All Posts Tagged With: "military"

Too bad, says Royal Military College

A member of the faculty at Royal Military College in Kingston, Ont. is speaking out against an honourary doctorate degree that will be awarded to hockey commentator Don Cherry, reports the Kingston Whig Standard. French professor Catherine Lord argues that Cherry has said contemptuous things about gay and lesbian people, immigrants and French Canadians. But the college’s spokesperson said that the degree will go ahead, adding: “for more than two decades, Don Cherry has been a supporter of the military and of military families.” Cherry, co-host of Coach’s Corner on CBC, has raised funds for military families and made visits to Afghanistan to raise the profile of Canadian troops. Cherry recently faced threats of legal action for calling three hockey players ”turncoats” and “hypocrites” for their beliefs on fighting in hockey. He has since apologized.

Administration asked to ban recruiters from campus

A petition is circulating among University of Toronto students to convince the administration to ban military recruiters from the campus. So far the petition has around 300 signatures. “We are continuing to collect signatures on the petition and we’re meeting with the administration as well,” graduate student and one of the anti-military organizers, Daniel Vandervoort, told Canadian University Press. “Canadian military is not just your run-of-the-mill employer . . . This is an organization that trains people to kill and to fight wars.” On Feb 2, Vandervoort and PhD student Jacob Nerenberg, led a protest of 30 people against Department of National Defence recruiters who were on the campus to discuss policy analyst jobs with students. The activists are also encouraging students to protest against a talk today to be given by Brigadier-General Jonathan Vance. A Canadian Forces spokesman said they don’t recruit at universities unless invited.

Scholarship for children of fallen Canadian soldiers is granted despite professors’ objections last March

(Editor’s note: This post has been updated below)

Hang on to your knickers, University of Regina professors. The first Hero Fund scholarship has been awarded.

Maritimer Matthew Mellish is the first recipient of the Hero Fund scholarship for children of fallen Canadian soldiers. Matthew’s father, Warrant Officer Frank Mellish, was killed in 2006 by Taliban insurgents in Afghanistan. Matthew has received $10,000 from the Canadian Hero Fund to cover tuition and books.

A nice break for a young student who has obviously had a rough ride, right?

Wrong, you imperial jingoist!

When a similar initiative, dubbed “Project Hero,” was being launched earlier in the spring and universities across Canada were signing on, a group of professors from the University of Regina released an “open letter” to the president of the university objecting to its participation in the scholarship program.

They wrote that the Hero Fund (Update: We have been informed by Hero Fund administration that they are unaffiliated with Project Hero. The Hero Fund relies strictly on private donations, whereas individual universities foot the bill for Project Hero recipients.) Project Hero was “a glorification of Canadian imperialism in Afghanistan and elsewhere.”

“We do not want our university associated with the political impulse to unquestioning glorification of military action,” they argued.

Though despite the professors’ valiant (dare I say, heroic?) efforts to get the university to ditch the program, the University of Regina is still participating in the Project Hero scholarship. And now the Hero Fund has awarded its first scholarship. Bloody compatriots! Surely an extended appeal to Matthew Mellish directly is the next step in these professors’ pursuits of military modesty. Right? Or will bashfulness suddenly seize their pens when ideology is confronted with a real-life story?

Anti-war movements on campus are not new. Poppies have become the target of late, quickly becoming an unfashionable statement on many Canadian campuses. Some students and professors choose to abstain from wearing the Remembrance Day symbol because they believe it glorifies war. Others opt to wear white poppies, which is seen as a symbol for peace and nonviolence.

Then there are more direct approaches; in 2007, for example, the University of Victoria’s student union banned military recruiting at the campus job fair, a move which was later overturned by a general vote. At Laurier that same year, students chose to protest across the street from a veterans’ memorial, only after conceding to pressure and abandoning their original plan to protest on the memorial during ceremonies.

This sort of in-your-face pacifism is what leaves as bad taste in some people’s mouths. Choosing not to wear a poppy on Rememberance Day is a personal choice–lighting a torch to the stash is not. The University of Regina professors can exclude the word “hero” from their own military vernacular if they so desire, but no one asked them to serve as university administration conscience. They have the option to keep their change in the pockets, and the decorum–hopefully now–to cease the politicization of a student’s personal tragedy.

Answer: no.

Faculty members  at the University of Regina have come out against the University’s adoption of “Project Hero,” a program by which scholarships are provided to children of those who have died while serving in the Canadian military.

Related: Should soldiers’ children get special scholarships? Answer: yes.

One can almost hear the outrage before it is even spoken: Canadian soliders are heroes, people will say. They put their lives at risk for us everyday, and we must do everything we can to support our brave men and women in uniform.

This kind of thinking is so widespread, I’m sure many people accept it as an unquestionable article of faith. To them, the U of R faculty must seem perverse, if not diabolical, in their thinking. But I’m with the profs on this one.

To be sure, military life, especially life in a combat zone, cannot be easy. One does not have to be a soldier to know that it’s hard, dirty, dangerous work, often done a world away from home, and often done in the defense of our highest principles. For the record, I don’t oppose Canada’s operations in Afghanistan, and I’m proud of my fellow Canadians who are trying to bring hope to a region where hope is in short supply.

But let’s not let all that blind us to the reality of military conflict. Our soldiers are not just there putting their lives on the line. They are there killing people. That’s why they have guns. That’s what armies do. That’s why they call it war. Don’t get me wrong: it may be necessary, but if it is, it is a necessary evil.

And that’s why I can’t support things like Project Hero. It implies that military officers have a special status simply by virtue of being in the military. It suggests that the whole class of people is to be venerated, and that military service is a special calling to which only a select group of heroes can aspire. And if the military is always to be honoured, then the things that they are called upon to do are inherently honorable, and that, in the end, is to glorify war and its attendant violence. The fact that Project Hero provides funds for the children of dead soldiers has to imply what Wilfred Owen famously termed the old lie: that it is sweet and noble to die for one’s country.

Yes, members of the military do hard jobs that are dangerous and important. But so do police, and firefighters, and lots of other people. Even professors have died in the line of duty. Let’s be grateful to those who serve in uniform, but let’s do them the honour of treating them honestly in the process.

Children of fallen soldiers will get four years free tuition at participating schools

According to The Belleville Intelligencer, an Ontario-based military reserve officer is trying to persuade all Canadian universities to offer free tuition to the children of soldiers who have died in the line of duty in Afghanistan.

Kevin Reed, a 42-year-old honorary lieutenant-colonel of an army reserve unit in southwestern Ontario, says he was inspired by the work of Rick Hillier, Canada’s retired general. Hillier is now the chancellor at Memorial University of Newfoundland, which was the first to institute the policy.

So far, Reed says the University of Ottawa, his alma mater, and the Universities of Windsor and Calgary are all on board. He says OttawaU’s president, Allan Rock, was quick to support the idea.

The details vary, but Reed says the schools have all agreed to offer four years of paid tuition, plus two years of room and board (provided the student lives on campus) to all children of Canadian Forces staff who are killed in an operational mission since the start of Canada’s war in Afghanistan. As of now, Reed says there are about 30 Canadian children who have lost a parent in the conflict.

And how does he intend to spread the word to other schools?

“I’ve just been going to one university at a time, and we’ll continue to do so until we get ‘em all.”

Now that school’s out for the summer, my family is planning our annual trip to MarineLand. But with seven people involved, going to an amusement park for a day is no longer a vacation. It’s officially classified as a military operation. The problem is, I’m not a General. Or a Lieutenant. Or even an assistant [...]

Now that school’s out for the summer, my family is planning our annual trip to MarineLand. But with seven people involved, going to an amusement park for a day is no longer a vacation. It’s officially classified as a military operation.

The problem is, I’m not a General. Or a Lieutenant. Or even an assistant drummer boy. With my mom, dad, and 18-year-old sister ranking ahead of me, I barely have the authority of the drummer boy’s secretary. The one who isn’t allowed to answer the phone. Or sharpen pencils.

I’m four years older than David, seven years older than Michael, and 13 years older than Sam. Yes, my parents will be crispy 50-year-olds by the time Sam is in Kindergarten, but that’s a separate (and kinda repulsive) issue. The point is, my family obviously isn’t seniority-based.

I’m going to university in less than a month and a half. I’ve been breathing air four years longer than any one of my brothers. If my family were a law firm, I would have made partner by now. But my parents are denying my natural right to Bossy Older Brother privileges.

Sure, in terms of mini-van seating arrangements, I’m ranked ahead of David, Michael and Sam. But that still puts me in the back row, in the land of no arm rests, where cup-holders are spoken of only by the Village Elders, who remember the days of prosperity when it was possible to sip from a Coke and then, in a feat of luxury, tuck it into a convenient little pocket.

I’m squished into one bench seat with all the other lowly Privates, who aren’t old enough to comprehend the etiquette of eating Doritos. When any of my younger brothers eat orange-powdered cheesy ass, they suddenly start taking deep, open-mouthed breaths, deciding that the time is right to make up for every time they’ve held their breath underwater.

And then there’s the debris factor: when anyone under the age of 12 eats a Dorito, they end up with more powdered cheese on their fingers than what was originally on the chip. After an hour-long drive, thanks to three younger brothers exuding second-hand Dorito, I’ve aspirated a lethal amount of concentrated, processed cheddar.

It’s an unfortunate scientific fact: hot Dorito breath rises. In the midst of such poor air quality, my body will kick into survival mode, forcing me to take short, shallow breaths as a desperate defence mechanism. I don’t know which would be worse: suffocating in a dense cloud of Dorito powder, or being resuscitated by David’s Dorito-powdered breath.

Worst of all, my parents don’t understand the backwash situation that ravages the Land of No Arm Rests. They don’t allow private water bottle ownership. Water bottles are community owned. Even if I get first-lips on a bottle of water, within minutes, the entire supply will be tainted. After enduring the triple-gauntlet of my younger brothers- also known as the Triforce of Cheesy Sips- the contents of the water bottles are more solid than liquid.

There was only one thing to do: overthrow the Republic of the Back Seat of the Van and form a complete dictatorship.