303.1 Every board shall support pupils who want to establish and lead,(a) activities or organizations that promote gender equity;(b) activities or organizations that promote anti-racism;(c) activities or organizations that promote the awareness and understanding of, and respect for, people with disabilities; or(d) activities or organizations that promote the awareness and understanding of, and respect for, people of all sexual orientations and gender identities, including organizations with the name gay-straight alliance or another name.

Ontario Legislature
The first week of December Charles McVety and friends, including his provincial political sidekick Rondo Thomas held a news conference sponsored at Queen’s Park by MPP Frank Klees to express his and their displeasure of Bill C-13,  Accepting Schools Act, or the anti-bullying bill, which is supported by the Ontario opposition parties.  As well the bill is supported by public and Catholic educators.

The religious right news conference was called because of upset over the last clause above – which gets twisted into the most God-awful anti-gay nonsense in McVetys fundamentalist world. His website, Stop Corrupting Children, set up to oppose anti-bullying, blends gay-straight alliances into persecution of churches using school properties to curriculum guides for Ontario schools. Never mind what one has to do with the other as long as enough outrage and confusion can be generated. Jack Fonseca, (Campaign Life Catholic) who is not a Catholic educator stated that parents are outraged.  Not so fast Jack. Stick with the legislation and stop attacking anothers Catholic  faith.

“With respect to the premier being Catholic, the Catholic Church has very clear moral doctrine … And it’s not changeable,” Fonseca said Tuesday. “Dalton McGuinty, nor any other person that wears the cultural badge of Catholic and goes to church in order to look good come election time — they don’t have the right to change Catholic teaching.

“So, Dalton McGuinty, unfortunately, he’s not a great Catholic on the moral issues. He supports abortion on demand, he supports taxpayer funding of abortion, he supports gay marriage, he opposes the traditional definition of marriage in law. That’s not a very strong Catholic.”

Rondo Thomas came out with some whoppers such as: The premier’s mother said to him, ‘Dalton, I didn’t raise you this way.’ I rest my case.” The Premier’s mother did no such thing. James Bow at Bow. James Bow. was outraged at the Rondo Thomas performance, but not for reasons the men at the table think. The media conference below did not get quite the outraged support that I think was the objective. The support of MPPs on both sides of the aisle is not there.

Akwwaaard.
This media conference is an education on the religious right, complete with buzzwords, the muddling and misinformation.

The next step is the email blasts, (the severe ‘backlash of the 10s of thousands’!) through the various groups McVety represents, including his Institute for Canadian Values. This one went out this week.

I want to personally thank you for taking a stand to protect children from Dalton McGuinty’s radical six gender education.

Your voice is making a difference.

Many people ask me why McGuinty is forcing every child in Ontario schools to question his or her gender and for Catholic Christian schools to have homosexual clubs.

I believe the answer is that he is giving in to very aggressive special interest groups that want to indoctrinate our children to their way of thinking.
Since we alerted parents to this problem the Premier has been flooded with calls and emails. He needs more.
MPP’s with last names starting with letters N – Z did not receive your email.

The ‘unstoppable groundswell’ for MPP’s with last names starting with the letters N-Z just hasn’t happened yet. Heaven only knows what MPP’s with last names starting with A-M have received, if online reaction at McVety’s Canadian Times is any indication, even McVety Institute for Canadian Values supporters are wary this go-around.

The Ontario legislature is in recess until February 21st.

An international religious group that claims to help men and women “overcome” their homosexuality is generating controversy because of its charitable status in Canada.

As part of its mission statement Exodus Global Alliance, based in Ajax, Ont., says it is “serving people affected by homosexuality through counselling, support groups and other services.”

“Our issue is that they purport to be able to cure homosexuality. Homosexuality is not an mental illness,” said Matthew McLauchlin, co-chair of the federal NDP’s Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender Committee.

“If all we were talking about was promoting a certain religious view of homosexuality we wouldn’t be having this conversation,” he said. “They are promoting something that’s directly against the public interest.”

McLauchlin, who ran for the NDP in three federal elections, said the Quebec wing of the NDP unanimously adopted a position to strip the organization of its charitable status at a convention in Gatineau on Nov. 20.

Can’t hurt to have a provincial wing of a party take note, but acampaign has been going on since September to have Exodus Global Alliance based in Ajax Ontario investigated for false claims and have it’s charitable status revoked.

In August of this year New Zealand had the balls to refuse Exodus Global Alliance charitable status. Exodus Global Alliance has operated in Canada since 1999. As far as I’m aware there is one cure the gay ministry left under the Exodus Global/International umbrella called Living Waters and located in Winnipeg.

Exodus has a long history of denying it’s role and hiding it’s agenda and Exodus Global Alliance has not been forthcoming with the Charity Directorate.

“Our goal is to help people dealing with homosexuality,” said Bryan Kliewer, the executive director of Exodus Global Alliance.

“Our particular focus is to help people who want to live a life that is congruent with their Christian faith,” said Kliewer, who went on to defend his organization’s charitable status.

“We provide educational services, connect people with churches and professional counsellors and those activities satisfy the rules the Canada Revenue Agency has for charitable purpose.”

However, Exodus does not mention homosexuality when describing the work it does on its CRA application form. It does mention it provides help dealing with abuse and other family issues and Kliewer maintains it has nothing to hide despite the omission.

There are Christian ministries in Canada able and willing to assist people struggling with sexual identity which do not exact thousands of dollars from clients, make false promises and claims, who do not lie, use discredited and false information or practice counselling without qualifications. Exodus is not one of them.

The constant in the Canadian branch appears to be Rev. Jack Hannah, a Baptist minister and creationist who is the Canadian representative of CreationResearch.net . Exodus started in 1999 with

CBC
St. John’s Telegram (via Christian Governance)

Who is blogging?
pretty random – Lord Help Us

Update: I’ve set up a sub-page to help organize a campaign. Visit http://www.slapupsidethehead.com/action/

On Wednesday, I posted a story about how Exodus Global Alliance—a religious organisation that offers “freedom from homosexuality” through prayer and something they call sexual reorientation therapy—was denied charitable status in New Zealand.

This piqued my curiosity, and a quick search of Canada’s registered charities showed that Exodus is, indeed, enjoying tax benefits as a registered charity here in Canada.

Since Wednesday’s post, a lot of people have emailed me in agreement that “curing” gays should not be considered a charitable activity in Canada and have been asking what they can do about it. Here’s what I know, and what I think can be done.

First, though, a bit about Exodus Global Alliance and what they do.

What is Exodus?

Exodus is a U.S.-based religious organisation whose slogan is “proclaiming freedom from homosexuality.” Despite all scientific evidence, Exodus claims that homosexuality is a mental disorder and that gay people can change through prayer and reparative therapy.

Exodus, in association with the American Family Association, a U.S.-based, anti-gay lobby group, is mainly responsible for the Love Won Out conference, held several times a year across the U.S. and Canada. This conference includes unaccredited counseling sessions, seminars for dealing with gay family members as if they are disordered, and prayer sessions.

Why is this a bad thing?

Reinforcing the idea that people should detest their natural sexual orientation can lead to demonstrable harm, but more basically, sexual orientation is not a recognised disorder and cannot be changed. There are simply no peer-reviewed studies to support it. The best that Exodus can cite are participant surveys likeJones and Yarhouse, published in a non-scientific journal by InterVarsity Press, a Christian publishing company; Schaeffer, et al., published by the in-house press of Biola University, a private Evangelical Christian school in Los Angeles; andPonticelli, who hand-selected a statistically unusable sample size of only 15 participants for her results. As participant surveys, none of these are objective studies. (A participant survey of suicide cult members, for example, would suggest that joining such a cult is a life improvement because the members would report satisfaction and believe that they’re doing the right thing. It’s an extreme example, but it demonstrates the flaw.) And yet, even these surveys largely show that a majority of participants were unsatisfied with their experiences at Exodus!

While Exodus likes to spin the same argument around and claim that the “gay lifestyle” (whatever that means) is harmful even if gay people don’t agree, this is not backed up by the medical and psychological community. The world’s largest and most well-respected medical organisations have all gone on record to say that homosexuality is not a recognized disorder, that gay people are not inherently worse off than straight people, that sexual orientation is unchangeable, and that attempts to change it often result in serious psychological harm. These organisations are easily citable and instantly recognisable, including the American Psychological Association, the American Medical Association, the American Academy of Pediatrics, the National Association of Social Workers, the American Counseling Association, and many others.

The consensus from the medical community is further evidenced by Exodus’ spectacular failures, including the coming out of two of its founding members and several former Exodus leaders, as well as the countless private members who have left their organisation confused and distraught.

Do Exodus’ activities violate Canada’s rules for charitable status?

Probably. All registered charities operating in Canada must provide what the Canada Revenue Agency calls a “public benefit.” This is a long legal definition that I can’t claim to fully understand, but, of particular note, a charitity’s activities must be “regarded as valuable by the common understanding of enlightened opinion,” and such value “must be weighed against any harm that may arise from the proposed activity and a net benefit must result.”

Since homosexuality is not a recognised disorder by any respected medical organisation, it’s questionable as to what benefit could come out of trying to treat it as one. Moreoever, the consensus in the medical community is that all attempts to treat homosexuality as a disorder may cause serious psychological harm. With no clear benefit, and demonstrable harm from Exodus’ actions, I think there’s a strong case to argue that Exodus’ activities do not meet Canada’s criteria for charitable status.

Exodus has already been awarded charitable status; can it be revoked?

Yes. Charitable status can be revoked for one of three reasons: Voluntary revocation (unlikely in this case), Revocation for failure to file taxes (also unlikely), or revocation for a cause other than a failure to file. The latter is complicated, but states that charitable status can be revoked for “a failure to comply with the requirements of registration,” which may include the “public benefit test.”

According to Revenue Canada, claims of public benefit by any charity “may be [...] rebutted by concerns raised,” and there is definitely legal precedent of this.

How do I raise a concern with Revenue Canada?

Contact Revenue Canada’s Charities Directorate at 1-800-267-2384 and ask for your concerns to be directed to the Charities Compliance Division, or write to them:

You can also submit your concerns via email. CharitiesComplianceDivisi.LPRA@cra-arc.gc.ca

While you’re at it, contact the Office of the Commissioner and Office of the Deputy Commissioner of the CRA:

I recommend simply stating something along the lines of the following:

I’m concerned that the activities being performed in Canada by Exodus Global Alliance, a registered charity, do not meet the criteria of a public benefit as defined by the Canada Revenue Agency.

Exodus’ primary activities include the promotion and treatment of homosexuality as a mental disorder—a notion not supported by the medical and psychological community. Since homosexuality has not been listed as a disorder in medical literature since the mid 1970s, it does not require treatment as promoted by Exodus. Several respected medical and psychological associations, incuding the American Medical Assocation and the American Psychological Association, have issued official statements attesting that such treatments may even result in serious psychological harm.

For these reasons, and in the interest of Canadians, I believe Exodus Global Alliance’s charitable status should be re-evaluated according to the Canada Revenue Agency’s public benefit criteria.

I think it’s reasonable to expect that, with enough expressed concern, and backed by a supply of evidence that Exodus simply can’t refute, the CRA will launch the process of revocation for a cause on Exodus Global Alliance. But they need to hear our concerns first. Slap into action, share this story with your friends, and let the Canada Revenue Agency know that “curing” gays shouldn’t be a charitable activity in Canada.

Where can I learn more about these gay “curing” societies?

The activities and distortions of several Exodus-like organisations are well-documented. I strongly recommend visiting Truth Wins Out, an organisation dedicated to exposing the myths and political motivations behind organisations like Exodus. Box Turtle Bulletin also regularly posts exhaustive investigations into these organisations, exposing the deliberate distortions used to back up their claims.

Take Action! “Curing” gays shouldn’t be a charitable activity in Canada. Help put a stop to phony charities and Slap into Action!

Slap Upside The Head

Update: Xtra has an article on Mark McIntyre’s campaign, including the benefits Exodus Global Alliance receives from having Canadian charitable status. Ex-gay group’s charitable status questioned

As part of the Marquee program, various festivals received larger amounts in funding. There are a number of Marquee festivals and events in Canada and $100m has been allocated over the two years of the program to boost them. As a Tier One festival (i.e. with attendance of more than 250,000) Pride Toronto qualified for 20% of last year’s expenditure budget up to a maximum of $3m. The figure of $397,500 constitutes 20% of the 2008 festival budget and this was the criteria for the program. Significant funds are needed to achieve enhancements that will substantially increase attractiveness to tourists, and all funding was allocated specifically for enhancements that encourage tourism. It was understood from the outset that the program would be managed by Industry Canada.

Pride Toronto is thrilled to have been able to participate in this program and we believe that the recent success of the festival shows that the funding was justified and the expenditure will prove to be worthwhile. As for the issues surrounding Minister Ablonczy, we have no ability to comment on the workings of government. We appreciate the Minister’s time and attention to this issue, and we wish her well at all times.

Pride Toronto in response to MP Brad Trost (C- Saskatoon-Humboldt) at Lifesite News.

“The pro-life and the pro-family community should know and understand that the tourism funding money that went to the gay pride parade in Toronto was not government policy, was not supported by – I think it’s safe to say by a large majority – of the MPs. This was a very isolated decision.”

The Toronto parade is in it’s 29th year. Macleans Magazine looks at the Conservative claims of fund allocation shifting from The Ministry of Small Business and Tourism to Industry. Applications for summer festival funding closed May8th. Diane Ablonczy’s name is still on the applications for Small Business and Tourism.  The Marquee Event Funding Program is part of the January federal economic stimulus package.  The spokesman for Industry Minister Tony Clement now says Ablonczy’s office wasn’t equipped to handle the 100 million dollar program.

David Aiken says out of 12 Conservative MP’s contacted only two would go on record.

“It’s a tourism event, like any other tourism event,” said Calgary Conservative MP Lee Richardson. “It attracts as many people in Toronto as the Molson Indy.”

Dona Cadman, a first-term Conservative MP from Surrey, B.C., said she supports Ms. Ablonczy’s decision.

“I’m proud to see this reaching out to all sectors of the Canadian mosaic,” Cadman said in an e-mailed message.

Charles McVety made an issue out of this two weeks ago.
McVety=Campaign Life=LifeSite

 Diane Ablonczy C- Calgary Nose-Hill

Who is blogging?

Montreal Simon: The Bigot Burning of Diane Ablonczy
Accidental Deliberation: Irresponsible
BigCityLib:  Has Diane Ablonczy Been Demoted For Being Too Gay Friendly?
Canadian Soapbox: Harperites Object to Money Offered Providing Homosexuals Or Bisexuals with Equal Status
Impolitical:  Governing Ugly
Baptist Potluck: Another reason to pray for PM Harper

Liberal Arts and Minds:  Think the Religious Right Has No Voice in Government?
The Galloping Beaver: The Reform Party Long Knives seem to be out
God Keep Our Land: Good on you Brad

Below the fold: The gay, lesbian and bisexual events funded by the federal government including in Brad Trosts area.

Saskatoon Star Phoenix – The Saskatoon Diversity Network received $9,000 from Canadian Heritage this year for last June’s Pride Festival.
David Akin’s On the Hill:

• Recipient: Canadian Lesbian and Gay Archives
  Minister: Hon. James Moore
  Funding received – $175,000.00
  Purpose: Arts in Communities
  Date: 2009-03-26
• Recipient: Vancouver Out on Screen Film and Video Society, Vancouver, British Colombia
  Minister: Hon. Josée Verner
  Funding received: $32,000.00
  Purpose: Project: 20th Anniversary Vancouver Queer Film Festival, Programming
  Date: 2008-2009, March 4, 2008
• Recipient: Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transsexual, Transgender Pride Toronto
  Funding received: $21,000.00
  Date: ** Last modified, 2008-02-19
• Recipient: Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transsexual, and Transgenderal Pride Toronto, Toronto, Ontario, Canada
  Minister: Hon. Josée Verner
  Funding received: $35,000.00
  Purpose: Arts in Community
  Date: 2007-04-23
• Recipient: Inside Out Lesbian & Gay Film Festival Inc. Toronto, Ontario, Canada
  Funding received: $20,000.00
  Purpose: Project: Toronto Lesbian and Gay Film and Video Festival, Programming
  Date: 2008-2009
• Recipient: Winnipeg Gay & Lesbian Film Society Inc, Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada
  Funding received: 4,000.00
  Purpose: Project: Reel Pride Film Festival, Programming
  Date: 2008-2009
• Recipient: Reelout Arts Project Inc., Kingston, Ontario, Canada
  Funding received: $7,000.00
  Purpose: Project: Reelout Queer Film & Video Festival, Programming
  Date: 2008-2009
• Recipient: Queer City Cinema Inc, Regina, Saskatchewan, Canada
  Funding received: $13,000.00
  Purpose: Project: Queer City Cinema 7, Programming
  Date: 2008-2009
• Recipient: Inside Out Lesbian and Gay Film Festival Inc.Funding received – $26,000.00
  Date: 2008-2009 Last modified, 2008-02-19
• Recipient: Darren McAllister, Ontario Canada,
  Minister: Hon. Peter MacKayFunding received – $550.00
  Purpose: To allow Darren McAllister to present his short film “Confessions of a Drag Queen” at the Outfest Gay and Lesbian Film Festival in Los Angeles, California from July 6 to 17, 2006.
  Date: 2006- 2007
• Recipient : Michael Mew, British Columbia, Canada,
  Minister: Hon. Peter MacKayFunding received – $900
  Purpose: To allow Michael Mew to present his short film “Peking Turkey” at the London Gay and Lesbian Film Festival in London, United Kingdom from March 28 to April 6, 2007.
  Date:2006-2007

As promised, the following updates my previous post on the Parliamentary Pro-Life Caucus, a secretive group of pro-life parliamentarians in Ottawa. Interestingly, the article, after being cross-posted at Religious Right Alert, was picked up by the blog of Equipping Christians for the Public Square, a religious right political advocacy group currently headed up by a former Pro-Life Caucus secretary, Tim Bloedow.

The most common means of linking MPs to the Pro-Life Caucus is to study their voting records on abortion-related bills in Parliament, such as Ken Epp’s Bill C-484. Lloyd Mackey of CanadianChristianity.com first took this tack in 2004, and in doing so illustrated some of the problems: both Stephen Harper and Paul Martin show up as members.

Others, such as David Akin, suggest that we can identify the members of the Caucus based on their attendance at the March for Life. He made a list of 18 Members of Parliament spotted during the 2006 demo; Conservatives outnumbered Liberals by about four to one, which suggests that at least on this occasion, the Liberals weren’t showing up in representative numbers.

The leading list for the moment, however, seems to be won circulated last fall election time by the Abortion Rights Coalition of Canada. This was the list adapted, for example, by Unrepentant Old Hippie last December in her analysis of Rod Bruinooge’s “kidneys’ rights” op-ed, his first shot across the bows as chairman of the Caucus. I’ve taken that list and combined it with Akin’s suggested criterion – attendance at the Campaign Life Coalition March for Life demos in Ottawa.

The following list identifies MPs according to four categories, then: whether they’ve been at one of the Marches; whether they were designated as pro-life MPs in previous election campaigns; whether they opposed bestowing an Order of Canada upon controversial doctor Henry Morgentaler; and whether they voted for Ken Epp’s fetal homicide bill (Bill C-484) on second reading last year. These final three categories are simply the ones suggested by the existing Abortion Rights Coalition work.

Until such time as the parliamentarians involved perform their democratic obligation to the public and explain for themselves whether they are affiliated with this caucus or not, we can do no more than speculate. Repeated apperances in pro-life causes, however, is indicative that the MP is pro-life – if not actually a part of the pro-life caucus. Those with three check marks to their name get coded yellow; those with all four get coded green.

Finally, those labelled pink are ones for which there exists direct evidence – usually from the MPs themselves, in press releases, Parliamentary speeches, and the like, or from references in the press – that they are current or former members or affiliates of the Pro-Life Caucus. There are only about a dozen and a half of those in the list, including the chairman, Bruinooge.

The consistently pro-life MPs, by these measures, are about sixty to seventy in number, which is around the rough size of the Pro-Life Caucus normally quoted by those in the know. That doesn’t necessarily mean that everyone I’ve highlighted is definitely a member of the Pro-Life Caucus, but it probably means that most are. Of course, individual MPs or their staff could do much to clear up the uncertainty by coming forward with a “yea” or “nay” on the issue of affiliation with the Caucus.

the defence team will concede that he indeed shot the couple, but argue provocation… It is not the eventual outcome of the trial that concerns me here. It is that such a defence is even permitted, based as it is upon patently false notions and premises. What’s next–the defence of necessity in a case of bride-burning? I shall be following this case with interest, and not a little anxiety.

Background on the case is provided by this article in the Ottawa Citizen. The Crown and defence, in the case, would seem to agree that the murders took place as well as that Sadiqi perceived them as honour killings: the question before the court is, does that justify reducing the charges to manslaughter?

(A disturbing “women’s work” metaphor in any case, and particularly during a controversy such as this.)

That a major Canadian development NGO was in serious trouble – for funding pro-choice groups would be news in itself. However, as deBeauxOs of Dammit Janet! pointed out in her scathing commentary on SoCon United’s blog SoCon or Bust, the pro-life crowd’s attacks were seamlessly carrying over from the specific issue of abortion, to all groups advocating women’s rights in general. There was, she remarked, an ironic message – “according to SoCon, fundamentalist Islamist and Catholic men share the same agenda: return women to the control that religious political authority allows men to enjoy.”

The same position was taken by Unrepentant Old Hippie when SoCon or Bust revealed a similar disgust for D&P’s supporting the use of condoms for contraception.

Terrible Depths recently took a similar perspective, too, and filled in some of the blanks on SoCon or Bust, an ostensibly “social conservative” but in fact Roman Catholic project of religious right activist John Pacheco:

SoCon or Bust is actually a group blog co-written by Chris Beneteau, an anonymous priest, and the organization’s director, John Pacheco. I don’t know who the priest is, though I initially suspected (and on reflection I’m almost certainly wrong on this) that he might be Pete Vere, a canon lawyer and author (with Kate Shaidle) of a book attacking Canada’s human rights commissions – and with whom Beneteau and Pacheco have written before. Beneteau doesn’t seem particularly prominent either, though he is an also-ran with the Family Coalition Party, a socon political party founded by Campaign Life Coalition activists in the ’80s.

Pacheco, however, is more recognizable. He also directs the Catholic Legate in Ottawa, a right-wing Catholic apologist group whose mission is to “re-evangelize our paganized North American and western culture” and which explicitly says that it accepts without question all dogmas, doctrines and moral teachings promulgated by the Vatican. In 2003, he also founded the Rosarium of the Blessed Virgin Mary Life Centre to oppose condoms and birth control pills. He and Pete Vere also helped found a new Catholic private school, Maryvale Academy,

SoCon United’s mailing address also raises some questions. They invite you to contact them at P.O. Box 11400, Station H, in Ottawa. Oh, ho! That’s also, as it happens, the mailing box used by the Catholic Legate, Pacheco’s apostolate, and the Rosarium, his anti-birth control league.

• The government of Alberta is refusing to permit employees to list their same-sex spouses as, well, spouses – they must be registered in the more limited category of “benefit partner.” Treasury Board president Lloyd Snelgrove says his government has “no intention of changing the definition of spouse to include people in same-sex marriages.” (h/t Slap Upside the Head)
  

• Pundit Michael Coren has attracted justifiable attacks from the likes of Dammit Janet! and the Galloping Beaver for a recent column suggesting that women should not be permitted to enlist in the army – they’re too small, too weak, and in general should be “laughing with college friends rather than fighting theocratic madmen.” Not finished with that, he goes on to add that women couldn’t possibly fend off the “Taliban tribesmen” and the “thrust of their long knives.”

• Brampton religious groups are tentatively declaring victory in a campaign to overturn proposed new bylaws that might, they say, threaten the tax-exempt status of large churches

In the (Think) Tanks

• The Focus on the Family-funded Institute of Marriage and Family Canada’s weekly family issues report, prepared by in-house researcher and former Conservative Party official Derek Miedema, says that the growing number of senior citizens will overwhelm Canada’s healthcare and social safety nets unless we shift more responsibility for their welfare away from government and onto their families. (Presumably this is more “sustainable” because it would involve more unpaid work by relatives, especially women.

• Equipping Christians for the Public Square will be holding an Ignite Our Culture convention at Trinity Western University in Vancouver on May 8-9. The theme, and subject of the keynote by anti-Muslim “scholar” Sam Solomon, will be: “A Veiled Threat? Islam in the West: Polygamy and Jihad.” ECP will also soon be holding several fundraising dinners in Alberta, featuring Ezra Levant.

• The Manning Centre for Building Democracy has created a “municipal campaign school” for Saskatchewan electoral candidates. Looks like it’s being run by Richard Ciano, the Conservative Party official previously implicated in previous attempts to boost right-wing voices in student politics

We’re looking for a name for this feature of links and we’re stuck.
A name themed around rocks, stones…any ideas?

In August 2008, 42 organizations led by the Canada Family Action Coalition complained to the Canadian Judicial Council, seeking Chief Justice Beverley McLachlin’s expulsion from the committee that recommended the Order of Canada be awarded to groundbreaking doctor Henry Morgentaler.

The “organizations” brought together under CFAC’s banner were, as the Canadian judicial affairs blog The Court noted, an odd bunch. Three were companies (Can American Stone Spreader, Can Am Fabricating and Welding, and A.J. Slinger Service), not public advocacy groups. Another “organization” was New Brunswick professor David Murrell. The Court went on to suggest that the coalition was deliberately inflating its list through repetitious endorsements (for example, listing four Charles McVety-linked groups in addition to the Coalition itself).

Others bloggers were already on the story. Under the prying eyes of Bouquets of Gray and many others, the 42 dwindled rapidly. Active Christians Engaging Society was dismissed as a group of just four rabble-rousers in Sudbury. The three companies identified by the Court were ousted, as was a website masquerading as an organization. Many others were eliminated as double-counts – Real Women BC, for example, was a chapter of Real Women Canada, yet both appeared on the petition. Within days, half the list had been discredited.

In September, Birth Pangs reported that the Canadian Judicial Council had dismissed the Coalition’s complaint. McVety pronounced himself “not surprised” by the verdict.

Reading List:

Benediction Blogs On. “Chief Justice McLachlin and the Canada Family Action Coalition,” August 20, 2008.

Bouquets of Gray, “When The Aints Come Marching In,” August 22, 2008.

Canadian Cynic, “Liars for Jeeziz,” August 21, 2008.

The Court, “The Complaints Against Chief Justice McLachlin are Less than Impressive,” August 19, 2008.

By July 25, 2008 blogger scrutiny began in earnest when unrepentant old hippie noticed chatter about a new poll by a company calling itself KLRVU.
The company, whose figures regarding Canadian approval contradicted reputable polling companies, had been hired by Campaign Life Coalition. The company data regarding Canadian opinion about The Order of Canada being given to Henry Morgentaler was noted at Lifesite and in a press release.
 
Plagiarism was found on the company website. KLRVU had taken a Survey US page, replaced the word America with Canada, and cut and paste the US site page, right down to the spelling mistakes.

Bouquets of Grey grabbed screen shots of both sites, highlighted the errors and pointed out the plagiarism.

Because the Survey US phone list didn’t work for Canada, KLRVU had to come up with something to explain their use of robot-calling for their surveys. Bouquets of Gray, July 25, 2008.

We have already pointed out that KLRVU has plagiarized a page of SurveyUSA and compared the two pages, with images of the opening paragraphs. The rest of the page is much the same–a rip-off of the SurveyUSA page, with minor changes.

But copying-and-pasting material and revising it for a new location is often trickier than one would assume, as can be seen in the section where KLRVu explains how it got your number.

News of the companies incompetence spread online and  Bouquet of Gray found more errors.

Here again, we see a few more changes. Most importantly, SSI is replaced by a Canadian company, Infolist Canada. Like SSI, Infolist Canada is described as the largest and most respected provider of data. But this is surely incorrect, since (as SurveyUSA tells us, SSI is the largest). Indeed, Infolist seems literally to have no public profile: no webpage, no phone number, no nothing.

By July 26, 2008 perhaps noticing all the cyber laughter and unwanted attention, Bruinrooge began to fix his KLR VU pages. It came to light his company had used infoCanada out of Mississauga for it’s phone list, not  Infolist Canada out of Toronto. Bouquets of Gray continued to methodically take KLRVU apart.

There’s a lot to be embarrassed about here. To his credit, however, Mr. Bruinooge has spent today trying to clean up the mess he created. Unfortunately, he hasn’t done a very good job of it. He has rewritten some of the text to remove the plagiarism. But he has not got it all, and what is left is a frightful mess: ungrammatical, incoherent, and unfocused.

The screenshots at Bouquet of Gray are worth taking a look at.

As Allan Bruinrooge tidied his new companies web presence, nothing could negate the reality his push poll had used robot calls and called what they had done, polling. 

And, what do you find there? A detailed description of “Voice Broadcasting”. What’s that, you ask?
Voice Broadcasting is a message delivery service that plays a pre-recorded message on a customer’s answering machine, voicemail service, or even to a “live” person. …
…Further down the page we learn
KLRVU specializes is supporting High Volume Voice Broadcasting customers. With an aggregate voice broadcasting capacity of more than a million minutes per hour KLRVU can provide you with that rare combination of unbounded capacity, low prices and exceptional service.

Most Canadians aren’t going to look at methodology. Lifesite and Campaign for Life Canada didn’t bother correcting their article and press release. 

To add insult to injury in an already badly handled push poll, a Campaign for Life Canada member went on radio apparently unaware the company they’d hired was being thoroughly investigated and discredited online.

As Bruinrooge went through the third clean up his website, he added something the end of July which no reputable company would dream of.
Klr Vu claimed that if people did not participate in it’s robot-calling poll you were skewing their polling. Declining to push a button in a Klr Vu robot-call was, according to Klr Vu, rescinding your chance and surrendering your voice to your next door neighbour.

Bouquets of Gray ends the dissection of the push polling company with a common sense question.

The point is that the result of a poll might be skewed if people don’t participate. But this is precisely the problem with KLRVU’s notorious Morgentaler poll. KLRVU claims to have called 157,115 Canadian households with the question
“Do you believe abortionist Henry Morgentaler deserves the Order of Canada?”
Of these 157,115, only 13,324 answered. But even if we accept KLRVU’s numbers (which seem inflated), 144,000 must feel like the hypothetical premier-hater in KLRVU’s example — they have not had their opinion recorded.
But the question has to be asked. If non-participation removes from citizens their voice and thereby undermines the validity of a poll, shouldn’t the 144,000 non-participants in KLRVU’s Mortengaler poll also discredit its results?

You’d think Klr Vu would have called it a day, but they didn’t. Once more they caught public attention in August 2008 when Allan Bruinrooge jumped into a political polling.  KLR VU set it’s robot-calling sights at a Guelph by-election. (The by-election was pre-empted by a federal election call in September 2008)

Reaction on political blogs was predictable.
Even David Aken picked up Klr Vu’s shoddy marketing and methodology. Allan Bruinrooge told Aken he targeted Guelph because he wanted to raise his company profile. Why would anyone hire a discredited company to poll for a by-election?  Scott Tribe, moderator of  The Progressive Bloggers aggregator wrote Allan Bruinrooge about his Guelph poll methodology and also received a response.  Bruinrooge joined The Blogging Tories in July, but never posted.

One of the questions raised in the investigation of Klr Vu’s Morgantaler poll and the Guelph by-election poll is why Allan Bruinrooge claimed membership in the MIRA.
There is no listing for his company on the corporate membership page of The Marketing Research & Intelligence Association. Klr Vu states on it’s webpage that Allan Bruinrooge is an individual member of the MIRA.

Have you blogged about Klr Vu? Drop us a line and let us know if we can use and link your post in full or in part.

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