More on "the end of woke"

Further to "What does 'the end of woke' look like?", WWW 11/2/25, we have more good news to report. [Notice he didn't say "share". Ed.] The Executive Orders are coming so fast that it's hard to keep up.

First of all, President Trump has announced that it's OK for people to use plastic drinking straws again. "We’re going back to plastic straws," he told the meeja at the White House as he signed the order. "Paper straws don't work. They break," he said, adding, "I don’t think plastic is going to affect a shark very much, as they're munching their way through the ocean." More common sense, not to mention trees saved.

Even more important are indications that Google has given up trying to toe the politically correct line. Their online and mobile calendars no longer include references to the first day of Black History Month or Pride Month, among other events. The company previously had those days marked at the start of February and June, but they reportedly don’t appear for 2025. 

In "Google Calendar removed events like Pride and BHM because its holiday list wasn’t ‘sustainable’", a site called TheVerge first reported the removals on February 7th. In an e-mail to the outlet, a Google spokesthingy wrote, "Some years ago, the Calendar team started manually adding a broader set of cultural moments in a wide number of countries around the world.

"We got feedback that some other events and countries were missing, and maintaining hundreds of moments manually and consistently globally wasn’t scalable or sustainable. So in mid-2024 we returned to showing only public holidays and national observances from timeanddate.com globally, while allowing users to manually add other important moments."

The company, which has also removed the first day of Women’s History Month in March and Indigenous Peoples Month in June, has stepped back from its diversity, equity and inclusion goals after President Trump signed an executive order to dismantle federal DEI programs. The EO was titled "Ending Radical And Wasteful Government DEI Programs and Preferencing."

Has the President got the wokesters' attention yet? Looks like it, but there's lots more to come. Stay tuned...and give thanks!

Anti-black racism in the Great White North? Surely you jest!

As regular readers of WWW know, racism of any kind is not tolerated in Canuckistan. Well, anti-white racism is OK, but slurs on Bipocs, followers of the Religion of Peace, Jews, and any other WAP (Woke-Approved People) are "completely unnaceptable"- the most overused phrase of 2023. 

 "Could you give us an example?", Walt hears you ask. Certainly. Meet Franck Sylvestre and his friend, who starred in a show called "L'incroyable secret de barbe noire" ("The Incredible Secret of Blackbeard") which was performed in a suburb of Montréal last year... just once.

M Sylvestre's show was included in the municipality's Black History Month schedule, but was cancelled because some Forces for Good in the community found it racist -- totally unacceptable! Imagine that!

A "civil rights" group telling named The Red Coalition -- how's that for full disclosure? -- called for further performances of the theatre piece to be cancelled, arguing that the unnamed puppet [At least he wasn't called "Sambo". Ed.] was an example of "anti-Black racism and reminiscent of blackface minstrel shows — performances intended to mock Black people."

The Red Coalition's director, Alain Babineau, tweeted that M Sylvestre's play was a "drop of systemic racism" and suggested M Sylvestre was a "sellout" in the service of white people. Franck Sylvestre is black (or "Black", if you prefer) by the way, a native of Martinique, a French possession [not "colony", shurely. Ed.] in the Caribbean.

Yesterday M Sylvestre has filed a lawsuit against M Babineau, alleging that he made unreasonable claims about the puppet, which have damaged his career in the theatre. According to the statement of claim, M Babineau "unreasonably associated the plaintiff and his puppet with racism, with the submission of Black people to white people and even white supremacism and the dehumanization of Black people." 

It goes on to call the criticism an attack on Sylvestre's reputation, and an attempt "to expose him to the hatred and contempt of the public in general and the Black community in particular." 

At a presser yesterday, M Sylvestre's lawyer said the puppet is based on his client's own appearance and that there's nothing racist about the show. He said it is not defamatory to describe actual racist comments as racist, but associating "someone who is clearly not racist, with a show that is clearly not racist" with racism is defamatory. 

"It's an issue of freedom of artistic expression," the lawayer added. "If every representation of a Black person that doesn't please M Babineau and others becomes blackface, becomes the subject of calls for censorship, that limits my client's freedom of artistic expression and, potentially, that of other artists." 

Indeed. If you were a juror, would you find for M Sylvestre, or do you believe M Babineau was doing the only decent and woke thing by calling out an expression of anti-black racism which in today's progressive society is... wait for it... complete unacceptable.

Note from Ed.: We contacted the Prime Minister of All Canuckistan, Blackie McBlackface, for comment, but have received no response.

Six things you can do to celebrate Black History Month

Never let it be said that Walt shrank from a challenge! It's still over two weeks to the much-longed-for end of Black History Month, so there's still time to do something to prove that you're woke. Here are six suggestions.

1. Read (and name) a poem by a Black author.

2. Spend a few minutes to learn about Africa, and answer three geographic questions

3. Dance to a Reggae song and list the name

4. Cook an African or Caribbean meal and describe it

5. Have a conversation with a Black co-worker and name them

6. Take a photo of an item in your home that reminds you of Black history and explain why with an accompanying picture.

I didn't make this up all by my(white)self. In fact they are taken from a memorandum sent to employees of the Regional Municipality of Durham (Ontario, Canada) promoting what they called the "Black History Month Scavenger Hunt". Really. 

A day after a copy of the list was circulated on antisocial media by a BLM activist, the usual suspects chimed in with shrieks of "Racist!" and call for "accountability", after regional officials issued the customary fulsome apology.

Shailene Panylo, co-founder of a group styling itself the "Durham Black Accountability Coalition" told Global News, "It was so incredibly shameful that I was as much as in disbelief as… I had to laugh, you have to laugh because how can after so much time, so much effort trying to educate, agitate, create change could something so completely off be put forth as a Black History Month initiative? It simply doesn’t make sense.

"Black History Month has long been an opportunity for non-Black folk to tokenize Black bodies within conversations and space, essentially freeing other people who are non-Black from having to interact with their own learning and unlearning in a way that's truthfully meaningful and would dismantle systems that activities like this only continue to uphold."

In response to the outcry, the Region of Durham tweeted "We hear you" and posted an image of a statement that said, "addressing anti-Black racism is a priority" for the municipality. It said there will be other activities throughout the month for staff to learn about Black history, Black culture and achievements within the Black community.

The statement also said, "Through engaging with the community and Regional staff we acknowledge that mistakes will be made when addressing anti-Black racism. This challenge activity is one of them." Note the use of the passive voice there. That's how you weasel out of saying, "We made a mistake!"

Global News spoke with Chair John Henry [Is he a steel-drivin' man? Ed.] and Regional Municipality of Durham Chief Administrative Officer Elaine Baxter-Trahair to ask about the activity and the details surrounding it. Said the Chair, "Once we found out about it, we were disappointed. We reacted yesterday afternoon. It wasn't something we saw. I'm apologetic for it and we're sorry it has happened."

Following the statement by the Chair, the Table (Ms Baxter-Trahair) said the activity and Black History Month activities were overseen by a "cross-department diverse group of individuals." She went on to describe what happened as, errr, a "misjudgment". "There was [sic] just a couple of misjudgments, so going forward I have to make sure there's the oversight and training in place so the committee can make better decisions."

So everything's OK then, in the Region of Durham. No systemic racism there! And yes, they're just about as woke as can be, although not so woke, of course, as Canuck Prime Minister Blackie McBlackface.

Racial profiling? On Canada's Parliament Hill? Yowza!

February is Black History Month. Why they picked the shortest month of the year is beside the point. The politically correct governments of both the USA and Canada want us to celebrate whatever black history we can find -- e.g. the story of Viola Desmond, Canada's answer to Rosa Parks -- and make sure there's a lot more of it in the future. That means more events... and laws... to ensure that people of the coloured persuasion play a more prominent role in our countries' social and political life.

Up in Ottawa, the capital of the Great No-longer-white North, the ultra-PC government of Just In Trudeau decided to start the festivities off with a special "Black Voices on the Hill Day", the "hill" in question being Parliament Hill, the Canuck version of Capitol Hill [not exactly as shown. Ed.] 150 members of the alleged "black community" were invited to Ottawa for a series of meetings with eight federal cabinet ministers, to discuss great progressive ideas like affirmative action and building more basketball courts to put a stop to yoof crime.

Of course they couldn't all meet with the ministers at once. Some of them had to wait outside the committee room where the meetings were being held. The sight of large numbers of black people loitering in the corridors of power disturbed the Parliamentary Protective Service -- the rent-a-cops responsible for security on Parliament Hill -- who responded by asking the visitors to wait in the Parliamentary Cafeteria, so that's where they went.

Some racist -- not a Member of Parliament, surely -- who dropped by the caf for a coffee noticed the large number of people of a type not normally seen in that precinct, and took a couple of pix with his cellphone, which he then passed along to security. A PPS guard went to have a word with the visitors. According to a spokesthingy for the Federation of Black Canadians, the guard "responded by labelling the delegates 'dark-skinned' and telling them to leave, even though established regulations allow civilians with the appropriate pass to be in that space."

In the US of A, the request to leave would probably have been countered with a sit-in, but the sheep-like Canucks [black sheep? Ed.] left quietly, but did complain to one of their own, an African-Canadian [sic] senator from Nova Scotia -- a Trudeau appointee qualified not just by her colour but also her gender -- who went public with the story, demanding a meeting with Mr Socks and the customary apologies all round.

The Parliamentary Protective Service was quick to oblige. A spokesthingy said the force [sic] is investigating the incident, and the PPS director's chief of staff [sic] issued a statement saying that "Our security personnel must always conduct themselves with professionalism and respect towards parliamentarians, employees and visitors. We need to do a better job in ensuring that this standard is maintained across our workforce. The Parliamentary Protective Service has zero tolerance for any type of discrimination."

So that's all right, then, even though no-one's head has actually been seen rolling down Parliament Hill. A further apology from the Prime Minister is expected momentarily, to be followed by a six- or seven-figure cheque to salve the hurt feelings and make the black voices understand that they have indeed been heard.