Get in Line Ladies

The latest StatsCan census data indicates that the odds of Canadian women finding a man are decreasing. The data says that women out-number men in Canada by a ratio of 100:96.

My thoughts: Finally, a wonky, demographic paid for by taxpayers that actually means something to me! Be patient in the queue though ladies: There is enough hot blooded K-nadian coiled and waiting right here for all of you!!!

Education is Killing Us

Statistics Canada is reporting that there were 1.01 million university registrations this year. But what does that stat tell us in and of itself? Does it mean more of us are devoted to higher learning? Does it mean that we are churning out smarter adults? NO.

It means a bunch of other things though, that are symptoms of the sorrowful democratization of education we have experienced in this country over the past 20 years:

1. That corporate institutions are growing obese by stealing filthy amounts of money via tuition from stupid peoples' mouths and their stupid parents' credit lines.
2. That a lot more stupid people are graduating with worthless undergraduate degrees.
3. That a lot more stupid people will live the rest of their lives under the horribly mistaken illusion that they are educated, but they'll be doing the same jobs they would have qualified for in the 1980s with only a high school diploma.
4. That scores of North York, Woodbridge and Vaughan teens will continue to drive SUVs to York U every day, play cards, find spouses, drop out and grow up thinking Machiavelli is some designer who makes awesome shoes and hand bags.
5. I could go on forever here, but basically, it means that we are increasing our stupid quo exponentially.

Down with education for the stupid! Up with elitism!
Stop the madness- let them eat mud and drool in the fields where they belong!!!

StatsCan Make You Rich!

In the Toronto Star today, we learn that a recent StatsCan survey "suggests the vast majority of Canadian adults feel there is a strong relationship between education and success in life." Hmm. So, let me get this straight. The survey doesn't actually prove that education leads to success in life. Nor does StatsCan attempt to prove that remaining stupid and/or uneducated leads to failure in life. Rather, it seeks to answer the burning societal question so many of us have repeatedly pondered over the years: How many Canadians believe that education leads to success?

What I want to see is a breakdown of respondents in the following groups: Stupid, Smart, Success, Failure. Moroever, because this survey was about what people believe rather than what is proven, I think it would be methodologically useful to consider more detailed, somewhat less empirical aspects of the respondents' characters, like these, for instance:
1. Does the person believe in ghosts?
2. Does the person immediately forward e-mails to everyone they know, which warn that cell phones can light your hair on fire and spontaneously make your colon explode if you use them at gas stations?
3. Is the person obsessive-compulsive or Catholic or both?
4. Does the person habitually smoke marijuana cigarettes?
5. Does the person believe in political altruism?

I'll tell you one thing that the StatsCan survey clearly demonstrates: That an education in statistics and/or sociology can make you one well-fed civil servant.

Get Your Business Black Belt!

Yesterday, media across North America carried a story about a new report that claims "Graduate business students in the United States and Canada are more likely to cheat on their work than their counterparts in other academic fields". What the story didn't say, however, was that students found cheating are likely given preferential treatment by teachers precisely because they cheated. These polyester-skinned little Trump-omatons are probably the first ones trotted out at corporate job fairs as the schools' best prospects. Cheating is an art especially useful in business, and requires deft ability - whereas bullshiting is more of a liberal arts virtue.

One can just imagine the so-called business professors locked up in Zen-like retreats, planning how they will circuitously instil profound lessons about their trade in the minds of the their empty-vessel, grasshopper-like protegees. They probably devise ridiculous rules like "Don't Cheat!" and post them, written on wooden planks above the chalkboards in the classrooms, just to weed out the weak from the crafty, or as they like to call the cheaters: Innovators.

Whether or not this study has any methodological merit, it makes one ponder how many of these paper-peeping plagiarist pupils end up plopped into political office positions though, don't it?

Calgary's Teeming Million

Run to the foothills! They're breeding! First untold riches. Then babies galore. What next...a majority government? Personally, I think the rise in population is a Liberal scheme: Aliens have been growing baby clones of Anne McLellan in test tubes in order to overwhelm the good 'ole boys in the next election.

Sweden, look out, cuz here comes the Dough family with little baby Kay-Dough in tow.

Report: Welfare Schmelfare!

The National Council of Welfare will release a report today that is supposed to provide policy options for a long-term anti-poverty strategy. Unfortunately, it looks like this is yet another in a long line of redundant, useless social policy studies. The report actually says "Neither political nor economic nor social policy changes seemed to have any dramatic effects on income inequality. The statistics show no great strides forward over the post to (past two?) decades for the poorest of Canadians." Hmm. How much cash did they liquidate to come to that enlightening conclusion?

If I am reading this correctly, their advice to the government is that there is absolutely no tangible effect from any of our current poverty-targeted social, community-based or economic programs on improving people's lots. Out of the other sides of their mouths they are calling for government to strengthen its commitment to such programs. More puzzling is the government's response: "A spokesperson for federal Social Services Minister Diane Finley said the government values the council's work but feels it has initiatives already in place to address poverty..." (Toronto Star) Of course, it should be noted that the council is a citizen's advisory body (fancy name for stakeholder-based special interest group) to the HR minister, with no real power to change anything.

It's more than ironic that low and fixed-income Canadians can barely survive, but those who have the required level of education and funding can make a living writing about the static fate of being a low-income Canadian. I don't get it. This is all just more indication to me that academia exists in its own little make-believe world, designed for the logically-circular perpetuation of itself and that government has its head up its collective ass on what really matters: People.

Cheer Up Canada

A new "study" says Canada, if it were some monolithic, animated entity would be relatively unhappy compared to the other countries of the world. We scored 111th out of 178 countries on a feel-good scale. I, for one, have a problem with demographic studies like these. They look at key indicators in a very biased way. The way they structure the methodology simply prescribes the results. Why couldn't they construct a more realistic paradigm within which to rank countries? For instance, I'm sure we would be leaders in being miserable. We could blow the competition out of the water when it comes to mindless consumerism. Surely, we'd rank at the top of any selfish and ignorant scale.

The study said we would be a lot happier if we didn't leave such a giant ecological foot print. Why can't we just look on the bright side for a change? You know what they say about those with big feet, right? Christ, can't we just cheer up? What a bunch of pessimistic, cynical fucking assholes we've become. And why do we always have to swear so much?

Look, I can't type anymore! I feel the urgent need to go punch someone from a happy country in the neck. Anyone know where I can find a radiantly-smiling Vanuatuan?

News Flash: Teens Ignorant

So, a new study says "Canadian teens know little about sexually transmitted infections and are participating in risky behaviour that could be hazardous to their health, an online survey of 14- to 17-year-olds has found." Eureka! Increasingly, the premises for what constitutes a newsworthy study are becoming pedestrian and obvious. The headline for this could have easily read Canadian Adults Completely Unaware Teens Naive, Horny.

I think I'm in the wrong business kids. I really need to land me a few big fat consulting gigs that do studies like The Political Economy of TimBit Consumpton and its Correlation to Fat Asses or The Ouch Effect: Application of Live Electrical Wires to Testicles Causes Physical Pain in Human Males.