Two days after Saudi Arabia granted women the right to vote in municipal elections, a woman was sentenced to 10 lashes for driving a car.
This IS 2011, right? Saudi women are just now getting the vote? And they still get lashed and otherwise punished for a feeble attempt at a moment of independence. Amnesty International is intervening on behalf of the woman and two others whose cases haven’t made it to court yet. There is no law banning women from driving but there is a law that says any driver has to have a state-issued license and women aren’t allowed to get one. So that keeps ladies from legally getting behind the wheel. Ridiculous, backwards country, that.
Wayne Simmonds, the black NHL player at the centre of a racist act at the John Labatt Centre here last week, is now in hot water for lobbing a homophobic slur at player Sean Avery. London Police are actually investigating last week’s incident where a young man in the stands tossed a banana at Simmonds. If you don’t know why that’s racist, google it. Many young people don’t know but I’m not about to explain it here. Now this week, after Avery sucker punched him in the first period of a game, Simmonds skated past the bench and called Avery a homophobic term. You’d think a guy who has said he has endured racism all of his life would know what it’s like to be marginalized and would be a little bit smarter than that.
Charles Adler, a talk show host I love to mock as much as listen to, the other day kept referring to the “mainstream left-wing media”. Where the heck are these people because they certainly aren’t in this country! Unless he’s talking about the CBC or the Toronto Star, and if so why doesn’t he just say so, Charles is way off the mark. The right-wing thinking, action and pontification in this country’s media out-numbers left-wingers by at least 3 to 1. And telling us it doesn’t, won’t make it so. Sheesh, I really hope people listen and think critically when it comes to media. Left wing, right wing, turkey wing…whatever they choose.