T.L. Morrisey

Showing posts with label Toronto. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Toronto. Show all posts

Wednesday, August 30, 2023

The CBC, Pyongyang, North Korea


May as well be a CBC news reader 


In 1936, the Canadian Radio Broadcasting Commission (CRBC) became the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation (CBC), which was a crown corporation. The CBC had a better organizational structure, more secure funding through the use of a licence fee on receiving sets (initially set at $2.50), and less vulnerability to political pressure.[84] When Bennett's Conservatives were governing and the Liberals were in Opposition, the Liberals accused the network of being biased towards the Conservatives. During the 1935 election campaign, the CRBC broadcast a series of 15 minutes soap operas called Mr. Sage which were critical of King and the Liberal Party. Decried as political propaganda, the incident was one factor in King's decision to replace the CRBC.[85]

                                                --from the Wiki page for Prime Minister MacKenzie-King 


So, right from the start the CBC has been accused of being biased, but it has never been as bloated and obese as it is now, $1.5B a year government subsidy--radio, television, cable, podcasts, and internet--and a history of being accused of bias. But it has also never been as biased as it is now with its woke, progressive agenda. 

    At times, it seems the CBC is the alter-ego of Justin Trudeau and it is then that I feel the CBC is broadcasting from some hermit kingdom, Ottawa, Ontario, always oblivious to their audience and persistent in promoting their woke causes. Maybe it is Pyongyang, North Korea, Justin likes dictators like Fidel Castro or the president of China and, like Justin, the CBC have no consideration for the audience, no consideration of service to their public, no consideration to tell us anything about Canada that actually exists, in fact no respect for  Canadians, no history, no religion and no religious broadcasts, not even any  programmes on Indigenous spirituality and culture, no programmes on the history of Quebec or Quebec culture, very little about any part of Canada outside of Toronto, no cultural regional broadcasts of concerts (as you will hear on BBC Radio Three, concerts recorded in regional Quebec), nothing on the culture of Canada unless it's Toronto-centric and biased and woke and progressive, no idea of the daily life of average Canadians, no programmes about the values of Canadians, nothing about the history and people they now demean as "European settlers" just as they demean pregnant women as "pregnant people"; but if a statue of Sir John A. Macdonald or Queen Victoria is being pulled down or splattered with paint, they'll be there rooting for the protesters, promoting the cause, condemning historical figures who helped build the country so that entities like the CBC can exist, doing all they can to attack the country under their three categories of interest: diversity, gender fluidity, and climate change. Do I exaggerate? Of course I exaggerate to make my point, but I am not exaggerating too much. 

    Considering how much money they get the CBC ratings are not good. If you want "news" and not opinion, watch CTV News, Global, or one of the other networks; maybe watch PBS Newshour or listen to the BBC World Service. A lot of money is being spent on the CBC's National News on cable, every night these people are seen jet setting to remote parts of the world to report on climate change or gender fluidity; I've seen them deep sea diving to report on the coral reefs, visiting London to interview Princess Anne, at the South Pole to report on climate change, and elsewhere; it isn't cheap, it's expensive.

    And I remember Wendy Mesley, a former Montrealer and one of the CBC's finest journalists, who was forced out of the CBC; as it was reported, she mentioned the French title of a 1968 book by Pierre Vallières that alludes to the "N" word, she was trying to educate these Toronto people at the CBC, but this made them feel uncomfortable and not safe.  I remember, as well, one of the CBC's woke dramas -- all of their dramas are woke -- in which high school girls were having fits and convulsions because of some illness, as far as I could make out, it was called "conversion" (maybe this drama sailed over my head); it took a while but it seems, without actually saying it, that the "conversion" these girls were reacting to was related to their sexuality, their gender fluidity, and then they trotted out soil pollution as the cause. Go figure. Meanwhile, on the other networks, not a word about woke or progressive causes, just Hudson and Rex and Private Eyes, entertainment that entertains, not propaganda disguised as drama. The CBC has even turned Murdoch Mysteries into a woke drama; is Heartland next to go? 

    When a broadcaster, like the CBC, whether it is Pravda in Moscow or Granma in Havana, or the harridan yelling the news on North Korean television, begins with a conclusion and a premise, it is not news, it is opinion, it is biased. I know there are good reporters at the CBC, Wendy Mesley was one of them as is Andrew Nichols, David Common, and Natasha Fatah. The CBC is Toronto, GTA-centric, they seem to think that Toronto represents Canada and their progressive and woke opinions are Canadian values, but they aren't. And if you watch the evening news on cable CBC, with its woman announcer, good luck seeing even one man reporting, it is a no man zone, it has become a mostly woman news broadcast. It all speaks to an exhausted corporation that is on the downward slide.

Sunday, December 2, 2012

Wednesday, January 11, 2012

Meeting David McFadden at the Morrissey Tavern in 1993





When we would visit Toronto in the early 1990s we would visit with David McFadden. David is one of my favourite Canadian authors, a poet, novelist, and traveller.  From right: SM, CZ, DMc.

Thursday, December 22, 2011

Friday, July 2, 2010

Gates at the Bridal Path, Toronto

                                     This is not the presidential palace of a banana republic but someone's home 
                                                                             in the Bridal Path area of Toronto.



                                                 So, this is what is behind those heavy gates...

Sunday, June 27, 2010

Toronto City Hall, 10:30 p.m. on June 11, 2010



I took the usual tourist photographs earlier in the day, then we had meetings all afternoon, and on my way back to where I was staying I found Toronto's City Hall ominous and purple, and strangely alien, towering over me.

Wednesday, June 16, 2010

Poets at Toronto City Hall


At Toronto City Hall, during the League of Canadian Poets' AGM, 11 June 2010; from left to right: Chris Lowther, David Day, Gloe Cormie, Stephen Morrissey, and Cathy Ford. Photo by Sonja Dunn.