for who we were or what we did, but just for what we represented, just for being women doing something a little untraditional. I think every woman and teenaged girl in Canada probably felt a little less safe, a little less secure, after that.

I can't write much about this. But I remember the women who were killed:

Geneviève Bergeron
Hélène Colgan
Nathalie Croteau
Barbara Daigneault
Anne-Marie Edward
Maud Haviernick
Barbara Klucznik Widajewicz
Maryse Laganière
Maryse Leclair
Anne-Marie Lemay
Sonia Pelletier
Michèle Richard
Annie St-Arneault
Annie Turcotte

I remember dozens of missing and murdered women from Vancouver's Downtown Eastside.

I remember the victims of violence.

Landmines!

I missed Friday -- International Day of Disabled Persons -- but never mind.

Press release on the end of the Nairobi conference

International Campaign to Ban Landmines

United States Campaign to Ban Landmines (since the U.S. -- in company with 40-some other countries including India, Pakistan, China, and Russia -- isn't a signatory to the Ottawa Convention)

"The issue is not the Ottawa Convention," [U.S. State Department spokesman Richard] Boucher said. "The issue is mines," he said. "The issue is the mines around the world that kill people, that harm people, that blow up children who are trying to play soccer, that blow up cars of people trying to get to their jobs.

"The issue, therefore, is one that we have to address not within the confines of a particular treaty, but in terms of what's going on in the real world," Boucher said.

"What's going on in the real world is that there are mines that have been sown in the past that are still out there in battlefields that's why the United States is the leader in demining and demining programmes around the world," he said.

That's a very fine and moving rhetorical flight, Mr. Boucher... so explain to me again, why does this mean you shouldn't sign the treaty?

*sigh*

(no subject)

Saw Bridget Jones: The Edge of Reason on Saturday with stilldeepwater in a cheer-us-up exercise. It didn't so much work.* How do you screw up that badly with 4 screenwriters? (Maybe that was the problem.)

I mean, granted the book had its (many) problems, but why did they keep the stupidest sub-plot, kill the halfway decent bits, and do away with all the character and relationship development that redeemed it?

As a writing exercise, I think I may outline another adaptation from the same source.

Grrr.

Afterwards we went to Fionn MacCool's for our 4th Guinness glass. I'm getting quite fond of the one on Esplanade, which I suppose was part of their devious plan. Passed a gaggle of guys dressed up in various 70s costumes as we left.

In other news, bought some bookcases and a kitchen trolley/counter from Swedish-for-hell. The bookcases are still in my parents' van because I think they are actually lined with lead, and my mother and I didn't feel like hauling 4 of them up my stairs (it was all we could do to get them to the checkout counter in the first place). But I put together the kitchen cart thingy and it's improved my kitchen at least 200%. Maybe up to 275%, I'm not sure. Puttered around on Sunday buying small necessary objects like a dishpan and some sucker-mounted sponge-holders. Met cousin J and Tilde for a walk. Made baked beans. Did laundry. Domestic stuff like that. Feel like I am finally settling into a routine!

*Although it was quite cute, in spots.

how do you spell "schadenfreude"?

texaslawchick, this one's for you: Projected Economic Costs Due to Health Consequences of Teenagers’ Loss of Confidentiality in Obtaining Reproductive Health Care Services in Texas from the Archives of Pediatric and Adolescent Medicine

Best-case scenario? $11.8 million. (Unfortunately because of the Archives' stupid restrictive access policies I can't see more than the abstract unless I head over to the library.) Yay! The article's free! *pets the Archives*

Hit 'em where it hurts! In the wallet!

More to come once I read the thing.

Oh, and the (other) library FINALLY has Going Postal on its way to me! Took them long enough!