Cost cutting is one thing; denying funding because a bureaucrat or politician is making decisions based on what some one said about a piece of art without actually seeing it is quite another. The first is just the way it goes; the second is a governmental attempt to control the arts, and indeed freedom of speech. Does the Harper government think that it was elected to make artistic judgements for all of us?
Saudi women: Some brave women of Saudi Arabia continue to make incursions against the status quo, the latest one aided by her husband, an imam, who taught her how to drive. It still astounds me that countries need to have religious police. Not that the same thing didn’t happen in the history of western nations, but it was several hundred years ago. This is the 21st century, and a woman in Saudi Arabia can’t leave the house without the permission of some one with male genitalia, her guardian, lest the dreaded religious police intervene and cart her off to jail.
A lovely weekend here, warm and sunny with a breeze to keep the bugs away, and a country to live in without fear. Happy Canada Day.
