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Canadian Conservatives in cultural hot water ... again

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Sheriff Roland:
The conservatives in charge of the federal government are taking a page from the Ontario Conservative (Harris) government of the 1990's - and revisited in the past decade by American Republicans in power.

They've now denied Montreal Pride (Diver/Cité) the 155 000$ for which the application met all the criteria. Reason given?

the tourism program had received so many requests, the government had to make a choice.

How transparent!

In Canada, in today's less prejudiced society, they (the Conservatives) are merely shooting themselves in the foot. - yet again. They are evidently giving in to their very small anti-gay/Christian values base.

Bye bye Conservatives. We won't miss you.

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/national/tories-reject-funding-for-montreal-gay-festival/article1226690/

Sheriff Roland:
http://www.cbc.ca/arts/story/2009/07/22/montreal-diverscite-funding.html

"To be told that there is no money, when there is. They have $100 million put aside; they chose not to give to Divers/Cité. The reasons … we don’t know. Is it we're gay? Is it we're Montrealers? We’re Québécois? It's incredible they would decide at this late date, five days before our event starts,” said Girard.

"Per capita, we bring in more tourism than any other festival in Canada. And you can ask any Montreal taxi driver, the hotels … about our impact on Montreal … we are a niche market, we are an extremely important tourism event," said Girard.
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As a side note ... It's been said that the Toronto Pride event attracted roughly the same number of participants as in past years. The parade was attended by roughly 1 000 000 people (as has been the case every year for over a decade) in spite of the fact that it rained all morning and into the start of the afternoon of the Sunday parade.

And the same has not been the case for other important festivals in Toronto (or even the Calgary Stampede). Most excuses include the declining economy and, more recently the Toronto garbage strike that is today entering it's second month.

http://news.xinhuanet.com/english/2009-06/29/content_11618508.htm

Pride Week is a huge tourist draw with participants pumping more than 80 million Canadian dollars (68 million U. S. dollars) into the city's economy every year.

    The annual event has recently been named Canada's best festival by the Canadian Special Events Industry.

Sheriff Roland:
This, from Toronto's gay press Xtra

http://www.xtra.ca/public/National/Tories_reject_funding_for_Montreals_gay_arts_and_culture_festival-7167.aspx

Despite the claim that money in the tourism program is limited, the Tories have found plenty of cash for other festivals. Today, Clement's office announced two large grants under the Marquee Tourism Events Program: the Calgary Folk Festival will receive $155,000 and Les FrancoFolies de Montreal gets $1.5 million.

Sheriff Roland:
Apparently, Vancouver's gay pride has also been refused funding ...

À Vancouver, les organisateurs du festival gai et lesbien de Vancouver auraient aussi essuyé un refus.

http://www.radio-canada.ca/regions/Montreal/2009/07/22/002-diverscite-ottawa-subvention.shtml

Sheriff Roland:
Lovely comment from a reader of that last quoted source:

Sous leur règne, le Canada est devenu plus républicain que les États-Unis.

roughly translated ... Under their (the conservatives) leadership, Canada has become more Republican than the U.S.

Agree 28
Disagree 4

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