New Media

Merry Christmas, everyone. I already did the Chanukah thing on this blog, but I suspect the majority of the readership is more of the mistletoe and stockings crowd. Enjoy the holiday.

For all those stuck at Vancouver’s snowbound airport or who had their Christmas plans canceled, I hope you’ve managed to cobble together some kind of alternative plan. In the meantime, here’s a Charlie Brown Heavy Metal Christmas to cheer you up a bit. Enjoy.

At first the snow that blanketed Vancouver this past week was not so bad. Sure, it made it hard to drive up the steep slope to our condo, but at least it made the city look pretty. Here you can see the city skyline from my building.

But yesterday afternoon, on my way home from Kin’s market, I came across the Snow Gods. First, there was Frosty the Shoggoth

Nearby, lurked the Leafy One That Cannot Be Named

And today, the city suffers under a demon-spawned cold snap that has knocked out Skytrain and turned our roads into slippery traps for the unwary. White Christmas? More like an attack by snow goons from another dimension. Just my interpretation, but if you’ve got a better one, I’d love to hear it.

Or celebrate your family’s traditional holiday. It’s all good. Merry Christmas, my Christian friends. And for my unsentimental atheist pals, have a, um, nice break from the work week. Meanwhile, I’m off to a party this evening to celebrate the Festival of Lights with family, complete with dreidels, latkes and presents all around. Eight crazy nights, indeed.

Ever wonder what the heck Chanukah’s all about? This video provides no real clues, but it’s funny.

If you still want to know what the festival of lights is all about, there’s always Wikipedia. Or there’s my version, which may or may not be entirely accurate:

The Maccabees, a ragtag leadership of some hard-boiled Jewish insurgents bled Antiochus IV’s forces after the decidedly non-multicultural king decided to sacrifice a pig on the altar in the Jewish temple in Jerusalem, around 175 BCE (Somewhere in Tehran right about now, Mahmoud Ahdaminejad is scratching his head trying to figure out what Jews were doing in the land of Israel before 1945.). The revolt was successful, Antiochus’ supporters melted away and the Jews found themselves in possession of the Temple (to be clear, not just any temple. This is THE Temple). But sadly, the bad guys had desecrated the place before they skipped town.

The Maccabees and their followers wanted to get that temple back in shape ASAP, since after all, it was a temple to G-d, not just any lightning-bolt chucking Hellenistic deity. Part of the process of rededicating the temple was burning some consecrated olive oil, but they only had enough of the stuff to last a day. This was less than ideal. Miraculously, the oil lasted a full eight days, which was enough to “cleanse the temple”. Ever after, Jews celebrated the holiday by stuffing their faces with very fattening oil-cooked foods like potato pancakes.

Don’t ask me how gambling with spinning blocks of wood figures into it. If anyone knows, please leave a comment.

Finally, it seems Canadians are winning the battle for hearts and minds on Afghanistan. We’ve already long since won that battle in the country where the actual fighting is taking place (Read the poll numbers Terry Glavin has collected here). Afghans want democracy, don’t want the Taliban and are desperate for international support to help bring these things about. But now it seems even my fellow Canucks are starting to get it. Some signs of progress:

A tireless worker and activist for women’s rights in Afghanistan, CASC member Lauryn Oates is profiled in the Globe and Mail this week as one of the Top 10 To Watch in 2009. An excerpt:

“Canadians seem so focused on the bad, and certainly that is compelling. But for some reason it doesn’t seem to sell to point out all the good things. Just in our small project, we’ve seen incredible changes.”

She said the Afghans she encounters, all ordinary, mostly rural people, are terrified at the prospect of a return to Taliban control.

In the past year, Ms. Oates said, Canadian Women for Women has helped build a new school for girls near Jalalabad from $75,000 raised entirely by Canadian donations.

Contrary to naysayers, Ms. Oates said, ordinary Afghans want international aid and intervention.

“People have this incredible resilience,” she said. “If they’re willing to go on, we have to be behind them. The least we can do is stand by them. This is not about charity or pity. I would never tolerate this in my country.

“I’ve learned how to be a human being there. There is such unbelievable hospitality and kindness, contrasted against such cruelty.”

And in the Georgia Straight blog, soldiers and UBC students Tylere Couture and Sverre Frisch, who have been on the ground in Afghanistan, demolish the foundation of stupidities mouthed by Langara professor Peter Prontzos and offer their own pragmatic assessment. An excerpt from their argument:

These groups have to be confronted with blunt force, the kind of force which requires large quantities of professional, coordinated, and well armed soldiers, not blue helmets under a peacekeeping mandate whose funding is being spent on social projects in Canada. Thus, there is no more a political solution to Afghanistan alone than there is a military solution to Afghanistan alone; the two have to be combined to provide the best possible outcome in Afghanistan.

Canada is in a war against thugs who throw acid in young women heading to school (CNN). It’s a war against psychotic nihilists who use children as remote-controlled suicide bombs (AP). We’re fighting fascists who, when the Taliban owned much of Afghanistan, turned the country into a 5-diamond hotel for international terrorists, while all resources went to subjugating and radicalizing the population.

That part of the world will never have a chance at freedom and a “normal” existence in the community of nations unless we win this fight. I’m glad to see more and more Canadians are on board. If you’d like to be a part of this movement in solidarity with Afghans, here’s your formal invitation to join the cause.

There’s tough times all over and in Vancouver, the poor and marginalized are suffering even worse than usual under an Arctic freeze-up. Kudos to Vancouver’s bloggers, twitterers and other geeks for stepping in to save the day.

Gillian Shaw reports today on a Twitter flash mob assembling in the downtown eastside to distribute warm clothing (Vancouver Sun). An excerpt:

“Here’s a coat,” said Steve Jagger, a Vancouver tech entrepreneur on Twitter as @sjagger, rooting around in the bottom of a bag to come up with something for a homeless man looking to warm up. “No, take this one instead, it’s a better fit and it’s cool.”

Kudos also to John Chow, who has raised over $12,000 for the Union Gospel Mission at a time when Vancouver’s hungry and homeless appear to need our help the most. John is better known for being better known – with 44,203 registered subscribers, his “Make Money Online“-themed site probably beats the readership of most Canadian print publications. Way to give back.

Miss604‘s Best of 604 Awards raised $1,800 for the Greater Vancouver Food Bank Society (which included my donation as well).

Meanwhile, Beautynight stuffed 500 Christmas stockings for their clients hoping to make positive lifestyle changes.

I often blather on about social media and Web 2.0 stuff, so for all you out there who were wondering about whether Twitter and social media really matter, here are some great examples of instant successes that have brought about positive change in the community. It actually works. If anyone else has come upon other examples of this kind of social-media making a difference locally in the last while, go ahead and leave a comment with the details.