Vigilance: Government resumes militarist spectacles

Oppose the Militarization of Culture! Make Canada a Zone for Peace!

PUBLIC SERVICE ANNOUNCEMENT⚠️

An #RCAF CF-18 will conduct a flyby over @BMOField for the @TorontoArgos #CanadianArmedForces Appreciation game on September 24, 2021 at approximately 7:30 pm. #Toronto pic.twitter.com/NPFbD7WsNc

— Royal Canadian Air Force (@RCAF_ARC) September 23, 2021

Four days after the election and the Afghan debacle before that, the Canadian Forces is launching yet another U.S.-style militarist spectacle, a “flyby” over a Canadian Football League (CFL) game featuring an “appreciation” of the military and war and its brutality. The spectacle is co-sponsored by Maple Leaf Sports & Entertainment (MLSE), the latest owner of the CFL franchise Argonaut franchise of the CFL. This oligopoly also owns Raptors of the NBA cartel, Maple Leafs of the NHL cartel, Toronto FC of the MLS cartel, Scotiabank Centre, operator of BMO Field (owned by the City of Toronto), lucrative downtown real estate, cable TV channels, you name it.

Call for removal of militarist mural at Belfast football grounds

Irish resist attempt of paramilitary gang to use sport to recruit youth

Disturbing new hoarding featuring masked UVF gunmen has appeared next to the home ground of Crusaders Football Club. The mural, bearing the logos of the UVF and the paramilitary group’s “youth wing”, the YCV, appeared at the Irish League ground last month.

Fiji sings

For a moment, hierarchies (historical, economic, political) are turned upside down. It is a brief glimpse of the day when the last shall be first | A Reflection by Tony Seed

Jerry Tuwai, captain of Team Fiji, sings on the podium with his team mates after receiving their gold medals following victory in the Rugby Sevens Men’s Gold Medal match between New Zealand and Fiji on day five of the Tokyo 2020 Olympic Games at Tokyo Stadium on July 28, 2021 in Chofu, Tokyo, Japan | Dan Mullan/Getty Images

(August 3) – You must be watching the Olympics. Did you chance to watch any of the Rugby Sevens matches?

This Day. Jack Johnson demolishes Jim Jeffries and the racist myth of the ‘Great White Hope’

Jack Johnson | United States Library of Congress

By amateursport.wordpress.com

On July 3, 1910 one century ago this day in Reno, Nevada, African-American boxer Jack Johnson knocked out the white supremacist Jim Jeffries, triggering a series of racist attacks across the United States; about 20 Blacks died, and hundreds were injured. Johnson holds a seminal position not only in boxing but also in athletics and in the movement for the rights of all.

Raptors Record Reality Check: The Little White Lie

How a lie manufactured by Raptors TV about a winning streak took “on a life of its own” in the mass media

By Our Senior NBA Insider

Originally published on the Amateur Sport blog

(February 6, updated February 7, 9, 10, 13) – Congratulations – the Toronto-based  basketball team and defending NBA champion that all the US pundits dismissed this season have won a franchise record 15 games in a row.

Last Wednesday night last week (February 5th), the Toronto Raptors came from being down 19 points to beat Indiana Pacers in the last minute 119-118, its 12th straight win. They finished the game on a 11-0 run, their defence forcing Indiana to turn the ball over four times.

XVIII Pan Am Games: A world away

By TONY SEED

First published on Amateursport.wordpress.com on August 10. 2019

Do you remember the Pan-American Games in 2015 in Toronto? It was a festival of sport and friendship of more than 6,000 young athletes from the Americas with venues throughout Southern Ontario. To raise the army of volunteers needed for various tasks, more than 60,000 people came forward to be selected, and of these only a third were chosen. Canada organized a delegation of its top athletes, who finished second in the medal standing. The Rogers Centre was packed for the closing ceremonies. The hosts built more than ten new facilities and 15 others were remodelled, to inspire the crowds that filled them. The privately-owned Hamilton Tiger Cats even finally walked away with a new stadium paid for by public tax dollars and renamed after some coffee chain owned in Brazil.

The Calgary stadium swindle (II)

Exactly how bad is the new Calgary Flames arena deal? Neil deMause writes in the Field of Schemes website:

(July 26) – With all of four days of public comment period (expiring today at noon, July 26) allowed before the Calgary city council votes next week on its Flames arena plan, the media have been commenting like crazy on how it’s either terrific or godawful. Among the takes:

The latest Calgary stadium swindle (I)

After a closed meeting behind the backs of the people on July 22, the Calgary city council announced an outrageous pay-the-rich deal with the owners of the Calgary Flames of the NHL for a new 19,000-seat arena. It will be built on current Calgary Stampede parking lots to replace the Saddledome. Details include:

PyeongChang ‘Peace Olympics’: Korean nation’s profound desire for peace and reunification sets tone

Photo shows joint Korean delegation entering PyeongChang Olympic Stadium at the opening ceremony, February 9, 2018, ending the parade of nations. The Korean Unification Flag takes centre stage and flashes across the stadium seats with the name “Korea.”

A great sense of excitement surrounded the opening ceremonies of the 2018 PyeongChang Winter Olympics with a united north and south Korean delegation participating under the Unification Flag.

North Korea – an agent of peace?

By PETER KOENIG*

The false alarm on a ballistic missile attack on Hawaii last Saturday from North Korea did not help the Peace Talks which were essentially initiated by DPRK’s President, Kim Jong-un. They spread enormous fear of a nuclear annihilation of Honolulu, pulverization of homes and people – of Armageddon for the Hawaiian population.

The football quarterback, the US president and a just stand

By TONY SEED (Originally posted on Facebook on September 4, 2016 and on amateursport.wordpress.com on October 15, 2016)

An American athlete, Colin Kaepernick, has taken a just stand.

“I am not going to stand up to show pride in a flag for a country that oppresses black people and people of color,” Mr Kaepernick, a quarterback with the San Francisco 49ers, told NFL Media in an interview after Friday’s game during which he again rightly refused to stand at attention during the playing of the U.S. anthem accompanied by a military flypast. “To me, this is bigger than football and it would be selfish on my part to look the other way. There are bodies in the street and people getting paid leave and getting away with murder.

“This is not something that I am going to run by anybody,” he said. “I am not looking for approval. I have to stand up for people that are oppressed. … If they take football away, my endorsements from me, I know that I stood up for what is right.”

Outrageous! Ukraine asks UEFA for permission to use Nazi SS symbols

These articles were originally published by this blog from amateursport.com on December 3, 2014 and are being republished on the occasion of EURO 2016 new underway in France, in which Ukraine is competing. Violent clashes took place on June 11 between English and Russian hooligans in Marseille. (On June 14, in a brazen political maneouvre, EUFA arbitrarily levied Russia with a suspended disqualification and €150,000 fine as French authorities set to deport up to 50 Russian fans. No action was taken against England.)

Photo shows “patriotic” Nazi SS Galician banner in in the Lviv Arena stadium in Ukraine

“We have yet to win back our symbols and to uphold them.” Condemn this growing fascism!

Oleksandr Hlyvynskyi, press attaché of Ukraine’s national football team, asked UEFA for permission to use “SS-Galicia” logos Hlyvynskyi said this during a roundtable discussion on the subject “The patriotic dimension of football: Fan culture.”

Why no-one remembers the peace-makers

‘Football remembers’? Celebrating war over and over and peace once | ADAM HOCHSCHILD*

Go to war and every politician will thank you, and they’ll continue to do so – with monuments and statues, war museums and military cemeteries – long after you’re dead. But who thanks those who refused to fight, even in wars that most people later realized were tragic mistakes? Consider the 2003 invasion of Iraq, now widely recognized as igniting an ongoing disaster.  America’s politicians still praise Iraq War veterans to the skies, but what senator has a kind word to say about the hundreds of thousands of protesters who marched and demonstrated before the invasion was even launched to try to stop our soldiers from risking their lives in the first place?

What is the real narcotic in sports?

By TONY SEED*, Editorial, Shunpiking Magazine

In the name of all the competitors I promise that we shall take part in these Olympic Games, respecting and abiding by the rules which govern them, in the true spirit of sportsmanship, for the glory of sport and the honour of our teams. – Olympic oath