Canada Encouraged US To Place It On Piracy List

An anonymous reader writes "Copyright, U.S. lobbying, and the stunning backroom Canadian response gets front page news treatment today in Canada as the Toronto Star covers new revelations on copyright by Michael Geist (who offers a longer post with links to the cables) from the U.S. cables released by WikiLeaks. The cables reveal that former Industry Minister Maxime Bernier raised the possibility of leaking the copyright bill to U.S. officials before it was to be tabled in the House of Commons, former Industry Minister Tony Clement's director of policy Zoe Addington encouraged the U.S. to pressure Canada by elevating it on a piracy watch list, Privy Council Office official Ailish Johnson disclosed the content of ministerial mandate letters, and former RCMP national coordinator for intellectual property crime Andris Zarins advised the U.S. that the government was working on a separate intellectual property enforcement bill."

Comments

Clearly wikileaks must be stopped !!!

[assemblerex]

Can't have people getting used to the truth now, can we ?

Re:Clearly wikileaks must be stopped !!!

[Anonymous Coward]

Can't have people getting used to the truth now, can we ?

they already know that governments are full of lying sacks of shit. in fact all governments are liars and murderers. yes even yours. quit pretending yours is special because you were born in that country. patriotic rhymes with idiotic for a reason.

this is what happens when you celebrate hierarchial society and tell people you're either a "leader" or you're a nobody. makes positions of authority irresistable to sociopaths who will say or do anything to get them.

problem is what to do about it. who would you vote for to fix this?

Re:Clearly wikileaks must be stopped !!!

[causality]

It's not just governments - it's people in general. Same goes for relationships, business and since government is made of people, that too. There's nothing you can do about it. Well, except put computer algorithms to handle it, but even then the algorithm designers would try to cheat and get some advantage towards them. People in general are full of shit.

The kind of "full of shit" that most people experience is denial. Usually of their personal weaknesses, insecurities, shortcomings, etc. They protect and excuse these things because they are identified with them. Identification with them means that letting them go would feel like a sort of death. Mostly they mean well, they just don't objectively see themselves or understand that their motivations for doing most things are a lot less wholesome than what they imagine them to be. Believe it or not, most people who are manipulative don't realize it. They only know that people respond to them when they behave that way and it seems to get them what they want so it must be "correct".

A lot of people would, in fact, be horrified to actually realize the daze they are in that prevents them from seeing how selfish they really are. A side-effect is that almost nothing is done for its own sake because it is good to do. There is always a secondary motive. The saying is "most people have two reasons for what they do: the good reason, and the real reason." Usually the closest the average person comes to understanding this is to realize that they have a lot of inner conflict and have grave difficulty being at peace with themselves, truly relaxing, or being content without some kind of entertainment or distraction.

That's bad enough, and goes a long way towards explaining why they are so willing to tolerate liars and portray it as normal ("eh he's a congressman what do you expect, of course he lies"). Yet it's different from actively, knowingly and deliberately trying to deceive. There's a plan and a purpose combined with an awareness of what one is doing. It's perpetrated by people who are sworn to do what is best for the nation and entrusted with a lot of power with which to do it. There's an element of betrayal here that isn't present in the "little white lies" most people tell.

It's part of why, perhaps surprisingly, telling a really big lie to masses of people tends to work out more successfully than telling a small one. Hitler was quite explicit about this in Mein Kampf:

The size of the lie is a definite factor in causing it to be believed, for the vast masses of the nation are in the depths of their hearts more easily deceived than they are consciously and intentionally bad. The primitive simplicity of their minds renders them a more easy prey to a big lie than a small one, for they themselves often tell little lies but would be ashamed to tell a big one.

Even there you can see a hint of ego perspective or selfishness. The people assume their leaders must be just like them. Therefore if they would be ashamed to tell a big lie, there leaders must be also. The inability to perceive that other people don't function anything like the way you do and would do things you would not do is part of what makes people vulnerable to this kind of deception.

Re:Clearly wikileaks must be stopped !!!

[osu-neko]

they already know that governments are full of lying sacks of shit.

Yes, true, but in many circumstances, it's important to know the specifics.

Re:Clearly wikileaks must be stopped !!!

[causality]

I don't think it has to do with big and small lies. I think most people deep down want to believe that other people are good, or that they have the potential to be good (The Vader Effect). Of course, there are limits to this optimism. But a politician hoodwinking his or her constituents is no different than a grifter tricking an old woman out of her pension. They both rely on a psychology that may be instinctual to humans due to our species' predilection for social structure; we by default want to trust that people will act in ways that benefit the society and not harm it, and us.

This is the denial of which I was speaking. The urge to trust someone who is manifestly not trustworthy (governments, shady businesses, etc) is a product of denial. It's an inability to see that there are red flags.

The "big lie vs. small lie" was an analogy. The point was that people want to relate to themselves something that may be relatively alien to them. There is a self-centeredness inherent in this that is the opposite of objectivity.

The solution is to neither trust nor distrust, but instead to completely ignore the words and look at what the actions tell you about the person. Those who are not trustworthy also suffer from that self-centeredness and once you understand what it is, you can identify it immediately. They will give themselves away, but not if you are too caught up in your own mind to observe.

Also I would add that people are born inherently good. The problem is that long before they reach adulthood or even their teenage years, they are corrupted with the phony choices offered to them. Be it media, schooling, peers, society, you name it ... the options they are left with boil down to two wrong choices. They can be a bully or they can be a pushover. So they find a place for themselves in a social hierarchy of some kind. It may be "jocks vs. nerds" etc in school or it may be the corporate ladder in adult life. Either way, there is someone they can push around who is expected to take it and in turn, there is someone to whom they are expected to be subservient.

Be it giving or receiving, it is always about domination and control and the struggle to achieve them. This is why sociopaths feel so justified in their deceptions. They perceive themselves as "having what it takes" to rise to the top and they regard it as a virtue they have earned. The result is that noble people with integrity who do not look for ways to control others, who want to live and let live whenever possible, who regard force as an option of last resort only after reason fails, those people are kept out of leadership positions and we inhereit the fucked up world we know today. It's an asylum, the inmates are running it, and all of the wrong things have lots of forces cooperating to make them happen, such as draconian copyright law. That's where the political clout is found.

If we had a perfect meritocracy then perhaps those at the top would have legitimately earned it. The problem is, we don't. It's not about how good you are, how skilled you are, how wisely you would govern, or how much you respect the rights of others. It's about being in the right clubs, knowing the right people, being one of the good ol' boys, and climbing to the top by climbing over the bodies of anyone who stood in your way. Sociopathy isn't just tolerated. It's actively encouraged and rewarded.

Could someone summarize the summary?

[Anonymous Coward]

What a mess of adjectives.

I think it says: one Canuck politician tried to get his way in a Copyright legislation deal by using America as muscle.

Politics are bad mmmm'ka?

[Yo Grark]

I know politics can get evil at time but seriously, WTF?

That's as close to treason as I can see to the tech industry.

Media Levies? Fine, thank you for protecting us from RIAA type tatics.

But then to turn around and sell out the entire COUNTRY to further your agenda? That's plain evil and I wish someone had the gonads to actually put people in jail over this.

Yo Grark

Re:Politics are bad mmmm'ka?

[Anonymous Coward]

Well we, as Canadian citizens, can demand that this politician be sanctioned. All it takes is to make a bit of noise so that the right people feel they can't ignore the issue. Write to the media, to your local representatives, spread this story to your friends, on Facebook, and be sure to tell people "We can get the guilty punished, we simply need to act. Let's do it!".

I'm going to do just what I said above. Will you?

Re:Politics are bad mmmm'ka?

[Anonymous Coward]

They won the last election. They got a MAJORITY (even if only by a couple thousand votes). They DO. NOT. CARE.

Look at all the scandals from income trusts to Gazebogate to Kairos and beyond. Look at how they cover up their wrongdoing to hide it from the Auditor General, and nothing happens. Look at how they instruct their political staffers to abuse their offices of government and the political staffers get fired/resigned for the election and sneakily hired back afterwards. Look at the RCMP investigation of one staffer that clearly and illegally interfered with Access To Information requests, admitted doing it, and then the investigation was dropped with no comment post-election. Look at how they first came into power, with the then RCMP commissioner abusing his office to make spurious claims against Liberal MPs mere days before the vote.

Sure, write to the media. I'm sure that Globalist TV and Corporate Television Vehicle will really care about what you have to say! The remaining option, CBC, will be too busy supplicating themselves to get the hard-right radicals to stop calling them communist (which they won't, unless the CBC turns into Conservative Pravda for real). And the newspapers? When the vast, vast majority are owned by the same small groups of people and near universally endorsed the Conservative Party last election even with all the many scandals?

Re:Politics are bad mmmm'ka?

[cheekyjohnson]

You shouldn't be blaming the politicians, you should be blaming the voters who admire the leadership skills of these politicians.

Or just blame both.

Well, I am not shocked...

[iCEBaLM]

For those that don't know, we currently have had pretty far right leaning neo-conservative governments (still not as far right as the US tea party, but pretty bad).

They have been caught lying to parliament and making illegal backroom deals in the past, yet because the Liberals can't seem to field a leader who isn't a blithering idiot (Dion) or perceived as weak (Ignatief) our left of centre vote gets split between Liberals, NDP and Green (which combined makes up over 50%) and the right of centre vote goes all towards the Conservatives.

It just goes to show you, that first past the post doesn't work well...

None of this is any surprise

[mbone]

None of this is any surprise to anyone who has been paying attention.

To paraphrase Douglas Adams, they are not above being sleazy in the same way that the ocean is not above the sky.

You know ...

[Haedrian]

I think this sort of information should be forced to be disclosed legally.

How are people supposed to know who to blame for the mess of legislation if this sort of thing is done under wraps? I'm sure this guy wouldn't see another term in office if this sort of thing was known earlier.

I realise doing it in secret was the whole point of it, but these people should be held accountable, they are meant to represent the people, and the people need to know what they're doing.

the biggest leakers - governments

[decora]

and they typically 'leak' information for political reasons, for power and influence, for purposes of manipulation and propaganda.

that is why government prosecutions of 'leakers' are the ultimate hypocrisy. government itself is the biggest leaker of all.

Re:Here's the good thing

[PsychoSlashDot]

These cable leaks will effectively neuter the Conservatives for the next four years, since their entire policy is based on sucking American cock.

Are you kidding me? There are three types of us; those who know what's going on and act on that knowledge (a.k.a. politicians), those who know what's going on and don't act on that knowledge (you and I), and the vast, vast majority that don't read about any of this and wouldn't understand or care if they did.

All the politicians need to do is keep smearing each other with "they tax you too much" and "they are killing our health care/education/whatever" and "he's a pedophile". Nobody brings real issues into campaigning because the majority of constituents don't understand real issues not because they're stupid but because they don't want to.

Piracy schmiracy

[Antisyzygy]

I don't understand why people allow their governments to continue to crack down on piracy as if its some kind of major problem. Markets will adapt, and to give an example of one look at the gaming industry. Many people now get games through Steam because its convenient. You get it the minute the game comes out, and you get access to a bunch of other features, like automated updates, etc. It is impossible for them to pirate games on these platforms, and many publishers are coming up with similar system. Also, there are multiplayer capabilities in many games that require unique CD-keys, like Starcraft II, etc. Another example is Netflix and Hulu. They offer a streaming service whereby you get to watch what you want when you want to and don't bombard you with more advertisements than actual television. If Hollywood would just release new movies over some premium streaming service, no doubt they would cut down on bootlegging and piracy in general. It boggles my mind why everyone isn't in a complete uproar over this, as all of the measures governments take are inherently anti-consumer and only meant to benefit the corporations failing business models.

Obviously

[Anonymous Coward]

Piracy is legally sanctioned in Canada by the surcharge added to the price of digital media to compensate for its use in making unauthorized copies of copyrighted materials. If you're NOT pirating media in Canada, you're not getting all of what you've paid for.

Re:Aren't Canadians wondering...

[Anonymous Coward]

Actually, this is Canada carefully manipulating the USA, we just want it to look like we're the victim. The overall plan is to implement Canadian currency as the Common North American currency.
-eyeballs Mexico-

Re:Harper could school Machiavelli and Karl Rove.

[Your.Master]

No, it's the "political faction I disagree with as contrasted to the one I agree with" play book for the last century or more.