Ingrid Segerstedt-Wiberg, 1911-2010.

The Swedish humanist, journalist, and politician Ingrid Segerstedt-Wiberg has passed away. She was the daughter of Torgny Segersted (1876-1945), editor-in-chief of Göteborgs Handels- och Sjöfartstidning (a Gothenburg daily), and one of the most vocal opponents of Nazism and fascism prior to and during the Second World War — a time when those ideologies were quite popular in Sweden.

As early as 1934, Segerstedt-Wiberg helped organise a committee to aid Jewish refugee children who arrived in Sweden on their own, establishing an orphanage on Viktoriagatan in Göteborg. After the war she continued to work with refugees, chaired the Swedish section of the Women's International League for Peace and Freedom, as well as UNA-Sweden, and was a member of the Swedish UNICEF National Committee.

Segerestedt-Wiberg also worked as an editor (1949-1953), and publisher (1968-1973), for the magazine Världshorisont, Göteborgs-Tidningen (a Gothenburg tabloid) between 1949 and 1955, and finally Göteborgs-Posten — where she served as assistant editor between 1969 and 1976. A indefatigable activist, Segerstedt-Wiberg was Sweden's first female editorialist, and authored some fifteen books.

As a representative for Folkpartiet (Liberal People's Party), Segerstedt-Wiberg was elected member of parliament between 1958 and 1970, leaving the party in 1999 following its decision to endorse Swedish NATO membership. Throughout her life, she remained a strident, vocal challenger of the xenophobia far too prevalent in Swedish society.

Lighting the darkness.

During December, the month with the shortest daylight hours of the year in the Northern Hemisphere, many households in North-West Europe are decorated with symbolic candlesticks to “banish” the darkness. It's a tradition rooted in the Christian Advent, reaching back to the Middle Ages, though the modern variants of wreaths or candlesticks, with four candles representing each of the Sundays preceding Christmas Day lit in succession, originated among German Lutherans in the mid-1850s.

The tradition of lighting Advent candles (or wreaths) didn't arrive in Sweden until the 1870s, and didn't become widespread until the 1920s, though candles had been integral to seasonal celebrations for centuries. Today electric Advent candlesticks with seven candles in a pyramid shape dominate, and seem to change the entire country's appearance overnight, displayed in practically every home, institution, and workplace from the beginning of December (occasionally earlier) to St. Knut's Day.

Originally referred to as julljusstakar, "Yule candlesticks", to avoid confusion with the live candle variety, they are a fairly recent addition to the season's decorations. The very first electric Advent candlestick was constructed (but not patented) in 1934 by Oscar Andersson (1909-1996), an employee at the Göteborg warehouse of the Dutch electronics firm Philips.

Towards the end of 1929, Philips introduced electric Christmas tree lamps in Sweden. Many of these lamp-sets, designed for 120 V common in urban centres at the time, were returned 'defective' to the Philips warehouse, having been subjected to 220 V in rural areas. Tasked at the warehouse with salvaging the functioning lamps from these sets, Mr Andersson - a technical gymnasium graduate – had the idea to mount electric Christmas tree lamps on an ordinary wooden candlestick (purchased at Grand Bazar for 2 Swedish krona, or roughly 53 cents – the equivalent of C$ 8.80 today).

Displayed in the window of his parent's apartment on Karl Gustav Street in the quarter of Landala, the approval Mr Andersson's invention garnered among passers-by encouraged him to present the electric Advent candlestick to his supervisor. Savvy to its potential, the supervisor brought the contraption to Philips' Stockholm headquarters, where initial scepticism eventually turned into an agreement to manufacture a trial run of 2000 electric candlesticks for the 1939 Christmas season.

Marketed as a “fireproof,” safer alternative to live candlesticks, the Philips Candlesticks were completely sold out (at 13 krona apiece, or roughly C$ 3.38 – equal to C$ 44.39 today) before Christmas Day that year. Mass-production commenced once WWII ended, and the material shortages caused by it were rectified. By the mid-1990s, around a million electric Advent candlesticks were sold in Sweden annually and could be found in just over 90% of Swedish households.

Intriguingly, the advent of the electric Advent candlestick largely altered its function from a symbolic, religious one, to a practically secular, illuminating one – pleasantly dispelling the darkness for believers and non-believers alike over the past 70 years.

Note: this article originally posted on November 29, 2008.

A War to Remember.

On November 11, they were almost halfway, having left Québec nearly two weeks earlier. Volunteers from all across Canada, heading for a theatre of war on the other side of the globe. For some of them, who'd barely traveled outside their home province, it may as well have been the end of the Earth. For some of them, it'd be the last place they'd ever go. They had signed up to defend peace, justice, progress, and civilization itself, against an enemy who — they'd been told — threatened all with his backward religious zealotry and militant aggression. They were the vanguard, the first 1,019 Canadians out of 7,368 (including 12 female nurses) who'd fight for the British Empire in South Africa over the next two and a half years.

The Second Boer War, known as the South African War in Canada, began 110 years ago. Canadians' awareness of this conflict, its causes and consequences, isn't particularly acute — though given our current involvement in Afghanistan, and the parallels between the two conflicts, we could do with a reminder. Especially as we once again find ourselves governed by reactionaries hellbent on reshaping the identity of our nation to one that better suits their jingoist stance — as evidenced by the current Conservative governments new, revised citizenship guide, and its greater emphasis on Canada's military history. Though don't rely on it for mention of Canada's "adventures" in South Africa, given that our exploits there aren't much to brag about.

That war was precipitated by the British Empire, having already annexed the Natalia Republic (today's KwaZulu-Natal) in 1843, setting its eye on the remaining independent Boer republics of the Orange Free State and the South African Republic (Transvaal). Situated between the Orange and Vaal rivers, by 1870 the Orange Free State had yielded impressive diamond deposits, while the Transvaal, north of the Vaal river, was the destination of the Witwatersrand Gold Rush in 1886, following the discovery of the largest gold-bearing deposits in the world. The South African gold may not have been as pure as that produced in Australia and Canada, but it was a lot easier to extract. As for diamonds, they wouldn't be discovered in Australia and Canada until a century later.

The only obstacle between the British Empire and this new sources of wealth were the Boer (black South Africans certainly didn't count). The Boer, descendants of Dutch, German, and French settlers were weary of the influx of mainly British prospectors into their states, and — having gained their independence — certainly not interested in becoming British subjects. The situation came to a head when British colonists launched a disastrous raid into Transvaal towards the end of 1895. Though ostensibly a private enterprise, it had been backed — until the very last moment — by the British government. The Boer successfully repelled the raid, but their predicament was exacerbated further by an unexpected expression of support from the German Emperor.

To the British this was simply further evidence of German meddling in "their affairs", and a perfect pretext for full-blown conflict. As British troops began assembling along their borders, the Boer gambled on a preemptive strike, launching an offensive in October 1899. However, by January 1900, colonial reinforcements from Australia, Canada, and New Zealand, gave the British the upper hand, and by September 1900 the Boer republics were overrun. Refusing to surrender, the Boer engaged in a protracted campaign of irregular warfare, lasting until May 1902.

Canada's Prime Minister, Wilfrid Laurier, initally attempted to steer clear of a conflict which had no bearing whatsoever on Canada's national interests. But a majority of English Canadians were rearing for a jolly good "adventure", with the sole opposition emanating from Québec, and a few vocal English Canadian labour unions and farmers' groups. French Canadians in particular were not only worried of setting a precedent for involvement in future conflicts, but could also sympathise with the Boer — small nations struggling for independece in a sea of Anglos. Laurier eventually bowed to pressure, and agreed to a compromise which saw Canada provide volunteers, equipment and transportation in lieu of conscription.

Though Canadians had participated in the Nile Expedition of 1884-85, this was the first time large Canadian contingents participated in armed conflict abroad. Many signed up beliving they'd fight alongside other Canadians, commanded by Canadians even. As it turned out, the Brits called the shots from beginning to end, minding to quickly get out of the way once the actual shooting started. A scenario Canadians would experience for much of the First World War as well. As it happened, the first significant British victory of the conflict was won by Canadians, in the Battle of Paardeberg. Though as wreaths are placed at the South African War memorial in Toronto, the Boer War Memorial in Montréal, and other points of rememberance throughout Canada, let's remember that this particular "victory" — like most of them — was the result of pure luck.

Having experienced their worst day of losses during the entire conflict (8 dead, 60 wounded) in their very first combat, and bungled a nighttime sneak attack which saw most of the Canadian battalion retreat, two Canadian companies managed to convince 4,019 Boer men and 50 women (roughly 10% of the Boer army) to surrender. The battle could've easily gone the other way. Today there aren't many obvious reminders of this specific conflict in Canada, beyond its most infamous commander — Horatio Herbert Kitchener — being the namesake of many a street, park, school, and public building throught the country, even a city in Ontario.

The Mennonite community once known as Berlin, was violently intimidated to change its name after the racist Field Marshall's death in 1916. No German name would be tolerated by the rabid pro-Empire Anglos — despite the fact that the conflict fought at the time was (ostensibly) against German Emperor Wilhelm II , the first grandchild of British Queen Victoria. But Kitchener is perhaps best remembered as the mustachioed Big Brother staring down from a recruitment poster — like a British Stalin — intimidating citizens of the Empire to go get killed in the First World War, the pointless conflict which spelled the end of the era of empires. (Though we're often told to revere those fallen in that war for their sacrifice to peace and democracy, let's remember none of the participating nations were democracies in any modern sense of the word.)

What is less known is the tactics Kitchener employed in 1900, once the British offensive had failed to subdue the Boer. Apart from a "scorched earth" policy, which saw the devastation of Boer farms and ranches, their livelihoods and livestock destroyed, as well as using Boer prisoners as human shields to protect trains, Kitchener also turned refugee camps into concentration camps. Though similar camps had previously been established in the Russian Empire prior to the first partition of Poland, in the USA to concentrate Native Americans, and by Spain in Cuba and the Philippines, Kitchener's concentration camps are distinguished for being the first to actually be termed such.

The internment of Boer women and children in 45 tented camps (and an additional 64 for black South Africans of various ethnicities who lived in the two independent Boer republics) was meant to deny the Boer "guerillas" access to supplies, food, and shelter. Those interned also served as a means to extort: families of Boer men still fighting received smaller rations than others, causing mass starvation. Combined with poor sanitation, lack of food soon made diseases — measles, typhoid, dysentery — endemic in the camps. Shortage of medicine and medical care quickly led to large numbers of deaths.

According to the Canadian War Museum's resident historian Cameron Pulsifer, any comparison of these camps with the more infamous ones established by the German Nazi-regime is "grossly exaggerated and unfair". An opinion that easily calls into question the point of said museum. Whether or not the British — with ample help from Canadian volunteers — had intended to perpetrate a genocide is beside the point. They waged a war on two independent states for the purpose of annexing their territories and forcibly assimilating their populations. Regardless of the stated intentions, the end result ultimately speaks for itself: nearly 25% of the Boer population, 50% of all Boer children under the age of 16, and an estimated 12% of the black South African populations died in Kitchener's camps.

Starvation, disease, and exposure killed 27,927 Boer — of whom 24,074 were children — and 14,154 black South Africans. Though as no attempt was ever made to keep records of black South Africans, their deaths were likely underestimated. As many as 22,000 of the nearly 107,000 black South Africans interned may have perished in the camps. By comparison, only some 3,000 Boer men were killed in actual combat. Additionally, of the nearly 28,000 prisoners of war taken by British forces, some 25,630 were sent to prisons overseas. While not as purposeful as the Holocaust, it's a genocide that's left a lasting effect on the demography and quality of life in the region.

Why does this matter to us now? Because Canadians participated fully in these genocidal actions, taking active part in the "suppressive" policies during the entire duration of the war. Military fetishists like Pulsifer and his fellows at the Canadian War Museum may lack the courage to admit it, but not one among all these people — men, women, children — ever posed a threat to Canada in any way whatsoever. The Canadian War Museum's obfuscation of the atrocities and war crimes committed by Canadian volunteers is disingenuous and dishonest.

Ironically, once awareness of the appalling conditions in camps had been raised, primarily by Emily Hobhouse, Kitchener allegedly issued a "take no prisoners" order to prevent overcrowding. This only came to light during the court-martial of three Australian soldiers — one of whom happend to be folk hero Harry "Breaker" Morant — put on trial for executing Boer prisoners. Kitchener denied ever issuing the order, promptly signing the death warrants of the Australians. This didn't prevent Canadian scouts from wearing black feathers to indicate they'd shoot any Boer captured under arms. And what do we have to show for our participation in this "grand adventure"? 267 Canadians killed in action, 252 wounded, three Victoria crosses, one scarf crocheted by the Queen, and a springbok on the cap badge of the Royal Canadian Dragoons.

Though the legacy of the Second Boer War also taints the dress uniform of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police, whose distinctive Stetson hats and Strathcona boots were first officially sanctioned for use by Canadian South Africa volunteers. Canada also "gained" a Minister of Militia and Defence in South Africa veteran Sam Hughes — a reactionary hothead who not only helped convince Prime Minister Laurier of the necessity of getting involved in the South African war, but would go on to whip up nationalist fervour in the build up to the First World War, goading Canadians to yet again sacrifice themselves in a foreign conflict that had little to do with them.

As we're asked by our parliament this year to pause for two rather than the traditional minute of silence on Remembrance Day, let us remind ourselves of the chauvinist forces that are in fact one of the leading sources of conflict in our world. Let us remind ourselves how easily we can be decieved to lend our support to armed aggression in far away places, against people we don't know and have never met, who pose little — if any — threat to us.

As the martial sentimentalists in our current government and in our society attempt to institutionalise militarism in our country, to ritualise rememberance ceremonies, and imbue them with chauvinist platitudes and historical revisionism in order to turn future generations into willing recruits, let us remind ourselves that in 1899, the (Liberal) government of Canada claimed the overseas expediton to South Africa would not be a precedent. Time has clearly proven otherwise. It is in our power to change that.

Wetaskiwin water tower.

Like grain elevators - the true skyscrapers of the plains - water towers were long the signature landmarks of prairie communities. More than simple storage containers, they signaled the locations of human habitation, displayed the names and mottos of villages and towns, and provided a spectacular and practically irresistible venue for adolescent shenanigans. The need for water may have been the main motivation for their erection, but the desire to express pride in hometowns and relationships eventually altered their significance from that of mere utilitarian structures to symbols of home.

As new technology came to replace them, these once immovable giants began to disappear. No longer useful to the communities they had served, the cost of maintaining them quite often outweighed the benefit of preserving them. Though standpipes (cylindrical water storage tanks) remain quite common, only 36 water towers remain in Alberta. Out of these, fewer than half are still in use. Among those, the Wetaskiwin water tower stands out as Canada's oldest functioning municipal water tower - having continually served its community for the past 100 years.

Originally painted black - like most of its contemporaries - its riveted steel legs support a 450,609 L (119,038 gal.) capacity steel tank - holding enough water to fill an average, 25 m public swimming pool. The original wooden sheath protecting the tank from cold winter winds has been replaced by a steel enclosure, topped by a blue, octagonal peak, while steel tie rods and turnbuckles ensure the 45.72 m (150 ft) tall structure (54.86 m including the antennas on top) doesn't topple.

The tower was erected during the 1906-1907 building boom, which saw Wetaskiwin grow from a tiny town to "the smallest city in the Empire". The Calgary division of the Dominion Bridge Co. was responsible for construction, while the Ontario Wind Engine and Pump Co. furnished the tower's equipment. Both companies were involved in erecting a large number of similar structures across Canada, constructing towers in neighbouring communities like Camrose and Lacombe - though apart from Wetasksiwin, only nearby New Norway has retained its Dominion-built tower (erected in 1947).

The Wetaskiwin water tower stood unconnected and unused for a year and a half following construction, as the town's water and sewage system didn't actually reach it until 1909. Today it primarily serves the western end of Wetaskiwin - now a city of 12,285 inhabitants - drawing water from Coal Lake. Formed on the Battle River roughly 13 km east of the town, the lake has served as Wetaskiwin's municipal water supply since 1968, and had its level regulated for this purpose by an earthen embankment and dam in 1972.

Threatened by demolition six years ago, the now refurbished water tower became a subject of great dispute in Wetaskiwin when initial renovation estimates were drawn up. Ranging from C$1.22 to 1.38 million, compared to the C$250,000 cost of tearing it down, the figures left many citizens feeling that the money could be put to better use. A problem architectural conservation faces everywhere, not just in small prairie communities; the public doesn't mind preserving its cultural heritage as long as it doesn't have to pay for it. Preserving aesthetically spartan, utilitarian, industrial structures - such as water towers - presents a particularly difficult challenge.

The costliest part of the renovation appeared to be the removal of the lead paint coating the tower, though once it was established that it was possible to largely seal rather than remove the original paintwork, by February 2004 the city was able to reduce the total cost to C$748,000. As it turned out, the singularity of the project required very specific scaffolding to envelop the structure, raising the total cost by July 2004 to C$988,710 - leading concerned citizens to vent across the pages of the Wetaskiwin Times Advertiser, generating well over 40 articles and countless letters on the subject of the water tower.

What began as concern over spiraling costs erupted into a full-blown scandal, once the complete tally of the delayed project was revealed. Though optimistically scheduled to be completed between August and October 2004, work on the the tower wasn't finished until October 2005. Following many delays and several gaffes, the restoration of the city landmark totaled C$1,918,362 - leaving even the city councillors responsible dismayed. Though the city had committed nearly C$739,000 to the project, the Wetaskiwin Memorial Fund had raised C$130,000 in private and corporate donations (from as far away as Arizona), while the provincial and federal governments contributed C$236,000, that still left (roughly) an C$814,000 hole to fill. Even with the rejuvenation completed, the debate over whether the water tower's new white garb represented money well spent continued - until the controversial renovation of Wetaskiwin's National Historic Site, the 1907 Court House, overtook it in 2006.

Unlike the Gleichen water tower, erected in 1911, the Wetaskiwin tower hasn't yet been added to the Canadian Register of Historic Places - probably because it remains a fully functioning component of municipal infrastructure. Its new exterior incorporating the official city colours - designed by local students in competition - will likely enable the tower to serve the community for at least another half-century. Dominating the city skyline, visible for ten kilometers, it also stands as a striking reminder of the vital role water towers played in the survival of many prairie communities.

Mother of All Demos.

Networked collaboration, videoconferencing, digital text editing, hyperlinks, a pointing device (superficially resembling a rodent) called a “mouse,” surely are familiar to the average computer user today. But on this day, 40 years ago, some 1000 participants of the Fall Joint Computer Conference had their minds blown as they were exposed to all of the above for the very first time, during a 100 minute demonstration now known in hacker lore as The Mother of All Demos. At a time when most people thought computers were purely for computing, this was the stuff of an interactive future decades away.

The team that launched this point-and-click revolution in 1968 was led by Dr Douglas Engelbart, founder of the Augmentation Research Centre (ARC) at the Stanford Research Institute in Menlo Park, California. Engelbart had spent twenty years trying to secure support for building a working prototype of an interactive, collaborative computer system that would allow people to work collectively to solve complex problems. What his team unleashed at the San Francisco conference was the oN-Line System (NLS), the very first attempt to put these ideas into practical form. It was a gamble: Englebart and his team didn't yet have a fully developed system, and had used research funding without official approval.

The presentation wasn't only successful, but so far ahead of computing at the time, its technology so convincing, that it directly contributed to the personal computer revolution of the 1980s and the development of the World Wide Web in the 1990s. But while many of the NLS components and features, such as the mouse, hypertext, the graphical user interface, multiple windows, information organised by relevance, integrated text and graphics, two-way video and teleconferencing are now ubiquitous, the NLS itself was far too oriented towards extremely powerful systems and highly specialised operators to become the standard system its creators envisioned.

Unlike many of their contemporaries, Engelbart’s team wasn’t interested in automation but augmentation, not merely designing a tool but a system for working with knowledge. They strived to change the entire process of how we work, think and interact with data, as well as the machines we employ for that purpose. Today, the basic premise of the NLS permeates modern computing, but its scope is yet to be fully realised; while their presentation inspired much of the hardware and software now widely used, the manner in which the ARC team used the NLS to collaborate is presently just being introduced with the evolution of web communities and services like social-networking sites, video sharing sites, wikis, blogs, and folksonomies.

Know your rights.

December 10 marks the 60th anniversary of the UN adoption of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, the first global statement of its kind. Outlining 30 basic rights to which all humans are inherently entitled, essential for us all to achieve our full potential, and to live a life free of fear and want, it affirms all humans free and equal, regardless of race, religion, economic status, age, gender, or personal characteristics, and pronounces these basic rights the foundation of peace, justice, and freedom in our world.

Along with the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights and its two Optional Protocols – one creating an individual complaints mechanism, the other abolishing the death penalty – ratified (with the usual reservations) by 163 nations, and the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights, ratified (ditto) by 159 nations, the Declaration forms the International Bill of Human Rights. Unlike the Charter of the UN, the Declaration isn't a binding treaty itself; it complements the Charter as a fundamental constitutive document.

Created in the late 1940s, when it became apparent that the UN didn't sufficiently define the rights referenced in the Charter, in particular the “fundamental freedoms” and “human rights,” the Declaration was initially drafted by Canadian legal scholar John Humphrey. It provided a foundation for the Canadian Human Rights Act, which aims to inspire a vision for Canada in which “all individuals [free from discrimination] should have an opportunity equal with other individuals to make for themselves the lives that they are able and wish to have.”

So, take the time on Wednesday to rediscover the world's most translated document (into more than 360 languages), take part in local events, as year long activities around the theme Dignity and justice for all of us culminate, and make sure you know your rights. In Canada the day will likely pass quietly, as our political leaders enjoy their unscheduled work stoppage, following the Conservative PM's refusal to put the reactionary policies of his minority government to a vote.

But you can still remind the PM that his government's attempts to legislate away complaints related to pay equity, filed by the Canadian Human Rights Commission, are an affront to the principles of the Canadian Human Rights Act, the Charter of Rights and Freedoms, and the international human rights standards that Canada is supposed to be upholding. An alternative to dealing with Mr Harper's impenitent band of redneck buffoons, is to Write for Rights with Amnesty International Canada, or simply adding your name to the Every Human Has Rights campaign initiated by The Elders.

World AIDS Day.

This year, December 1 marks the twentieth anniversary of World AIDS Day, originated at the 1988 World Summit of Ministers of Health on Programmes for AIDS Prevention. Every year since, governments, international organisations, and charities around the world have organised campaigns dedicated to raising awareness of the AIDS pandemic caused by the spread of HIV infection.

Since it was first recognised in 1981, AIDS has killed more than 25 million people, making it one of the most destructive pandemics in recorded history. Despite improved access to treatment and care, in 2007 the disease claimed 2.1 million people, among them 330,000 children. The International Red Cross and Red Crescent Movement has warned that the pandemic is so severe in some countries it should be classified as a disaster, fitting the UN definition of an event overwhelming the capacity of any single society to manage.

Over the past two decades significant progress has been made, but much more needs to be done as the pandemic continues to wreak havoc across the world. The theme for this year's World AIDS Day is Lead - Empower - Deliver, a continuation of last year's Take the Lead theme, focusing primarily on political leaders delivering on their promises – such as universal access to HIV prevention, treatment, care, and support by 2010, and the Millennium Development Goal to reverse the epidemic by 2015.

The AIDS pandemic cannot be reversed, and gains made cannot be sustained, without a reduction in the new infection rate. According to a study recently published in The Lancet, universal testing for HIV, followed by immediate treatment could cut the number of people developing full-blown AIDS by up to 95% in ten years time. While such a strategy could virtually eliminate HIV transmissions, the WHO has warned that the feasibility of universal testing is challenged by weak health care systems.

But money alone won't suffice to cure the world. Between 2001 and 2007 there was a six fold increase in financing for HIV programmes among developing countries, which has led to lower mortality and higher rate of prevention. However, the progress is uneven, and key to success in addressing the epidemic is further, immediate, worldwide reduction of the human rights violations associated with AIDS, the gender inequality, stigma, and discrimination acting as roadblocks, impeding effective, evidence- and rights-based responses to the pandemic.

Today the spread of AIDS has stabilised at an unacceptably high level. While the number of new HIV infections globally declined from 3 million in 2001 to 2.7 million in 2007 (that's still almost 7400 people a day), an estimated 33 million people were living with the disease in 2007 – more than half of them children. In sub-Saharan Africa, by far the worst-affected region, the pandemic has even begun to decline, but infections are on the rise in a number of places outside Africa.

The USA has one of the largest HIV prevalence rates in the world, with an estimated 1.2 million people living with HIV in 2005. In Canada, an estimated 58,000 people were living with the disease in 2005 – an increase of 16% since 2002 – with women's proportion of new HIV infections on the rise. AIDS continues to disproportionally affect African Americans in the USA and aboriginal people in Canada. The rate of new HIV infections in the EU has almost doubled since 1999, with particularly high prevalence in France, Italy, Spain and the UK – Estonia, Portugal and the UK having the highest rates of new HIV diagnoses. The ECDC estimates that almost one third of people living with HIV in Europe are unaware they are infected.

While globally the percentage of women living with HIV has remained at 50% for several years, women's share of infections is rising in several countries. Among children, the annual number of new HIV infections has declined since 2002, but an estimated 370,000 children under the age of 15 became infected in 2007 (over 1000 a day). Despite young people, 15 - 24 years of age, accounting for 45% of all new HIV infections, many of them still lack accurate, comprehensive information on how to avoid exposure to the virus.

Events marking the day will be held throughout the world (see here for Canada), calling for universal treatment, care and support for people living with HIV and AIDS. But the most important action remains to educate and protect yourself and your loved ones. So, spread the word and enjoy sex safely.

Je me souviens.

As Remembrance Day dawns we're once again subjected to chauvinistic platitudes and historical revisionism from various self-proclaimed defenders of peace, freedom of expression, and democracy. Media bring us tales of soldiers' "heroism", television tableaus overflow with gung-ho war movies. A day during which we could have reflected on the horror of war — and the 42 currently fought around us — is turned into a celebration of the armed forces and militarism.

What is ironic is how anti-democratic and stifling this trend is. Apart from distorting in the public mind the processes by which tolerant, democratic, and peaceful societies are actually forged (popular political organisation and action, as opposed to armed conflict), these simplistic ceremonies obscure the actual causes of war, and — worse still — serve as tools of indoctrination, insisting on absurd notions like the "necessity" of warfare. Notions aimed at turning future generations into willing recruits for further slaughter.

It's worthwhile then to remind ourselves of the grip that the martial sentimentalists still hold on our collective imagination, how for self-serving purposes they trample even the very things they claim we owe to their sacrifices. Things like the freedom to dissent, to express an opinion contrary to theirs, for example. It's nearly two years ago that the Royal Canadian Legion threatened the Peace Pledge Union with legal action for infringing on its "trademark" red poppies.

The PPU, founded in 1934, has for over seventy years been the distributor of the White Poppy appeal, which the Legion suddenly felt threatened not only its economic interests, but apparently also its unique right to dictate history and influence current military policy. In its comment on the incident, the PPU reflected:

What was originally a meaningful ceremony of consolation for tens of thousands of bereaved quickly turned into a justification of a futile war, and every soldier became a hero. Those heroes, and the millions more who have died in war since then, continued to be 'honoured' and 'remembered'. But what does that mean? What is being honoured and remembered?

What was once a language of conciliation has become a language of obfuscation. When the victims and perpetrators merge into a meaningless whole, as in 'to honour those who have died in war', we know we are in fantasy-land. People go to war for many reasons — not all of them worthy of respect, let alone honour.

Tens of thousands rushed to the recruiting offices in 1914 for the adventure that the war might offer. Tens of thousands more, who did not want to go to war, were conscripted and signed up to kill — not to die. Why should we honour reckless or foolish adventurers because they were killed in a futile war? Why should we honour those who acquiesced with the state's order to go and kill — that is, to perform acts that are contrary to most moral codes and laws?

'Tell them of us and say "For your tomorrow we gave our today".' That inscription on a memorial to World War Two's Burma campaign is how the British Legion likes us to think of the war dead. It's a neat piece of sleight of hand, aiming to make us grateful, even a little uneasy. It certainly deflects deeper questions about the 'values' of war. It is this guilt-inducing meaning that the red poppy attaches to itself; and this is largely why so few dare to criticise its pernicious values. No one has died in war for me — or for you. (The comment can be read in its entirety here.)

Let us then dare today to remember that in no other era in human history has so much time been spent talking about peace, and so little done for it. That there has never been more lies, more death, more destruction, and more despair than in our time. Let's remind ourselves of the human casualties, the millions of people murdered, as well as the material, economical, and cultural losses.

Let's remember how easily we can be deceived to lend our support to armed aggression in far away places, against people we don't know, who pose little — if any — threat to us. Most importantly, let's remember that when the battlefields finally fell silent on the eleventh day of the eleventh month in 1918, there was hope that one World War would be lesson enough for future generations. These things are worth remembering.