And No Skinning Them Either

I was going to write about something important, like how so many people out there have not seen Ladyhawke and that is just a damn shame because Ladyhawke has both Ferris Bueller-esque Matthew Broderick AND Bladerunner-as-opposed-to-The Hitcher-esque Rutger Hauer, PLUS it has swords and crossbows and hawks and wolves and horses, but I was informed that were I to proclaim my love for this movie I would lose all credibility forever and ever Amen, and so I won't.

Instead, I'm going to talk about Canadians. Unlike most, I have had great love for Canadians. Dude, Neil Young is Canadian. Okay, right, I hate him, but others whose opinions I respect really do seem to like him and so I will concede that there must be something valuable there. And anyway Joni Mitchell. L.M. Montgomery. Catherine O'Hara. Rufus Wainwright. Tegan and Sara. Leonard Cohen.

And they have really good healthcare, and I've talked to a lot of Canadians who never once uttered the word "eh" so I think that must be a myth, and hey it's EVEN COLDER UP THERE THAN IT IS IN MINNESOTA so I think that earns them a little slack.

Well, no more. The BBC has reported that Canadians are even more insane than the insanest.

The town council of Herouxville, Quebec issued a proclamation for all immigrants, informing them that Herouxville has certain standards, and the town council is hereby enumerating the cultural practices that will not be tolerated there.

The declaration declares: "We wish to inform these new arrivals that the way of life which they abandoned when they left their countries of origin cannot be recreated here. We consider it completely outside norms to... kill women by stoning them in public, burning them alive, burning them with acid, circumcising them etc."

It goes on to stipulate that in Herouxville, women are allowed to drive, vote, dance, and own their own homes. Sikh children are not allowed to carry their ceremonial daggers to school, even though the Supreme Court has ruled that they can.

A Montreal police officer was so enthusiastic about all this, that, in the tradition of Canada's great musicians, he wrote a political ditty: "We want to accept ethnics, but not at any price...If you're not happy with your fate, there's a place called the airport."

Councillor Andre Drouin, the driving force behind the declaration, is shocked that people--including the president of the Muslim Council of Montreal--find the declaration to be racist. After all, there have been cultural clashes between immigrants and real Canadians, and it's time to lay some ground rules.

Of course, the documented incidents have included asking a Toronto courthouse to take down their Christmas tree, and a gym to frost their windows so folks don't have to watch the sweaty jigglings on the treadmills. No acid-burnings or drive-by circumcisions have been reported.



I'm gonna blow this damn candle out
I don't want nobody coming over to my table
I've got nothing to talk to anybody about