that is too funnny! you got ripped off! course, if you wanted to sue your employer, the Supreme Court of Canada has your back!

Bear in mind that most Americans who saw this were violently offended by Michael Moore for daring to make such lies about Bush.
I wonder if the US would ever try to attack us cuz a)we are lax about pot, therefore support organizations like the Hells Angels, therefore support terrorists, b)we have mad resources such as oil, water, forestry & agriculture, Quebec women, and room to breathe, c)who would/could stop them?, d)Michael Moore likes us, e)"Blame Canada" is pretty catchy you gotta admit.
Quebec and Canadian resistance against the americans...get your hockey sticks sharpened.

It was a very well supported film. Bearing in mind that the President is the hardest individual to press any litigation, Moore would have to be damn sure there weren't any false facts because he'd be hit with a slander suit so hard it'd be likened to treason. Making false claims about a President, especially during war time and in an election year, would be a Federal Fucking and an innocent President would have slammed Moore in a just setting like a courtroom. But Bush isn't doing anything is he?
Everyone should see this movie, even just to stimulate conversation. I don't know how long Michael Moore will be around for.

Thanks man...I'd heard that exact same thing from every other person I've known who went to that area. Just saw Fahrenheit 9/11. I think if Fox News and Halliburton Co. got destroyed (by accident of course) the world would be a better place. They're more evil than Bush.

I retarded with sarcasm...I can give it out like nobodys bizness, but I'm usually oblivious to it myself. I figured 3 in 1993-4 would make you 13-14, but I get you now.
I'm turning 27 this summa. I was goinng to my first raves in 94.
I don't really rave anymore now. Now it's all business (but fun business!).

Just got back from this. I think people will get a lot of debate from whether or not this movie is well done, factual, or justified, but one thing is certain: It's a brutally powerful message (I don't think I'm ruining the message for you when I tell you it is "Fuck You Bush. And fuck your friends"). Given who the target market is for this kind of movie (and judging by the effect of Bowling in pop culture) this picture is Bush's PR nightmare. This is a lot like David v. Goliath and David just got Goliath in the nuts.
I agree about the Corporation, but it is a canadian film! Of course it'll be rough. I saw "stupidity" and felt it was a little rough building arguments effectively. The only documentaries we should be producing up here is mocumentaries like FUBAR, Best in Show, and Trailer Park Boys! We're gifted at it!

That may be the truth in what we see in documentaries today, but that is a function of the capitalist media's influence on the commercial side of documentary production.
The truth is, the documentary is an essay on film, and an essay has to set out to answer a question in the form of a thesis. The thesis can only be supported, but instead of quoting sources they use video. Theoretically a documentary should seek truth and be only as biased as any essay, and be judged on the merits of the arguments it presents in support of it's view. Truth is its own motive, and it will be distorted and compromised if the motivation is shared with an agenda, such as political objectives or finance. And truth isn't always profitable.
While it may stand to reason the if a picture is worth a thousand words, then video is worth a million, the downside of the medium is that video holds so many pschological cues and is still fundamentally limited to one person's vantage point (camera) so it is more susceptible to misrepresentation and abuse. Throw in a soundtrack, narrator, and some clever editing and you can lead an audience like Spielberg.

Dan, can you post some nice things about the people of the middle east? Have you had any positive or uplifting experiences with anyone that you could share? Right now the media here is painting those people in a very negative light. If you listen to Fox, CNN, network, can-west (anything besides the CBC) you'd think that everyone in the mid east is a primate that can't think of anything if it wasn't declared by Mohammed. These are the same media sources that made all of Ireland and Catholics look like thug bombers because it sells papers and comercial spots.
Maybe you got an online journal I haven't found yet. I need some truth.

Yeah...it didn't make it on CNN this time. THe world knows that socceer fans are one step up the evolutionary scale from howler monkeys so it's not big news when they do something stupid. Dude, you missed some of the best photo ops you could ask for in a lifetime when Greece won. If they miraculously win again, and lets face it, they've been extra lucky this tourney, TAKE PICS OF THE FESTIVITIES. Seriously, we shouldn't have to be telling you this.

Michael Moore isn't a brilliant documentary maker. He obviously has an agenda, therefore he is the latest and hippest propaganda artist and is a genius at using the current strength and influence of media as his own weapon. The way he litigates and publicly fights only increases public curiosity and provides advertising that Moore doesn't have to pay for. When Disney tried to block the film because Eisner is a hard core republican and didn't want to piss off his old golfing buddy Bush, the dumb bastard couldn't get his head out his ass far enough to see what Moore was doing: Creating the best advertising media storm possible.
Moore may be the first independant to declare war on an administration and sway an entire election. Gallop has already reported, for the first time, that America's support for the Iraq war is dying (54% against say Iraq was a full-on mistake). The election is already set to be a nail-biter, with Bush losing ground every day. By making Moore a pop-culture icon representing those that would like to tell the admin to fuck off will not get older voters to change, but he will get younger voters to actually vote in the US cuz all of a sudden this fat-ass bad-ass is chilling with the other celebs that take his POV. He's like Kevin Smith, Ralph Nader, and Jackass all rolled into one. Very marketable...

¤M|c²K[o_O]S¤...sorry if I was getting all up in your shit about acting and PGL and that...I had no idea you were so young!
Wicked Bolton pic. Hilariosity at it's finest!

I've got a DVD player. It's made by Digix...which I suppose is the best DVD player a person can find in Khazakstan. BUt it works fine! You can play stuff on it!
I'm looking to get rid of it for $30.

That is a personal choice that I respect.

for the record, we're looking to sublet for til August 31 at $350/mo. The apartment is 1400 and the room is usually 600.

We've got a room opening in our sick downtown apartment. It's a huge 6 1/2 with just me and my gf living here for now and it's located at the top of Drummond @ Dr. Penfield on the 7th floor of a respectable building. Those of you who have been here know how wicked this place is! Great view from the balcony (we watch the fireworks from here), close to everything, and tricked out home entertainment. I'm prefferebly looking for somebody who DJs or produces cuz I have a studio and turntables. Live phat on a skinny budget, and spend the summer living large downtown.

fricking good idea!!!! Tonight it might thunderstorm. That's always great for trip!

I hope they keep it R in the states. It essential that they do. Michael Moore should be happy if it is kept R because the gov't just made that movie into forbidden fruit, and th kids...they LOVE the forbidden fruit.
An R rating isn't good for making money, but the way DVD sales go, they don't have to do good at the box office. And if you just want to get your messafe out....Perfecto! Should get all the little yanky kiddies thinking...or at least the ones we need to start thinking.

Hoorray for Quebec's version of Canada Day!!!

I've got a fever of 103 and the only cure is more cowbell.

Trying to get a human to understand the universe from planet Earth is akin to trying to get an ant to understand mechanical engineering by placing it on an engine piston.

I'm there. This weekend will potentially kill me.

It looks great. Like Starsky and Hutch meets the cast of Office Space! Can't go wrong, even if the lot of them just sat around reading the phone book.

Big Up Scott! 2K for the 2Ks! 3K...here you come.

Smegma...Nasty...and very funny!

I produce music I like. Simple as that. I don't care if anyone else likes it or not. It's great when they do, because then I can share with them, but it's not my point.
I say you better love your own music, because you're the only one guaranteed to like it, and if you don't like it, why should anyone else? It's your expression.
I love suprising myself. It's the best feeling ever. It's the point.

I'm not trying to porve the existance of GOd, and the mere suggestion on your part that I am indicates that you either didn't read me carefully or are missing the boat entirely. Anyways, Ian, you're a good bloke, but your errors in logic and argument are indicative of your lack of understanding of too many areas implicit to a debate such as this. This is probably not your area of study and I don't think you really understand what's being discussed here becasue if you did, you wouldn't be raising the Grade 8 questions. Read some more about psychology, evolutionary biology, and physics. I recommend the Elegant Universe by Brian Greene. But I'm not wasting any more time on this.

Aerial, It's the quiet before the storm. Perfect call with the sine wave!
don't listen to what the kids say. They don't understand. The cynics will always bash becasue if they new how to create, they would be creating.
I want to find the visionaries who can see ahead of the E-Tards and meth heads who just finished exploiting the scene.
Every decade has it's thing. The next 2 years will define the 2Ks much the way the 80's identity didn't solidly emerge until 84-86, or the 90's in 94-96.
The beauty of the sine wave is it is so predictable!

Thank you for bringing up babies! That's almost the perfect example of my point. Babies don't understand. You emerge from the haze of your infancy into your childhood where you develop reason. We're talking about Piaget and Vygotsky now, no new territory. The first stage is the breaking in of your senses when you start learning how to use them. This is followed by the recognition of sensory patterns (faces, noises, smells). After a while of responding exactly trhe way an animal would respond we begin to remember and it is the development of memory that brings us language. We initially use language to convey our base needs. Gotta eat, gotta poop, like, don't like. Those are the major conversations at the beginning of our lives. It isn't until we learn how to reason and learn to think about how we think (metacognition) that we truly emerge from adolescent savages into refined humans. It is our ability to reason that makes us Human. Animals (and indeed most humans) lack the ability to reason. Fetching and verbal commands are merely conditioned responses to stimuli such as voice, or the act of throwing. A dog's instict to chase will make them follow the stick, or car, or mailman. But it is the element of a reward such as a treat that trains them to bring it back because there is no instinct to retrieve an object for the owner. Training doesn't count as intellectual learning. Even plants can be trained if you consider the arts of horticulture.
I agree that humans over estimate their importance, but I'm fairly certain that evidence provided by early childhood development and abnormal psychology that even rational humans are few and far between, and that animals are in fact still lower down on the reasoning ladder.
I also think that assuming god is a human-like entity is innaccurate and arrogantly human. God is a word attached to that which we do not understand and cannot control. People that pray to any god are simply trying to impose human-like control on elements out of our realm of control.

They do not. They communicate. Do you talk with the animals Dr. doolittle? ;)

Animals that can like or dislike are merely responding to cues given by the person themselves. Remember that animals don't have language so most of their communicative ability is drawn from visual, olfactory, and other sensory conditions. Animals sensing "evil" on a person are probably relying on eye contact, posture, and the same social structures that they use to determine social status within their species.

I'm speaking as someone who has a B.Sc in those subjects. My father is a veterinarian. My brother is a biological researcher at the National Research Council. Animals do not choose the way humans choose. Choosing left or right for an animal is still getting something to eat. Usually the difference between right and left for an animal is a function of physical distance or opportunity.
The proof is classical conditioning as demo'd by Pavlov. Animalas run on pure stimuli. Humans are the only specias that can make such choices with a single exception: dolphins. Dolphins are the only animal that seems to function in a pattern similar to humans. They have sex for pleasure, and can grasp language. They can also deny their drives in certain conditions. Not even the great apes can do that. Fuck, I know many humans who can't do that.

Ian, you're more complicated than that. Animals don't have the same kind of will as humans. They are subject to their drives.
You look at an eagle soaring and you wonder what it's thinking. "It's so free. Majestic. It flys and has none of my worries of paying rent, interpersonal relationships, a job...." The Eagle, translated, is thinking "Where's the FOOD! Sweet fuck I need to find FOOOD!".
Perhaps it was evolution that gave us our perception. Have you studied biology, organic chemistry, quantum physics, astrophysics, or anthroplolgy?

I go for the beats, not the booty. Honestly, I've been to Stereo more than any other places, namely cuz I'd heard of the sound system even when I was studying in Ontario and New York. Saying that Stereo doesn't have a great system would be way wrong. Maybe it's the over abundance of shitty house music being played on their system that puts me off.
I suggested Circus, mainly cuz if a person was coming in from out of town, it's my opinion that it has the best facilities.
True dat about the glowsticks @ Stereo. I've had friends lose their sticks upon entry. But a "don't drop the soap" reference wouldn't have fit much better.
As for theatre, it sounds to me like you've never worked in theatre. Maybe you got a lead in your highschool play, and maybe your friends do the fringe festival? I'd like to come out and check out their skills if they have anything in production now!
I'm sorry...never heard of "PGL" so I don't think we're talking the same calibre of professional. I'm talking about The National Theatre School and the Stratford Conservatory in Canada, and Julliard and AMDA in the US. I did a semester at "Old Vic" in London.
Studying theatre in HS or CEGEP doesn't count as "serious". Especially not in Quebec.
But I am serious about supporting any of your friends who are working in theatre! PM me if you have info about their production!

That's what I find interesting about The Book of the Dead reference in Dan's post. It's the decision to embrace the light (a person with a good heart and clear conscience would have no problems) or to turn away from it because I either feel I do not deserve it or that there are things I still need to take care of on Earth (since only I would know the true nature of my decisions through life, my own judgment of self is the only thing that could deter me from embracing the light, and I'm the only judge that I cannot fool).
From a neurophysiological and cognitive vantage, the Book of the Dead really hit a bunch apparent facts long before Dr. Penfield made women smell burnt toast!
I hate religion. If there is a sentient God out there, 1) It's way more complicated and powerful than any faith gives it credit, and 2) It's pissed cuz every religion under the sun has pissed on its name.

Montreal is ready for a new scene to emerge. House and trance exploited the scene and ran it into the ground. The scene that will prevail next will be the one that provides the best time, simple as that. If you have a crew that can throw a party because they like it and have fun doing it, it will be felt by the crowd and they'll want to come to the next one. You throw too many events, the market will saturate and people won't come out.
Back in the day, people threw parties for the pure fun of it. When it becomes more business than pleasure, the crowd will feel like they just stepped into a work environment.
And if drugs are driving your scene, your scene is doomed. It's a matter of time.

Hahhaha. If you only knew. Me saying something is too gay means it's just that: Tooo gay. I've worked in professional theatre for 5 years. If I said that half my best friends were gay, I'd be under estimating. But Stereo has a mutant homo. Uber agressive, uber obnoxious. Maybe it's just the quebec version that makes them insufferable. My theatre friends pointed it out to me here. One of them said "these guys make it embarassing to be a fag".
Go to Stereo for the Sound System (notice the caps). It is undeniably good. But if you drop your glowstick, let it go.

Still, the ladies would probably like it more than generic palm tree and dingy. Though Paul, I really really liked the ones that show architecture or street scenes. I love the way the houses look in Greece. Take more of them! The others could be Sandbanks in Picton ON for all I know.

The only place worth going out in this town now is Circus.
Stereo: Too gay. Aria: Too boring and overpriced. Going to a club is fine if you're slimey, but unless you're guest listed don't bother. Only tourists and under 21s wait in line.
Best vibe in town are the loft parties. Unique to monteal and probably the precursor to something great.

Take pictures of the hot ass guy! You're probably too young to appreciate it but pics of peeps are the only ones that matter. Pics of vistas we call "cheap post cards".

To answer the question actually posed, I believe the knowledge we as humans posess, that our life is finite, and that life will continue after we die, adds consequence to our earthly actions. Whether we place others before ourselves would ultimately depend on the disposition of the individual. I'm starting to realize that what makes an action "good" or "evil" is open to interpretation depending on personal bias (i.e. Hitler's actions, although deemed evil by a majority of the planet as judged by history, can not be justified by "evil" motivation...He was acting out personal motivations in what he misguidedly believed to be in the best interest of his nation). Since our perspectives and interpretations are potentially infinite the only grounds we can use to judge any person's actions is their personal motivation to impose their chosen action, and in order to do that, we must actually BE that person. In other words, the only person who can truly KNOW if your decision is good or evil is you, with your intimate knowledge of your motives.
I have a theory, and I welcome any challenges to this idea (please!). Our interpretation of what makes an action morally good or evil depends on the dynamics of the resulting "energy" of our action. For example, what we deem to be "good" is typically the higher energy path. It's actually easy (energy-wise) to do bad. You cheat on a test, you lie about what you did, you fuck over someone, and you make your life a little easier for that decision because that is the motivation to make those choices. That's the nature of the mechanism that makes us feel guilt and like a cough from smoking, it goes away with experience. It's more work to be good. It really hard to do good when we won't recieve positive benefits for our good action. And it's practically impossible to be good when we recieve a negative personal result for our good.
We know we're doing something wrong when we cheat, or lie, or screw someone over because empathy allows us to put ourselves in the other's shoes and consider what it would be like if the roles were reversed.
If we make decisions based on our drives (I think the 7 deadly sins represent abuse of drives) we go with the flow of the entropy of the universe like every other animal. What makes us Human is our ability to resist that flow. It what makes us strive to find, or try to impose order to chaos. It's a by-product of our consciousness. We have the gift of free will and are freed of our base drives. The first sentient humans recognized that when they started taming our species. I think Adam and Eve are an allogory for the first of the species that recognized itself and it's ability to choose to do, or not do as it saw fit. That's the fruit of knowledge, not some apple. So we were cast out of the cushy bliss of ignorance that other species exist in (and that children enjoy) where they are sheilded by the true weight of reality and mortality (out of Eden).
So I think there's risks inherent to either belief system regarding how we live our lives. In one we run the risk of succumbing to the notion that in order to get the most out of this life we must do so at the expense of those around us. In the other we run the risk of living our lives in another world at the expense of those around us.

Dan, that was one of the soundest arguments I have ever read, if you can call it an "argument". It was really sound and some interesting points were raised.
I'm not going to tackle what I believe happens after death cuz I sure as hell don't know. Anyone who makes any claim about what happens after death, whether it's Christian heaven, atheistic nihilation, or a fantabulous Chocolate City, has no more individual logical validity than any other theory. It just so happens that groups of people tend to believe similar ideas on the matter cuz, lates face it, this is some heavy, potentially scary, thinking and your average person would rather have ideas fed to them then generating their own as it is much less labour-intenisive.

On the notion of the 1st Bardo being white light, it just so happens that science has described a similar set of activities in the brain during death. It has to do with the brain activity as it is subjectd to the anoxic conditions (no air) of death. As you die, your sensory cortex starts to freak out with no air so it starts firing arbitrarily and starts shutting down. The eyes, in such an excited state, register white light, and as they shut down, there is an effect similar to the light of a TV shutting down (well an older TV) where the light concentrates into a single point of intense, tunnel-like white light. The memory cortex doesn't go away so easy. It apparently lingers a short while longer. Many people report seeing loved ones at the end of the tunnel, logically because the memories can exist in one's mind's eye, producing a new "visual" experience not unlike a dream (for you science kids, the brain shows "delta" waves just before shutting down...the same waves we see in consciousness or REM sleep). THis could be the states described in the Book of the Dead.
I'm not going to speculate on God or the Soul. But what I will say is that 1) there is a finite amount of matter on this planet. 2) a percentage of that matter (mostly Carbon, Hydrogen, and oxygen) assumes a unique state for a finite period of time where it displays a quality we call "life". 3) of the "living' matter, there is a spectrum of consciousness with things like fungi on the lower end, and certain mammals on the higher end. 4) Of the most conscious living organisms, some humans display sentience, intelligence, metacognition, and enlightenment, though not all. There's still a significant number of us that are still more animal than man.
I don't know if we'll ever find a more accurate definition for the purpose of life. I believe that the best working model is that the purpose of life is to live. Life finds a way. I think it's more likely that we are a part of a larger organism that is Earth (Lovelock's Gaia Hypothesis) where I grow using nutirents from other organisms that give me life through their death, only to return to providing other organisms with nutrients after I die. But I have a Will. I can make choices. If the concept of a "Big Bang" creation to the universe hold any salt, then mathematically our universe exists in the momentum of that initial force of explosion. The existance of life would add an element of chaos to that equation, and if there's one thing nature likes, it's chaos. In that case, maybe God is the force driving evolution breathing life into the chaos. Or God is the momentum of that 1st big bang. God could be the sum of all the living Earth competing to live, and living to compete; a massive, planet-sized organism we're only beginning to understand.
I think we've moved past the "I think therefore I am". Way to recognize your own sentience. I think the reality of my experience is "I am therefore I think."