It is supposed to be a fundamental principle of criminal law that a person is presumed innocent until proven otherwise by the State (government). This is the ideology or the rhetoric (which much of the left have swallowed). The reality is otherwise. In reality, the administrative apparatus of various organizations of the government and semi-governmental organizations assume that you are guilty first and that you have to prove your innocence; otherwise, you suffer negative consequences.
An example is the requirements that the Ontario College of Teachers imposed on me in order for me to qualify as a teacher in the province of Ontario after I moved from the province of Manitoba. To qualify as a teacher in Ontario, you must gain the approval of the Ontario College of Teachers (OCT). The OCT website explains what this organization does:
ABOUT THE COLLEGE
The Ontario College of Teachers licenses, governs and regulates the Ontario teaching profession in the public interest.
Teachers who work in publicly funded schools in Ontario must be certified to teach in the province and be members of the College.
The College:
sets ethical standards and standards of practice
issues teaching certificates and may suspend or revoke them
accredits teacher education programs and courses
investigates and hears complaints about members
The College is accountable to the public for how it carries out its responsibilities.
You can find the qualifications, credentials and current status of every College member at Find a Teacher.
The College is governed by a 37-member Council.
23 members of the College are elected by their peers
14 members are appointed by the provincial government.
To qualify as a teacher in Ontario, among other things, you have to answer a questionnaire. On the questionnaire, there are questions concerning arrest–and since I was arrested by the RCMP (the Royal Canadian Mounted Police) (but never convicted), I was obliged to prove my innocence in various ways.
I sent, along with my explanation, a table that I had constructed concerning my experiences (and the experiences of my daughter, Francesca) with the child welfare organization Winnipeg Child and Family Services (CFS), located in Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada.
Below is the second and third parts of the answer to the second question (relating to whether i was fired)
II. Issues about my teaching ability. This issue needs to be broken into three parts: the issue of my competency as a senior-high French teacher, my competency as a middle-years French teacher before my assignment as a glorified educational assistant in September 2011 and my competency as a middle-years French teacher during the period from September 2011 to February 2012.
B.
Middle-years French: Earlier, I had undoubtedly some difficulties in this area—especially classroom management issues. Many students simply did not want to learn French, and I had to teach it. Since I philosophically disagreed with forcing students to learn something that they found useless and resisted whenever they could, I did my best in a bad situation. That some students hated French was obvious—and understandable.
Nonetheless, despite this bad situation, when the principal, Randy Chartrand, evaluated me in November 2010, his assessment was generally favourable (see the accompanying evaluation).
C.
By the time I started school in September 2011, my heart was already pounding occasionally. Being assigned the role of educational assistant to one special-needs grade nine student in power mechanics for the morning (the school was on the Copernican system of quarterly terms, with two classes per day for senior-high students) was humiliating. Given that many students already knew that I had a doctorate, they undoubtedly would be wondering why I was assigned the role of educational assistant. Given that Ashern has only a population of about 1,400, so too would the community. I did not find any place where I could really relax.
I still taught the afternoon middle-years French classes. However, it was clear that the principal (and the superintendent) wanted me to resign. Evidence of this, in addition to my assignment to one special-needs student in September was the situation that I faced as a middle-years French teacher at the beginning of September, 2011, I did not know where I was to teach middle-year French at first. Furthermore, once I was assigned a classroom for middle-years French, it was where the foods and nutrition teacher taught her classes—hardly the ideal environment for teaching middle-years French. It was the only classroom where there were still chalkboards rather than whiteboards. Furthermore, Zumba classes were often held at noon in the classroom so that I had little time to set up for the class.
In October 2011, my heart was pounding to such an extent that I consulted a medical doctor to determine whether there had been any physiological damage. An EKG showed that there was no rhythmic problems at least. I received some medication to reduce the pounding, but the pounding continued.
On October 26, the new principal, the superintendent, an MTS representative and I had a meeting. It was at this meeting that I was obliged to undergo clinical supervision again (see below for a possible explanation for such a condition—and not my so-called incompetence as a teacher).
This entire situation undoubtedly affected some aspects of my teaching ability—in one classroom, mainly, where I had increasing problems of dealing with the students’ behaviour and lack of engagement. The small class with which I had particular problems found French boring. I tried to make it “interesting,” but obviously failed in that effort. I had had four of the students in previous French classes, and only one made any real effort to learn French. I had contacted the parents often for the other students, but this led nowhere.
Furthermore, I had increasing problems with classroom management in that class. The situation deteriorated further in that classroom from January 2011 onwards. The students, when they often refused to do something that I wanted them to do, would complain to the principal. At one point, the principal called me into his office concerning their complaints that I was instituting detention because of their lack of compliance with my requests (and I personally find detention to be purely punitive and hardly educative, but I was expected to control their behaviour, so I instituted detention against my own philosophical beliefs). I felt my hands were tied. When the students continued to disobey me, I did blurt out at one point, “Why do you not tell the principal to have me fired.” This assertion undoubtedly led to the February meeting with the principal, the superintendent, an MTS representative and me (although nothing was specifically said about this incident).
At the February meeting, the superintendent mentioned that due to my cancer and the arrest, intensive supervision would be necessary. The superintendent indicated that I would receive various supports in order to enable me to attain the teaching standard expected of me. Since my interpretation of the intent of placing me on intensive supervision was an extension of the control expressed in assigning me to be an educational assistant and assigning me to an inappropriate environment for learning French—especially in the middle years—I spoke to a member of the EAP program of MTS (I had been seeing him since October 2011), who suggested that I go on sick leave. This is what I did.
I was not fired, but the conditions in which I was working were already difficult. I then met with a representative of the Manitoba Teachers’ Society and the lawyer for the MTS. The lawyer informed me that I could grieve the requirement that I be placed on intensive supervision (the issue was grievable under Manitoba law), but I would still have to undergo the intensive supervision while the grievance was being processed, up to and including arbitration. Since I came to the conclusion that I had no further desire to work for that division, I resigned.
In any case, I was neither a great French teacher, nor the inept teacher that the principal made me out to be (see the accompanying combined report by the principal and my reply. The representative from MTS indicated that he thought that the report reflected badly—on the principal. He helped me edit it so that it was 30 pages in length (but unfortunately I do not have a copy of that report). [I subsequently found a copy of the report, which I have included in another series of posts.]
This is part of my explanation for answering “yes” in several of the questions.
Note that the Ontario College of Teachers presumed that a question of the firing of an employee requires the employee to justify her/himself and not the employer. The default judgement of semi- and governmental departments is that the employer makes legitimate judgements, and the (ex) employee has to justify her/himself in view of such judgments.
The social-democratic or social-reformist left, however, rarely even acknowledge this fact. Even the radical left (or what appears to be the radical left, often enough) fail to take such common experiences of the working class when they formulate their “strategies.” Thus, they are often blind to the need for persistent ideological struggle against this default view of the capitalist state.
On April 28 is the National Day of Mourning in Canada to commemorate those workers who have suffered disease, injury or death at work. However, unions rarely if ever raise the issue of how effective such a day of mourning is for addressing the health and safety problems that workers experience. Why do more or less 1,000 workers die every year at work and around 600,000 experience injuries or disease (Bob Barneston (2010), The Political Economy of Workplace Injury in Canada).
For example, I listened to the “Welcome to the Toronto & York Region Labour Council’s Day of Mourning ceremonies” for 2021 (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zl-7e8Ta-H8&list=LL&index=14). In none of the presentations do the presenters attribute problems of health and safety to the structural situation of the persistent need to accumulate capital at the expense of workers’ health and safety.
One of the ways in which the health and safety of workers who work for an employer has been jeopardized is the administrative shift in the capitalist government’s definition of the causes of dangers to health and safety. Government or state representatives defined health and safety problems in purely technical terms, ignoring the social causes of dangers to the health and safety of workers.
From Tom Dwyer (1991), Life and Death at Work: Industrial Accidents as a Case of Socially Produced Error, page 26:
Conflict over the weakness of safety laws proceeded [in England], especially from the 1870s when workers were able to achieve greater parliamentary representation. Through an examination of the content of regulations, we can see that workers’ social demands were largely ignored as, increasingly, solutions to problems emerged in important political compromises that were channeled technically. … The vision that the state lent to the prevention of accidents was overwhelmingly based on the development of technical criteria, while social criteria were, with some notable exceptions, given little attention.
The shift from defining health and safety dangers from social causes to technical causes led to the increasingly bureaucratic or administrative definition and treatment of the problem; this in turn contributed to the fragmentation of workers’ organization and struggle of the workers in relation to the social power of the class of employers.
From Tom Dwyer, Life and Death at Work: Industrial Accidents as a Case of Socially Produced Error, page 27:
The attention of unions was increasingly channeled away from the worksite and toward legislative change to be conquered through the efforts of members of Parliament sympathetic to the workers’ cause. The power of the bureaucracy grew as industrial problems became increasingly subject to political control through their transformation into administrative questions.
This view of the shift towards governmental administration of problems and away from class organization and class struggle is consistent with the view of a more general shift towards a capitalist government that administers laws–public administration.
From Mark Neocleous (1996), Administering Civil Society: Towards a Theory of State Power, pages 106-107:
In fact, the theoretical ‘problem’ over the relationship between struggle and
structure only arises by separating them and thus being faced with the necessity of syncretically syncretic • \sincretic=characterized or brought about by a combination of different forms of belief or practice] drawing them together again, or at least positing a causal relationship. But, as Werner Bonefeld [a Marxist theoretician] writes, structures are a mode of class antagonism and thus both the result and premise of class struggle. This is true of the capitalist state generally and specific institutional developments of that state. For the other moment of the making of the English working class was the (re)making of the modern state. Far from being supine [which means: failing to act or protest as a result of moral weakness or laziness], in the process of struggle the working class forced the emergence of new state structures – of political administration- and through these a reordering, far more fundamental than that forced by the bourgeoisie in its struggle, of the relation between state and civil society [capitalist society apart from the government or state]. The British state, faced with struggling classes, pre-empted revolutionary change by subsuming class struggle under the state through the development of administrative structures and mechanisms. The development of the state can be traced to the incorporation of working-class struggle into its very structures, as increasing elements of civil society found themselves structured, restructured and submerged. With typical flexibility and a seemingly endless ability to adapt itself, the British state responded by creating a space within itself for this purpose. Thus, although the working class was constituted by the state, the state itself was constituted through class struggle. The working class was both constituted by and constitutive of the structures of political administration and state power. (To put this another way: we need a conception of the working class not only as subjected, but also as subject.) The only way to incorporate the English working class was for the state to be altered accordingly, new (administrative) forms emerging which could then be used against the working class. Political administration, then, acts as the fulcrum around which both the working class and the modern state were ordered. Just as humans ‘by their own toil keep in existence a reality which enslaves them in ever greater degree’, so the working class in its struggles produce the real structures which then enslave it. Poulantzas [a Marxist political theoretician] rightly claims that ‘struggles are inscribed in the institutional materiality of the state, even though they are not concluded in it; it is a materiality that carries the traces of these muted and multiform struggles.’
This insight can be strengthened and tightened by positing political administration as a specific form of working class struggle, by following Adorno [a Marxist critical theorist] in arguing that administration acts as a process of subsumption, a mechanism for ordering and covering over. ‘Administration’ has feudal origins referring to the management of the estates of the dead; hence ‘the administration of wills’.67 I am arguing that we think of political administration as state management of the struggles of the working class. By subsuming struggle, political administration is ‘working-class power post festum [after the fact]; working-class political victories captured and formalized at their moment of triumph.’68 In these administrative structures the state appropriates and nullifies the struggle of the working class; as such they are the fossilized remnants of class struggle; they are the subsumption [meaning: of including under another, usually something more general] of struggle – working-class struggle abolished and preserved. Born of the struggle of the working class these structures are then left with the task of administering that same class, a task performed in relation to both collective organizations of the working class and its decomposed elements known as ‘citizens’. It is therefore through the very process of struggle that the working class, and not its ‘aristocratic’ elements, now most definitely of civil society, also finds its struggles incorporated into the state, transformed into administrative structures and turned against it. Thus in its struggle to become a class of civil society, the class discovers itself also to be a class of the state.
The administration of the health and safety of workers by the capitalist government or state channeled workers’ struggles in this area into a redefinition of the nature of the causes of health and safety issues, away from social causes–such as the very nature of the power of the class of employers and how they, directly or indirectly, use workers for purposes over which workers have no control (see The Money Circuit of Capital) and which is inherently connected to the possibility of disease, injury and death.
If the capitalist government is adept or skillful at channeling worker discontent into new administrative forms, then issues must be addressed in such a way that the capitalist government cannot accommodate them (see, for instance, my argument for a generous universal basic income that erodes the market for the hiring and firing of workers, A Radical Basic Income as a Radical Reform).
In relation to health and safety issues, strong workers’ organizations at the local level (not just unions and union reps), coupled with increasing links between workers’ organizations across industries, would be a necessary step in preparing workers to resist forms of class struggle that include legislative changes that define problems as non-social and, correspondingly, shift solutions to the redefined problems by means of administrative means.
To achieve this, would it not be necessary to abandon all talk of “fair compensation,” “fair wages,” “fair contract,” “Fair labour laws save lives,” “decent work,” and so forth? Such phrases paper over the real and persistent threat of disease, injury and death that workers face. Opposition to such phrases, of course, is hardly sufficient. Is not opposition to such cliches necessary, though, if workers are going to initiate a movement dedicated to addressing the social causes of their own sufferings.
It is supposed to be a fundamental principle of criminal law that a person is presumed innocent until proven otherwise by the State (government). This is the ideology or the rhetoric (which much of the left have swallowed). The reality is otherwise. In reality, the administrative apparatus of various organizations of the government and semi-governmental organizations often assume that you are guilty first and that you have to prove your innocence; otherwise, you suffer negative consequences.
An example is the requirements that the Ontario College of Teachers (OCT) imposed on me in order for me to qualify as a teacher in the province of Ontario after I moved from the province of Manitoba. To qualify as a teacher in Ontario, you must gain the approval of the OCT. The OCT website explains what this organization does:
ABOUT THE COLLEGE
The Ontario College of Teachers licenses, governs and regulates the Ontario teaching profession in the public interest.
Teachers who work in publicly funded schools in Ontario must be certified to teach in the province and be members of the College.
The College:
sets ethical standards and standards of practice
issues teaching certificates and may suspend or revoke them
accredits teacher education programs and courses
investigates and hears complaints about members
The College is accountable to the public for how it carries out its responsibilities.
You can find the qualifications, credentials and current status of every College member at Find a Teacher.
The College is governed by a 37-member Council.
23 members of the College are elected by their peers
14 members are appointed by the provincial government.
To qualify as a teacher in Ontario, among other things, you have to answer a questionnaire. On the questionnaire, there are questions concerning arrest–and since I was arrested by the RCMP (the Royal Canadian Mounted Police) (but never convicted), I was obliged to prove my innocence in various ways. Despite no conviction, in other words, I had to prove my innocence. The social-democratic or social-reformist left, of course, are silent about such conditions (they are probably unaware of them).
I sent, along with my explanation, a table that I had constructed concerning my experiences (and the experiences of my daughter, Francesca) with the child welfare organization Winnipeg Child and Family Services (CFS), located in Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada.
I. Explanation for the investigation of Dr. Fred Harris by the CFS [Child and Family Services] and the RCMP [Royal Canadian Mounted Police–the national police in Canada] (related to the accompanying table, which forms part of the explanation):
In all probability, my daughter panicked when I gave her the letter concerning my operation related to cancer; I categorically deny ever having choked my daughter. (My daughter recently told me that she had subsequently indicated to either the WCFS or to the RCMP that I had not choked her).
She may also not been able to face the fact that she had been violent towards her father when he had cancer. The only action that I regret is throwing the tea. I certainly had no intention of hurting my daughter, but for that I am responsible—nothing else. I lost control—that is a fact. The mitigating circumstance is that I had, unknown to myself, cancer at the time, which subsequently was considered to be terminal, in all probability.
However, the initial accusation by the WCFS was that I had choked my daughter; there was no reference to my throwing tea. Given the practical abuse of Francesca for over a decade by the mother—and the neglect by the WCFS in recognizing such abuse (it was only subsequent to the arrest that the WCFS apologized to Francesca, indicating that she had indeed been abused by her mother)—the timing of the apprehension of Francesca is certainly suspect.
Given both the timing and the fact that the ground for the apprehension was the falsehood that I had choked Francesca, I made it clear in court that I was acquiescing “without prejudice.” I then began to send a variant of the supplementary table to the Minister of Justice, the Minister of Education and the Premier, Greg Selinger, implying that they had apprehended Francesca on false grounds. This may have precipitated the investigation by the RCMP.
I asked my daughter this last December (2013) when the issue of the tea came up. She indicated that that issue arose subsequently. My interpretation is that the RCMP was fishing for any grounds (with the probable support of the CFS) for arresting me in addition to the false claims that I had choked my daughter and had thrown her to the ground. My interpretation is that the capitalist government was using Francesca to hide its own criminal neglect of Francesca for over a decade (and, possibly, because her father is a Marxist).
The need to hide the criminal neglect of the WCFS may have even been more urgent for the WCFS since Francesca, in claiming that I had choked her, also apparently claimed that her mother’s common-law husband had sexually abused her. (When she made that claim I am uncertain. On Father’s Day, 2010 Francesca informed me that she had told the WCFS that she had been sexually abused. If true (it is still before the court), the WCFS’s lack of action for over a decade would have contributed to such abuse.) [The court eventually dismissed the allegation of sexual abuse against the common-law husband of Francesca’s mother; I now believe that Francesca was sexually abused by him despite the court’s decision. I will explain that in another post.]
I do not regret what I did (apart from the incident of the tea). The apology ten years after the fact is hardly sufficient for the persistent abuse that Francesca was subject to over the years. The WCFS and the CFS is a fascist organization that acts as if Canadian citizens are guilty first and must prove their innocence afterwards. It uses intimidation tactics (such as the letter of January 2004 and the October 6 2010 phone call by Darryl Shorting) to achieve its ends.
It is instructive that it is I who have to provide an explanation of the investigation. Undoubtedly, it could be argued that it is not the WCFS that is applying for teacher certification. That is true. However, the WCFS apparently need not explain anything at all to anyone.
My explanation, then, is that the organization that need not explain (the WCFS and the CFS) itself needs to explain—its neglect of Francesca (and probably many, many other children) for over a decade. It is necessary to expose such behaviour if the problem is going to be resolved—and not presume that those who have been investigated by such an organization have to explain their actions. It is the WCFS that needs to explain its (in)actions—and it will only have to do so if its neglect is exposed.
However, the WCFS will continue to act undoubtedly with impunity—until those who are intimidated by the WCFS (and the consequences that flow from speaking out) speak up and end the silent oppression that characterizes such an organization. Children deserve much more than the neglect characteristic of the WCFS and the CFS. Such a situation is characteristic of adult behaviour in general in relation to children (see the accompanying article, “Dewey’s Concepts of Stability and Precariousness in his Philosophy of Education”).
This is part of my explanation for answering “yes” in several of the questions.
Recently, I experienced a less oppressive form of “service” by the Ontario Ministry of Health–but an oppressive form of service nonetheless. Having turned 65 on December 30, 2021, I retired. Earlier, I had been receiving disability benefits from Manitoba Teachers’ Society and the Canadian Pension Plan (I will be outlining, in future posts my experiences with that). I applied for assistance under the Ontario Seniors Dental Care Program.
The following post has as its justification the Marxist strategy of the politics of exposure (making visible) the hidden oppression structures, strategies, tactics and acts characteristic of capitalist society (see Thomas Mathiesen, The Politics of Abolition (1974)and Law, Society and Political Action: Towards a Strategy Under Late Capitalism (1980)).
In an earlier post, I provided a table of a series of oppressive measures that I have experienced as the Marxist father of my daughter, Francesca, ranging from false allegations of sexual abuse by Winnipeg Child and Family Services (WCFS) to the persistent physical abuse of Francesca by her mother–and the subsequent threat by the WCFS in January 2004–to have me arrested for allegedly making false accusations of physical abuse (which were, in fact, all true) (see A Personal Example of the Oppressive Nature of Public Welfare Services). I sent that table to Manitoba Premier Greg Selinger, to the Ministry of Justice and to the Ministry of Education, among others.
To be eligible for the program, it is required, apparently, that married couples must both file an income tax return. If they do not both fill out an income tax return, file it and have it processed, they will not be eligible. I initially refused to fill out my wife’s tax return. As anyone who has filed an income-tax return knows, even the simplest income tax return takes probably at least an hour to fill out (if not more)–for non-professionals, at least.
I had not known of such a rule that both spouses must file a tax return when I filed my 2020 income tax. My wife, who is now 54 on January 27, 2022) has had zero income since she came to Canada in 2018 (she is a landed immigrant). I declared that on my income tax return every time for the years 1918-1920.
On the basis of my declaration of zero income, we received the maximum refundable tax credits (such as the GST tax credit). The Canadian Revenue Agency (CRA) then, for the tax year 2020, claimed that I owed money since my wife had to file her own income tax return. I argued that this made no sense since I had already indicated that my wife had zero income. The CRA backed off, and it recognized that I did not owe any money.
On the other hand, the bureaucratic worker who attended me on the phone from the Ontario Seniors Dental Care Program used the argument that I was not obliged to fill out the tax return; she implied that I was free to not do so. Of course, just as a worker in a society characterized by the domination of a class of employers is free to not work for any particular employer (and suffer economic consequences for not doing so), so I am free to not fill out my wife’s income tax return (and suffer economic consequences for not doing so).
I was diagnosed with invasive bladder cancer in 2009 (60% chance of dying in the next five years–never occurred), rectal cancer in December 2015 (chemoradiation, without any further cancer being visible) and metastatic liver cancer in April 2017 (surgery on May 30, 2017, without any further cancer being visible). Given my experiences with cancer, I am well aware of the possible limited time I have to live (although I may live a long life–but not likely). I do not like to waste my time on unnecessary activities.
By the way, I encourage others to write about their oppressive experiences at the hands of “public services” on this blog. Surely my oppressive experiences with “public services” are not unique.
Below is a verbatim reproduction of the letter. I will make comments afterwards:
3000110 – Discrepen
This is to inform you that we have reviewed your application for the Ontario Seniors Dental Care Program; however, we cannot process your application at this time for the following reason(s):
Your last name on the account does not match the Canadian Revenue Agency records. [It was spelled Hairis–my last name is Harris.]
Information received from the Canadian Revenue Agency indicates that you and/or your spouse or common-law partner have not filed your most recent income tax return.
Applicants and if applicable, their spouse or common-law partner are required to have a valid Social Insurance Number (SIN) and have filed taxes for the most recent tax year in order to be assessed.
If you or, if applicable, your spouse or common-law partner did not file an income tax return in the most recent tax year, or do not have a valid SIN, you must complete an Application through Guarantor Form.
Your Guarantor is required to review and verify your completed application and sign section 2 in order to be considered for the Ontario Seniors Dental Care Program.
To print an Ontario Seniors Dental Care Program – Application Through Guarantor Form Visit ontario.ca/forms Enter 5126E in the Quick Search for Forms field
Your Ontario Seniors Dental Care Program Identification number is 000113933. Please quote this number when contacting or corresponding with the ministry.
Please contact us at 416-916-0204 or toll-free at 1-833-207-4435. In some cases, this information can be provided over the phone.
If we do not receive a response within 30 business days, your application for the Ontario Seniors Dental Care Program will not be processed.
To find out more about the Ontario Seniors Dental Care Program, please contact the Program toll-free at 1-833-207-4435 (TTY toll-free at 1-800-855-0511) or visit ontario.ca/SeniorsDental
Thank you
Ontario Seniors Dental Care Program
Of course, if a substantial basic income were in place, then I would use the money to obtain dental services without having to accept the bureaucratic, illogical rule of couples having to both file tax returns despite one of the spouses having zero income. Having “free” dental services provided by the government or state hardly ensures that there is a lack of oppression. Certainly, dental services provided across the board (like health care now is for most parts of the body) may involve less oppression than this particular form of oppression–but even health care can easily become oppressive–with differentiated sections of the working class (such as whether you receive hospital care via a private bed, a semi-private bed or being placed in a hospital room with several other sick patients)
Economic coercion can assume many forms; one form is for governments to force citizens to conform to illogical, bureaucratic rules.
This is a continuation of a previous post that illustrates how politically biased the capitalist government or state and its representatives (such as social-democratic social workers) are when it comes to determining real situations–especially when a person self-declares as a Marxist.
Just a recap: I filed a complaint with the Manitoba Institute of Registered Workers against a social worker who had written a court-ordered assessment concerning my wife at the time, myself and my daughter, Francesca Alexandra Romani (ne Harris). I am using the initials S.W. for the social worker. Mr. S.W., claimed that my claim that the mother of my daughter was using a belt and a wooden stick to physically abuse her, was “somewhat ridiculous.” Mr. S.W. was much less concerned about determining the truth of this claim (which is in fact true) than with my so-called indoctrination of my daughter in my “Marxist ideology.”
Since the civil trial in April 1999, my daughter complained of the following (as of February 18, 2000—it should be noted that the following does not include the many times Francesca told me that Francesca’s mother had hit her before Feburary 18, 2000): 1. Her mother was using a wooden stick on her buttocks; 2. Her mother used a belt to spank her on the same area; 3. Her mother grabbed Francesca and forced her into the apartment building; 4. Her mother had grabbed Francesca’s throat in the elevator and warned her not to tell me that her mother had hit her; 5. Her mother shoved Francesca to the floor on two separate occasions; 6. Her mother hit Francesca on the head with a book; 7. Her mother pulled Francesca’s hair; 8. Her mother scratched Francesca with a comb.
This contrasts with Mr. S.W.’s allegation, as noted in the last post, that ” Mr. Harris’ explanation for contacting the Agency [Winnipeg Child and Family Services] was somewhat ridiculous. He said that the child had made some vague indications that she may have been spanked.”
Mr. S.W. was much less concerned about the truthfulness of Mr. Harris’ claim (which is true) than with Mr. Harris’ Marxists ideas.
The Manitoba Institute of Registered Social Workers rejected my complaint, claiming that Mr. S.W. did not contravene the code of ethics of registered social workers in Manitoba.
I then filed a complaint against Winnipeg Child and Family Services (WCFS) with the Manitoba Ombudsman, and during their so-called inquiry, the WCFS threatened me in a letter with consulting their legal counsel and phoning the police on me. The Manitoba Ombudsman found the actions of the WCFS to be reasonable both before the letter and the letter itself:
Our office has investigated the concerns you raised and have concluded that the position taken by WCFS as outlined in their letters of January 13, 2003 and January 22, 2004 is not clearly wrong or unreasonable. Accordingly there is no recommendation that can be made on your behalf.
So far, the Winnipeg Child and Family Services, the Manitoba Institute of Registered Social Workers and the Manitoba Ombudsman proved themselves to be anything but institutions that reflected any kind of fairness or equitable treatment. Quite to the contrary. They either involved oppression in one form or another or justification of such oppression by vindicating an oppressive institution.
The social-democratic left rarely take this integrated nature of the oppressive powers linked to the capitalist government or state into account when formulating tactics and strategy. Indeed, many on the left even idealize such oppressive features by calling for, without qualification, the expansion of public services–as if such public services were not riveted with oppressive features.
Immediate Family Context, Or How I Failed Francesca, My Daughter, the First But Not the Last Time
As I indicated in my last post in this series:
In my next post, I will fast forward to 2007-2008, when Francesca skipped school so much that she was obliged to repeat grade eight in 2008.
I started my Ph. D. in 2002 and received a scholarship for three years, from 2002 until 2005, which helped financially, gave me some time to work on my studies without having to work as much as a substitute teacher, and enabled me to register Francesca in extra curricular activities without going into further debt (I owed around $16,000 from student loans associated with attending a bachelor of education program between 1994 (when Francesca was born) and 1996).
After 2005, however, I had to increase my work as a substitute teacher and, despite this, I increased my debt (by 2008, I had a credit card debt of around $7,000 and about $20,000 in student debt).
In the 2006-2007 school year, Francesca attended Elmwood High School, an inner-city high school not too far from the house where she lived with her mother. I was concerned about the impact her experiences at that school would have on her–as well as the kind of friendships she was establishing. (I had substituted at the school only a few times; my experiences did not impress me. For example, I substituted in one class that could lock from the inside. I had a key to the room where I was substituting, but it was in my jacket in the classroom. One student got up and left for no reason, and I followed him outside. Some students locked me out of the classroom. I had to go to the office and have the vice-principal open the door. I can certainly understand why students would do what they did in the context of an oppressive classroom setting–but I did want my daughter to learn something as well.
For the school year 2007-2008, her mother agreed to have her attend River Heights School, a middle-years school where I had substituted as well. The teaching, as far as I could see, was more rigorous, and there were more opportunities for extra-curricular activities.
However, my need to earn a living and my work on my doctoral dissertation led me to fail Francesca by not ensuring that everything was working out well at the new school. Her uprooting from her friends, and my lack of monitoring her situation, led to her skipping school more and more (I assume–her mother had fully custody–but I could have been much more active in ensuring that she felt more at home in the school and, if not, at least tried to talk to her and support her in attending. Francesca, it is true, erased messages that I received from school concerning her attendance–but that is hardly an excuse for my lack of rigor in monitoring the situation.
Furthermore, I should have known that something was wrong. At one point, she stole coins from one of my drawers. At another point, I had dropped her off for her swimming lesson at the Pan Am Pool in Winnipeg, and I received a call; the police had been called. Francesca had been caught stealing money from a purse in one of the lockers. Francesca was not charged–I convinced the police that this would not happen again. There is a difference between personal theft, which is wrong and theft from large stores and from companies–I told Francesca I do not do that not because it is wrong but because it is not worth the consequences of possibly going to jail or at least a criminal record. On the other hand, Francesca’s own defense of herself in front of the police was impressive.
In any case, I failed Francesca by not monitoring her situation. Not for the last time.
As I wrote in my last post in this series:
By that time, not even her mother could control her. Nor could I. Francesca had been violent towards me since 1999, when her mother refused to let me see Francesca or let Francesca to see me for almost three months.
In 2008, I obtained a position as a permanent teacher in September 2008, in Ashern, Manitoba, a very small town about 160 kilometers north of Winnipeg. Francesca’s mother agreed to have Francesca live with me since her mother could no longer control her. I decided to home school Francesca while living in Ashern and teaching there. I enrolled Francesca in distance education courses in June 2008, and I gave her the courses. She then left with her cousin, Laura, for Kelowna, a city in the province of British Columbia. I expected Francesca at least to work a bit on the distance education courses during the summer of 2008. She never did. That was the beginning of our problems.
Since Francesca was going to be taught by me by means of home schooling and distance education, I set up a schedule for the various courses. For example, for the social studies course, I wrote the following:
Assumption: Two days of work before August 31 and every day working on social studies Studying every day working on social studies until finished.
With such a start date, it is necessary to finish about 4 pages of the distance education package per day. The 4 pages do not mean just 4 pages of reading. It means that whatever is assigned for the 4 pages must be read or done and understood. For example, on page 3 of Lesson 1 for Module 1, it is necessary to become familiar with the Table of Contents by doing the exercise.
Module 1 August 21=Lesson 1, page 4 August 26=page 8 August 31=Lesson 2, page 12 September 1=page 16 September 2=Page 20 September 3=Lesson 3, page 24 September 4=page 28 September 5=32 September 6=Lesson 4, page 36 September 7=Lesson 5, page 40 September 8=Lesson 6, page 44 September 9=Lesson 7. page 48 September 10=page 52 September 11=Lesson 8, page 56 September 12=Lesson 9, page 60 September 13=Lesson 10,page 64 September 14=page 66, Review for Test 1 September 15=Test, Module 1 September 16=Review test, Module 1
How I Failed Francesca, My Daughter, A Second Time
We started to argue shortly after we moved to Ashern. Francesca did not study as she needed to if she were going to finish grade 8. In retrospect, I should have either hired a tutor (if possible since Ashern only had a population of 1,400) or registered her in the school where I was going to teach. I was afraid, though, that if I registered her in the school where I taught, she and I would have further arguments that would spill over into my workplace and, I could lose my job. For those who abstractly consider this irrelevant, I will simply point out that economic security forms a vital component of why the working class has a tendency to fight for socialism (see Marc Mulholland (2009), “Marx, the Proletariat, and the ‘Will to Socialism’,” Critique: Journal of Socialist Theory,” pages 319-343, Volume 37, Number 3; and by the same author (2010) “‘Its Patrimony, its Unique Wealth!’ Labour-Power, Working Class Consciousness and Crises: An Outline, Consideration” pages 375-417, Volume 38, Number 3.
The social-democratic left do not even talk about the conflict that members of the working class often face between their existence as members of a family and as members of the working class (wage workers, or workers who must subordinate their will to an employer) and how this contradiction ties into government actions. It is ironic because many movies and tv programs do just that–in a conservative manner, of course. How many reading this post have not watched a movie or tv program where the protagonists experience a conflict between the existence as family members, as members of the working class or as members of the state?
For example, Raju Das, in his book Marxist Class Theory for a Skeptical World, recognizes that family relations aid in identifying the class interests of family members. Thus, he writes (page 42):
A woman who is a school teacher and married to a working class man is not in the same class location as another woman school teacher married to a male ceo (1989d: 328). So the class location of husbands and wives should be treated as a function of both direct class location and their mediated location. Sometimes they can have a common class location and sometimes different.
Mr. Das is primarily concerned with indicating the primacy of class position or location (relative to, for example, being a member of a family); this is important, but from a practical point of view of how to organize the working class into a class capable of overcoming those class recognitions, we need to acknowledge and take into account the relationships that retard class consciousness or accelerate it.
Being a member of a family can do both. On the one hand, being a member of a family can make workers more militant as they struggle to maintain and improve their family life. On the other hand, it can also make workers more conservative when being a family member results in acceptance of subordination of the worker’s will to the power of the employer. For example, I remember one worker in the capitalist brewery where I worked (in Calgary, Alberta, Canada), who explicitly stated that his family was more important than his job. Of course, what a person says and what a person does need not coincide, but to ignore the importance of the family to members of the working class, organizationally, is bound to be fraught with problems.
Or it can result in contradictory tendencies since workers can be pulled in opposite directions simultaneously. Blindness on the part of academic Marxists to these issues indicate the extent to which Marxism as theory has become divorced from Marxism as practice.
In any case, I made the wrong decision by trying to homeschool Francesca on my own. We generally worked on her studies together after supper; before supper I prepared lessons and marked other students’ work. I worked late at night and on the weekend on my doctoral dissertation (which I finished in 2009, the following year).
Our arguments became more and more heated as it became evident that Francesca was falling further and further behind. I was becoming the person and father that I did not want to become–an oppressive father by pressuring Francesca to keep to the schedule. I had to revise the schedule several times, but it was always in need of revision.
One time, when we were arguing over her studies, Francesca, who was in the kitchen, picked up a pot lid and threw it at me like a frisbee. The lid nearly hit my face; she could have easily hurt me. I walked up to her and put her in a headlock, forced her to the ground, and obliged her to state that she would not throw anything further at me. She promised not to do so.
I do not to this day regret doing this; Francesca was out of control and could have easily thrown a knife at me.
Another time, we were arguing about her studies, and she punched me in the face. I pinned her arms in order to prevent her from hitting me again. I do not regret doing that either.
There was another time, however, which I do regret. We usually studied on the futon in the living room (where I slept). Francesca obviously felt tense when we were studying, and when she did not understand something, she would dig her elbows into my side.
One day, I was sitting on the futon, with Francesca on the right. We were studying, and I was drinking some tea. She began to dig her elbow into my right side, and it hurt. I responded spontaneously, and the tea went flying from my hands. Unfortunately, some of the tea hit Francesca’s face. She started to cry. Fortunately, the tea was not hot enough to burn her–but it could have been.
Yes, I stand condemned for hurting my daughter. The mitigating circumstance is that, unknown at the time, I had invasive bladder cancer, and the cancer had blocked my right kidney (it no longer functions). That is why I was having pain on my right side, and that is why it hurt when Francesca dug her elbow into my right side.
I had had drops of blood in my urine on and off for some time (usually at the end of urination). I had gone to the doctor’s office when I lived in Winnipeg, but he discouraged me from getting a scan because of the expense–it was a time of cutbacks, and he also discouraged me from having a cystoscopy (he said it was not a pleasant procedure–which it is not. But having cancer is also not pleasant). He thought it was a urinary infection and prescribed some antibiotics. The blood went away, but it returned when I was living in Ashern with Francesca–but it was much worse than before.
I started to urinate blood–my urine was red rather than yellow. After the incident with the tea, I showed Francesca this by showing her the toilet, which was filled with blood. This had no effect in her increasingly violent behaviour towards me or in the advance of her studies.
I went to see the doctor in Ashern, and he at first recommended antibiotics, if I remember correctly. Eventually he recommended a CT scan.
Francesca also started to communicate with her mother; undoubtedly, she was complaining about me and our relationship. She wanted to return to live with her mother.
I felt that I could not handle Francesca anymore, and since she was indifferent to my health, I also responded inappropriately by indicating that I never wanted to see her again. I failed Francesca again.
In early January, I took Francesca back to her mother’s place. Within a couple of weeks, though, Francesca and her mother fought again to the point that Francesca started living with her cousin, Laura, who already had children and was foster parenting. I did not communicate with Francesca, though–I was still hurting from her apparent indifference to the deterioration of my health.
The Experiences of a Sick Worker
In the meantime, I tried to hide my sickness from my employer, Lakeshore School Division, until I obtained my permanent position as a teacher, by cleaning up red spots that splashed on the men’s bathroom floor.
In January or February, I believe, the Ashern doctor informed me that the CT scan indicated that I had a tumor, but that I should not worry–in most cases tumors are benign.
In March, 2009, I was diagnosed with invasive bladder cancer. I waited for about two weeks before I communicated with Francesca.
I had surgery, but my urologist indicated that the tumor was too big to remove entirely through surgery without removing the whole bladder. He recommended chemotherapy followed by radiation.
In the meantime, Laura, Francesca’s cousin, was married to Sean, whose mother started to tutor Francesca. I also paid for an independent tutor for Francesca. She did finish grade 8.
In June 2009, the chemotherapy oncologist had his intern inform me that I had a 60 percent chance of dying in the next five years since the cancer had penetrated the muscle; I told Francesca this. He recommended the removal of the bladder. My urologist, who was also a professor at the University of Manitoba, informed me that surgery was the typical treatment for bladder cancer in North America whereas in Europe doctors usually tried chemotherapy followed by radiation to see if the tumor could be eliminated. I chose chemotherapy.
The chemotherapy worked during the summer of 2009. There was no visible cancer after the nine weeks of chemotherapy.
Francesca, in the meantime, started to attend St. James Collegiate in grade 9 and continued to live with Laura.
My urologist still recommended radiation treatment, but for some reason it took a long time before I saw the radiologist. After some time, the radiologist informed me that she refused to perform the radiation treatment because she claimed that my intestines and my bladder were too close together. She did indicate, however, that there was a procedure for placing a mesh inside me in order to shift the intestines out of the way in order to receive radiation treatment.
I reluctantly agreed to the surgery. The surgery was scheduled on April 19, 2010. Before that, on March 10, I believe, I received a letter from the doctor who was to perform surgery. I had to provide the letter to my employer in order to obtain time off.
Francesca and I were not getting along at the time. She was becoming more religious and refused to hear anything about the theory of evolution or my Marxist ideas.
Francesca’s Apprehension by the Winnipeg Child and Family Services: Oppression by a Welfare Service
On March 10, the day that I received the letter from the surgeon, I went to Tim Horton’s across from St. James Collegiate. I was going to tell Francesca about the surgery, show her the letter and also give her a book on evolution. She was, however, if I remember correctly, with another friend. She was taking the bus to return, I assumed, to Laura’s place. I decided that I would make a copy of the letter and put the book and the letter in the mailbox at Laura’s place.
I made a photocopy of the letter at Shopper’s Drug Store along the way, and then was going to go to Laura’s place by cutting across from Portage Avenue, ironically between the Manitoba Teachers’ Society building (McMaster House), on the one hand, and the building where the MTS Disability Plan office was located (as well as the Winnipeg Teachers’ Association-see illustrations below).
I took this route because Francesca was living on Nightingale Rd, where Laura, her cousin, lived; this was a shortcut that Francesca had showed me (see map below).
However, as I was turning to enter the shortcut, I saw Francesca walking towards this shortcut; she had obviously taken the bus, had gotten off and was going to take the short cut. I drove a little further on, parked the car, got out and gave her a photocopy of the doctor’s letter and the book on evolution.
I left to return to Ashern, Manitoba, 166 kilometers north of Winnipeg (where I worked as a French teacher); that evening, however, I received a phone call from the Winnipeg Child and Family Services (WCFS) indicating that Francesca had been apprehended by the WCFS and that I was forbidden from seeing her–on pain of being arrested. It was claimed that I had cornered Francesca and that she was afraid of me. It was also claimed that I had choked Francesca some tima ago, thrown her to the ground and that on another occasion I had pinned her arms.
I fought against this oppression for the next month. The WCFS sought custody from both parents, and I attended a meeting with a judge and the lawyer for the WCFS. The lawyer tried to insult me by asking whether I had ever been “psychologically assessed,” to which I responded by asking him the same question. I indicated to the judge how Francesca had been physically abused in various ways. The judge indicated that if the issue went to court and he were judge and the WCFS lost, then he would have no choice but to grant custody either to me or to the mother. Given Francesca’s and my present rocky relationship, I could not fathom our getting along together. Furthermore, now that it was probably that Francesca had played some part in the false accusations of choking her and throwing her to the ground, I felt that I could not trust her.
Of course, I did not feel that Francesca’s mother should have custody given the history of physical abuse.
I went to court one final time, indicating that I would abandon custody–but without prejudice.
The whole experience was very stressful.
On April 19, I had surgery in Winnipeg at the Health Sciences Center, but I had a lung infection and stayed in the hospital for 16 days. Francesca visited me once, and when I tried to talk to her about the claim that I had choked her and threw her to the ground by reminding her that I had put her in a headlock and forced her to the ground until she agreed not to throw anything else at me, she claimed that the choking and throwing her to the ground was a different occasion. Since there was no other occasion, my suspicion that she played some role in her apprehension by the WCFS was confirmed.
Expression of My Opposition to the NDP, a Social-Democratic Government
Once I left the hospital around May 5, 2010, I stayed with a friend in Winnipeg for a couple of months. Since I knew that I had not choked Francesca nor threw her to the ground, her apprehension by an organization that was instrumental in contributing to her physical abuse and her violence towards me angered me, to say the least. I began to send emails to the New Democratic Party (NDP, the social democratic party in Canada); the NDP were in power in the province of Manitoba. In one email, I titled it “J’accuse”–a take on the following (from Wikipedia):
I sent, among other things, a table that contained some of Francesca’s and my experiences with the WCFS (I will be posting a modified version of this table (the updated version is more inclusive) on this blog, much of which I have included in this series of posts. I also sent the material to the Manitoba Minister of Justice and to the Manitoba Minister of Education. I also began to send the material to government institutions outside the province of Manitoba.
Return to Teaching Before My Arrest by the Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP)–and Revelations
I returned to Ashern in the summer of 2010 to prepare for teaching. The surgery had failed–the radiation oncologist still refused to perform radiation because, she argued, my intestines were still too close to the bladder.
On October 6, 2010, Darrell Shorting, of the Anishinaabe Child and Family Services, called me at school. It was recess time (Ashern Central School, where I worked, was a grade 5-12 school). He stated that he knew what I had done, namely, choked Francesca and threw her to the ground. Mr. Shorting obliged me to inform the principal at the time (Mr. Chartrand) that I was under investigation.
I was put on administrative leave for perhaps one week. The staff, I believe, were told that it was medical, so I felt obliged to leave Ashern early every day early.
I had a subsequent meeting with Randy Chartrand, the principal, and Janet Martell, the superintendent. I categorically denied having choked Francesca and throwing her to the ground.
Lakeshore School Division decided to have me placed in the clinical supervision model for the year; my performance as a teacher was evaluated by Randy Chartrand, the principal at the time. I passed the assessment.
During the 2010-2011 school year, a few curious experiences arose with the RCMP. It was my habit to go, every Saturday at 12: 15, to a coffee and bakery shop called “Just My Kind of Bakery,” about a block and a half from where I lived. (see photo below). I read the Saturday Winnipeg Free Press there. I could have easily walked to the bakery, but I also often worked on either preparing lessons or marking student work after having read the paper and needed . I also generally bought groceries afterwards. It was more convenient to take the car with the newspaper and school work.
One time, I left the house where I lived at around 12:15 on Saturday, as usual, on a fall day, and I saw two RCMP cars enter the alleyway behind the row of buildings that included Just My Kind of Bakery. They went to the end of the alley, turned right and then turned right again–going towards Just My Kind of Bakery. I did not make anything of it–until I arrived at Just My Kind of Bakery. I took the shortest route to the bakery, but to park at Just My Kind of Bakery, I had to cross the yellow line. When I got out, the RCMP officers from the two cars approached me, and one of them stated that what I had done was illegal–I had crossed the yellow line. When I asked how I was supposed to get to Just My Kind of Bakery, he stated that I could approach the bakery from the other side in order not to have to cross the yellow line (the same route that they had taken–although they did not say that). Of course, apart from this instance, I had never seen the RCMP ever enforce this “law” during the three-and-half years that I lived there.
Sometime afterwards, I believe, I moved to the window seat in Just My Kind of Bakery because I wanted to be able to identify my accuser, Darrell Shorting. I suppose the workers there felt “threatened”–but my purpose was a typical claimed right of an accused–to confront one’s accuser. I had been charged and condemned for physically abusing Francesca without a trial; I wanted to know who was it who was accusing me (apart from the fascist organizations called Child and Family Services, whether in Winnipeg or in Ashern).
Ashern Anishinaabe Child and Family Services
Relation of Just My Kind of Bakery (Indicated by Fork and Knife) and Ashern Anishinaabe Child and Family Services
Another time, I was going to the school when it was dark to obtain something from the school in preparation for lessons; I saw an RCMP car nearby.
I forget exactly when, but Francesca contacted me, and we began to see each other. It must have been in 2011, before April 4. By coincidence we went to see a movie called “The Dilemma,” with Vince Vaughan as actor, among others. The dilemma was whether Vaughn, who saw his business partner and friend, should tell him that he had seen his wife kissing another man. My dilemma was whether I should confront Francesca with the false allegation of choking her and throwing her to the ground. After the movie, I dropped her off, and I decided to talk to her about it. We talked on the phone, and I indicated that I had not choked her nor threw her to the ground. She said that it did not matter since she forgave me. I insisted, however, that I had done no such thing. If I remember correctly, she hung up. When I tried calling back then and other times, there was no answer.
It was around the same time, or perhaps a little earlier, that Francesca was temporarily living with the parents of the husband of Laura since one of the teenagers who lived under Laura’s care had apparently tried to commit suicide, and there was blood in the house. I went to see Francesca there, and she told me for the first time that she had been sexually abused by Juan Ulises, the common-law husband, when she was a child. Given that she still claimed that I had choked her and threw her to the ground, I did not believer her at the time. Now I do. I attributed her earlier violence towards me to her mother’s physical abuse. However, even after she admitted that I had not choked her nor threw her to the ground, she insisted that Juan Ulises had sexually abused her. Her extreme violence towards me can be ascribed both to the physical and emotional abuse of her mother, the lack of action by the WCFS, the Progressive Conservative government and the NDP social-democratic government (elected in 1999)–and her sexual abuse by Juan Ulises.
My Arrest and Harassment by the RCMP
Just before the spring break, I noticed that two RCMP cars were parked outside the house where I lived and had flashed their lights.
After spring break, on Sunday evening, there was someone stamping outside the house–and when I looked outside, there were a couple of flashes of light from one of the RCMP cars. I heard a knock on the door, got dressed and opened the door. There were two RCMP officers at the door. They indicated that I was under the arrest. When I asked what charge, they asked whether I wanted others to hear about the charges or whether it would be better to hear about them inside. I “invited” them inside. They informed me that I was charged with three counts of assault of Francesca. I asked them what the charges were. Two of the three were the same allegations as the Winnipeg Child and Family Services–choking Francesca and throwing her to the ground. The third allegation was new–assaulting Francesca by throwing tea at her. The RCMP officer also indicated that I was not to approach Francesca and not to leave the province; otherwise, I would be put in jail. I was fingerprinted at a later date.
On the following Saturday (April 9, 2011), for the first time ever, several RCMP officers (some in street clothes) sat opposite me at “Just My Kind of Bakery” in Ashern, probably to intimidate me and to ensure that I was no longer looking out the window to see who Darrell Shorting was. One of the officers, not in uniform, was the father of one of my former French students at the secondary level. On April 16, 2011, several RCMP officers once again do the same thing, including the father once again–this time in uniform.
(As an aside, it may be that Darrell Shorting is the same person who complained about how children in First Nations communities should be kept in their own communities rather than shipped to Winnipeg under the “protection” of Winnipeg Child and Family Services (https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/manitoba/cfs-is-new-residential-school-system-says-former-cfs-investigator-1.2788730 ). If so, then Mr. Shorting saw fit to falsely accuse me of choking Francesca and throwing her to the ground and contributing to Francesca’s legal separation from me. Mr. Darrell, Shorting, as the article shows, was a former CFS abuse investigator for Aninshinaabe CFS.)
An Oppressive Working and Living Atmosphere
I returned to school next morning to teach. Curiously, one of the parents of a student I was teaching wanted to attend my class. I “agreed” to this.
Subsequently, at a teacher’s meeting, in May 2011 I believe, Neil MacNeil attended. He was a former teacher at Ashern Central School who had taught their for around 30 years. He was a principal in another school in another town within the same school division, but he was going to become the new principal at Ashern Central School during the 2011-2012 school year. At the meeting, he stated that he wished he could teach French since the French program was going downhill–which in itself I found inappropriate and humiliating since it was I who taught French.
Later that month, I was informed that I would no longer be teaching French at the high-school level (grades 9-12)–but I would still be teaching French in grades 6-8 (another teacher would teach French at the grade 5 level). Jennifer Bjorg, the daughter of the former French teacher whom I replaced once she retired (Darlene Hanlon), would be teaching basic French at the high-school level.
I enjoyed much more teaching French at the high-school level. It was optional for students, and most students wanted to be there and learn French. Since I did not like teaching basic French in the earlier years–especially since it was obligatory although many students did not really want to learn it–the stripping of my seniors French class resulted in an oppressive atmosphere for me.
Near the end of August, when I went outside, I found that one of the windows of my car had been smashed. The rock was still in the car. I went to the RCMP station a few blocks away to report it. The RCMP officer said that they could do nothing and that fingerprints could not be obtained from a rock. Nothing was done about it. There was no inquiry into the vandalism at all–further proof against the idealized version of the police by the “Marxist” Herman Rosenfeld (see, for example, Reform versus Abolition of Police, Part Two).
The oppressive atmosphere where I worked and lived increased substantially when I was assigned the position of a glorified teaching assistant by having to supervise one special needs student instead of teaching the seniors French classes in September, 2011. It was humiliating, and my heart started to pound excessively in September 2011. Furthermore, I was placed on clinical supervision once again–with Neil MacNeil as principal, not Randy Chartrand.
I started to have problems sleeping at night due to the pounding heart. I started to take sleeping pills–which did not reduce the pounding heart, but they at least permitted me to distance the pounding heart sufficiently to sleep. I also started to drink a maximum of a cup of red wine every day (a measuring cup since I knew what alcohol could do to a person–my father had been an alcoholic and died when he was 50). (In fact, I started to drink red wine twice a week because my former supervisor for my master’s degree and Ph. D. Rosa Bruno-Jofre, who had cancer around the same time as I did, recommended a book “Foods That Fight Cancer.” In that book, the author recommended drinking red wine since it had a concentrated chemical not as easily metabolised if a person ate only red grapes. Drinking red wine every day, though, was due to the oppressive situation).
The whole situation was oppressive. Ashern is a very small town–around 1,400 people. I never stated to anyone that I had been arrested, but the three charges were to be addressed when a judge was to hear the charges. I did not attend personally (I hired a criminal lawyer “at a reduced rate” because I was a member of the Manitoba Teachers’ Society–Josh Weinstein It cost me around $3,000). Obviously many people knew about the arrest. I could not rest neither at work nor at home.
I also started having problems teaching French with some of the students. I always had classroom management problems in the grades 7 and 8 levels, and they intensified as the year proceeded. I also experienced the oppression of the principal hovering around the classrooms where I taught, looking in whenever he wanted.
Of course, the threat of being jailed if I tried to communicate with Francesca was also oppressive.
In October, I believe, I started to see Gene Degen, a counsellor for the Employee Assistance Program (EAP) at the Manitoba Teachers Society building–the very building where I allegedly cornered Francesca and frightened her. I also inquired about going on sick leave.
The extent of the feeling of oppression can be seen from a series of communication between Adele Field Burton, case manager for the Disability Benefits Plan of MTS and me:
— On Wed, 11/2/11, AdelleFieldBurton<afieldburton@mtsdbp.ca> wrote:
From: AdelleFieldBurton <afieldburton@mtsdbp.ca> Subject: Apology To: “Fred Harris” <umharri5@yahoo.com> Received: Wednesday, November 2, 2011, 8:44 AM
Hi Fred
I am sorry if I have offended you or misunderstood what you were trying to say. It was not my intention.
You are entitled to apply for benefits if you are medically unable to work.
I am here to help if needed.
Take care,
Sincerely,
AdelleFieldBurton, BA BSW CCRC
Case Manager
Disability Benefits Plan of The Manitoba Teachers’ Society
I find the contents of your email interesting–in its naivety.
Fact 1: I went to see a brand new doctor since my previous doctor had left Ashern (a typical phenomenon in rural areas, so I am told).
Fact 2: I only indicated that I was under extreme stress; I did not elaborate.
Fact 3: The doctor listened to my heart.
Fact 4: I had an EKG.
Fact 5: He prescribed to me a drug and told me to look up on the Net its effects.
Fact 6: I looked up on the Net the drug and discovered that it was addictive.
Fact 7: I purchased the pills–with the intention of taking them for the purpose of addressing my immediate concerns–my stress as expressed in my increasingly intensified heart.
Fact 8: It was the pharmacist who informed me (not the doctor) that the pills would likely have no effect for the period of the prescription; it would be necessary to take the pills for probably six weeks to notice any effect.
Fact 9: I have been taking over-the-counter sleeping pills to try to sleep; although they do not alter the pounding heart, they do allow me to exist in a state of semi-sleep, with the feeling (though not the fact) of a pounding heart to be less intense;
Fact 10: You presumed that I refused to take the pills based on my Marxist beliefs;
Fact 11: My immediate concern is my constant pounding heart and a solution to that–not in 6 weeks henceforth.
Fact 12: Neither the doctor nor you seem to recognize what stress involves and what the person under stress needs.
Opinion: I do not appreciate your “aside” etc. You apparently have little understanding of the situation.
As an “aside,” on November 15, I have a cystoscopy. On Novemeber 17 I will have a CT scan. Anyone who knows anything about those who have experienced cancer can infer that at least some will be nervous about such procedures because of the possible outcome of a a negative diagnosis. Indeed, I had a conversation yesterday with my advisor for my Ph. D. about this since she had colon cancer at the same time as I had invasive bladder cancer.
Furthermore, on November 16 is the court date. Couple that with the clinical supervision and the humiliation of being shifted to “teaching” one student for 8 weeks and for being denied the right to teach senior-high French this year (despite having taught it for three years in a row), my stress level is quite comprehensible.
I will address my problems and my needs without your help. Should I need assistance, I shall contact another person from MTS.
Rest assured that I have no intention of ever contacting you again.
Dr. Fred Harris, Marxist
— On Mon, 10/31/11, AdelleFieldBurton<afieldburton@mtsdbp.ca> wrote:
From: AdelleFieldBurton <afieldburton@mtsdbp.ca> Subject: RE: Stress Leave To: “Fred Harris” <umharri5@yahoo.com> Cc: “Roland Stankevicius” <rstankevicius@mbteach.org>, “AdelleFieldBurton” <afieldburton@mtsdbp.ca> Received: Monday, October 31, 2011, 5:15 AM
Hi Fred
I am sorry to hear that things are feeling worse for you.
I guess there are a couple of things for clarification.
Although you are certainly under stress, this is not a diagnosis, it is a cause. In order to take time off work for medical reasons you need to have a note from a medical doctor that states you are unable to work for “medical reasons” (that includes psychological). If your doctor is prescribing an anti-depressant then likely feels you are exhibiting signs of depression. I do have clients who chose not to take medication as a first line of treatment, preferring to use talk therapy first. My approach to that is – Unless there is a past history of mental health problems where medication has been useful, I think it is reasonable to try counselling first but if after 6 months, the depression (etc.) is not improving, then medication becomes a part of “appropriate care and treatment”.
So I guess the first thing is to see if your doctor will support your going off work for medical reasons. If he does, then I can refer you to a psychologist – I would try to chose one who I think might fit for you.
If your doctor does not support medical leave and you still feel that is necessary, I can refer you to a psychiatrist who would just provide a medical opinion on whether you could work and provide treatment recommendations. It would mean one, two-hour visit. I would be clear with him about your concerns with psychiatry and I believe that your concerns would not be well-founded. There is really no other way to confirm your medical status if your doctor does not agree with time off.
As an aside, it sounds like you may be choosing what you consider to be the “lesser of two evils”, so I still wonder about your ability to participate fully in sessions with the psychologist. In any case, I would rely on the psychologist’s assessment of whether that was taking place. I wish there was some way we could help without impacting your philosophical beliefs but I am not sure what that would look like. The plan document is very clear about appropriate care and treatment.
In November 2011, the charges of assaulting Francesca were dropped–with no explanation at all.
I was to begin teaching an English class and a math class in November 2011, which I did–as well as the grades 6-8 French.
Neil MacNeil, the principal, submitted his clinical supervision report in December, 2011, evaluating my teaching during November and December 2011. I responded with around a 42-page critique, but I submitted it to Roland Stankevicius, a staff officer at the time with Manitoba Teachers Society (and later General Secretary), for comment. He recommended reducing it in certain places (and eliminating all evidently emotional language), so the final response was around 32 pages. Mr. Stankevicius indicated at the time that the clinical supervision report reflected badly–on Mr. MacNeil:
— On Mon, 12/19/11, RolandStankevicius<rstankevicius@mbteach.org> wrote:From: RolandStankevicius <rstankevicius@mbteach.org> Subject: RE: Response to Clinical Evaluation To: “Fred Harris” <umharri5@yahoo.com> Received: Monday, December 19, 2011, 9:32 AM
Hi Fred,
I have tried to play the role of editor here. Cut down on the length, improve tone. The strikeouts should be deleted in my opinion and the yellow highlights added.
You have provided a very scholarly response but it needs to be shortened. I hope you agree with my suggestions. Please call me over lunch to discuss.
Best to get this put away. You have made your points here. NM does not look good in a lot of how he states his observations (in my opinion).
(I will be publishing, in several parts, my reply to Mr. MacNeil’s assessment sometime on this blog.)
However, Janet Martell, the superintendent and Mr. MacNeil had other plans. Mr. MacNeil, Ms. Martell, Leanne Peters, assistant superintendent, had a meeting with Mr. Stankevicius and me on February 13. Mr. Martell mentioned my cancer and my arrest–without Mr. Stankevicius responding at all to this. I was to be put on “intensive clinical supervision”–which meant that I would be put under her supervision–all supposedly to provide supports for my teaching. However, Mr. Stankevicius, a staff officer at the time with Manitoba Teachers Society (and later General Secretary) indicated that it was a prelude to my being fired. The starting date was to be February 14, 2012 (see letter below):
Fred Harris Box 473 Ashern, MB R0C 0E0
February 14, 2012
Dear Mr. Harris:
Intensive Guided Supervision
This correspondence is further to our meeting on February 13th, 2012. Also in attendance at the meeting was Neil MacNeil, Principal, Ashern Central School, Roland Stankevicius, MTS Staff Officer, and Leanne Peters, Assistant Superintendent, Lakeshore School Division. During this meeting, we discussed the need to move you from a clinical model of supervision to the Intensive Guided model as per Lakeshore’s Regulations and Procedures.
This change in supervision is necessary as your competency in providing a quality education to our students has been brought into question and your teaching is deemed unsatisfactory by myself, as determined in consultation with Neil MacNeil. We clarified the procedures and reviewed, in general terms, the elements and expectations of good teaching and professional responsibility. We discussed the opportunity you would have to assist in determining supports required to meet the expectations. The timelines, in a broad sense, would run from today’s date until the end of April 2012. At the conclusion of the timeline, I will convene a meeting of all participants to determine the outcome of the Intensive Guided Supervision. Possible outcomes are as follows:
Recognition that the plan to achieve satisfactory teaching was successfully completed, or
A recommendation to the Board of Trustees for termination of your contract.
A second meeting has been scheduledfor Friday, February 17th at 9:30 a.m. at Ashern Central School to develop a plan for Intensive Guided Supervision. The plan will include:
a clear description of the areas requiring improvement,
a clear description of the expected changes in those areas requiring improvement,
a description of resources available within and outside the division to assist the teacher to improve teaching performance,
the timeline for satisfactory improvement to occur,
the meeting dates to review progress, and
an outline of the evaluation process and timelines which shall be followed, including expected dates of reports, both interim and final.
At this meeting, you will have the opportunity not only for input into the process, but to request clarification of any component of the supervision model, which will ensure you are in complete understanding of the Division’s expectations. If you are successful in meeting these expectations and demonstrate your desire and ability to continue to do so, no further changes in your performance will be necessary.
I am optimistic that regardless of what has happened in the past, progress can be made to the benefit of all concerned.
Sincerely,
Janet Martell
Superintendent/CEO
CC: Personnel file
Neil MacNeil, Principal, Ashern Central School
Leanne Peters, Assistant Superintendent, Lakeshore School Division
Roland Stankevicius, MTS Staff Officer
On February 16, 2012, I had a meeting with Mr. Stankevicius and a lawyer for MTS at the MTS building (McMaster House):
Marni Sharples <msharples@mbteach.org>
To:umharri5@yahoo.com
Cc:rstankevicius@mbteach.org
Wed., Feb. 15, 2012 at 1:37 p.m.
Thank you!
Marni Sharples
Coordinator, Teacher Welfare
The Manitoba Teachers’ Society
191 Harcourt Street
Winnipeg, MB R3J 3H2
‘ (204)837-4666 Ext. 239 or 1-800-262-8803
6 (204) 831-3077 or 1-866-799-5784
8msharples@mbteach.org
—–Original Message—– From: Fred Harris [mailto:umharri5@yahoo.com] Sent: February-15-12 12:36 PM To: Marni Sharples Subject: Re: Meeting – Thursday, February 16th
On February 16, 2012, I had a meeting with Mr. Stankevicius and David Shrom, a lawyer (probably a labour lawyer–he has since been on an arbitration board). Mr. Shrom informed me that the issue was grievable, meaning that the issue could be grieved on the basis of collective agreement provisions (but he did not specify, if I remember correctly, which provisions could be used to justify the grievance). However, he (or Mr. Stankevicius) indicated that, despite being grievable, I would still have to undergo intensive clinical supervision while the grievance was in process. Since I had no further desire to work for Lakeshore School Division (or for that matter any other employer), I decided not to pursue the grievance and made a deal to agree to resign if I was “allowed” to work one day in March to qualify for short-term disability until I qualified for long-term disability;
Bureaucratic Rules for Going on Short- and Long-term Disability
Fred Harris <umharri5@yahoo.com>
To:rstankevicius@mbteach.org
Sat., Feb. 18, 2012 at 9:29 a.m.
Hello Roland,
I received a doctor’s note yesterday for two weeks. I will fax that to the Division office. I also explained to the doctor the situation in relation to std [short-term disability], and he stated that he had no problem with signing another doctor’s note afterwards.
What are other conditions for std? Seeing a doctor regularly? Other conditions attached? What is the level of benefits?
I understand that I will have to work at least one day in March. In what would that consist? And where? I am unconcerned about the other teachers knowing about the situation–they undoubtedly will be curious. However, I have no desire to see Neil.
I do have some questions. Is std to be a bridging gap for ltd [long-term disability]? However, I skimmed through the ltd plan, and a condition for ltd is that the teacher still be employed. If the idea is to negotiate a deal and terminate, then I would not qualify for ltd. So I am unsure of this.
I also am wondering about prospects for future employment in other divisions. I would probably start out as a substitute teacher, but then again I do now know how difficult it is to be on the substitute teachers’ list in various divisions. Any ideas?
I also, as you know, plan on going to Toronto. Whether this year or next I am unsure. What probable impact, if any, would this have on working in Toronto, at least initially, as a substitute teacher?
Fred
— On Fri, 2/17/12, Roland Stankevicius <rstankevicius@mbteach.org> wrote:
From: Roland Stankevicius <rstankevicius@mbteach.org> Subject: FW: Lakeshore short term disability insurance (std) To: “Fred Harris” <umharri5@yahoo.com> Received: Friday, February 17, 2012, 12:24 PM
Hi Fred, I heard your voicemail message. I am in the office call if you are available.
Further to the previous email.
The note for next week can be “on sick leave for an indefinite period while under doctor’s care and will be reassessed on 28th February.”
The matter is that you need to be ‘not on sick leave’ for at least a day (at work) on or after March 1st. It is a bit complicated but basically you will be transitioning from one medical leave to the other and therefore will need a second medical note after March 1st.
My email to a doctor involved specifying what was required to satisfy the short-term provisions of the disability program:
From: Fred Harris <umharri5@yahoo.com>
To: “samy.faltas@hotmail.com” <samy.faltas@hotmail.com>
Sent: Wednesday, March 28, 2012, 02:09:46 p.m. EDT
Subject:Doctor‘s Note
Hello Doctor Faltas,
I am a patient of yours who saw the psychiatrist, Dr.Morier.
Lakeshore School Division requires a doctor‘s note, with two parts to it.
The first part should indicate that I was capable of working on March 23 (whether formulated as alternative work or simply as work is your decision).
The second part then should indicate that I was not capable of working as of March 26. The MTS representative (union representative) suggested that the wording should indicate that I am incapble of performing full-time teaching duties due to general stress and anxiety (this last wording, he suggested, should also be used for the Wawanesa form when you fill it out after having received the Dr. Morier’s report). Of course, it is up to you how you formulate the note.
The note can be addressed as To Lakeshore School Division
The note can be sent to the following address:
Lakeshore School Division
Box 100
Eriksdale, MB
R0C 0W0
If you have questions of the Division, you can phone the Division at 739-2101 and ask for Janet Martell (superintendent).
If you have any questions for me, my cell number in Winnipeg is: 951-2764.
Thank you, Dr. Faltas.
Fred Haris
Political Lessons to Be Learned
When we look at all these experiences, it can be seen that the government and its representatives in many ways functions to oppress workers and citizens. The left seem oblivious to this aspect of the regular person’s experiences. Indeed, the left’s frequent reference to the solution of “expanded public services,” for many sounds like a call for an expanded system of oppression. Is there really any wonder why workers and citizens have moved to the right in many instances? The left, of course, absolves itself of any responsibility for this turn. It chastises the lower levels of the working class for, for instance, voting for the likes of Trump, while it fails to look critically at its own contribution to the continued oppression of workers and citizens.
It should be noted that, in some ways, I was a lucky person. I was to receive short-term and then long-term disability. A friend of mine who worked in a private school ended up in the psychiatric ward after suffering constant criticisms from administration and relatively well-off parents. He received no financial help whatsoever.
Of course, my luck is relative; I would have preferred, of course, not to have had to experience such “luck” in the first place.
In another post in this series, I will outline the oppression that I experienced while on short- and long-term disability.
As I indicated in my last post, my substantial complaint to the Manitoba Institute of Registered Social Workers (MIRSW) against a social worker was dismissed without really considering the nature of the complaint. Of course, Francesca, my daughter, was still being physically abused by her mother I pursued the issue by filing a complaint against the Winnipeg Child and Family Services (WCFS) with the Manitoba Ombudsman.
Of course, Francesca’s mother in the meantime continued to use a belt, a wooden stick and physically abuse Francesca in various other ways (as I outlined in my previous posts in this series. I continued to complain to Winnipeg Child and Family Services about this physical abuse.
As I indicated in an earlier post, the physical abuse included (but was not limited) to the following: Since the civil trial in April 1999, my daughter complained of the following (as of February 18, 2000): 1. Her mother was using a wooden stick on her buttocks; 2. Her mother used a belt to spank her on the same area; 3. Her mother grabbed Francesca and forced her into the apartment building; 4. Her mother had grabbed Francesca’s throat in the elevator and warned her not to tell me that her mother had hit her; 5. Her mother shoved Francesca to the floor on two separate occasions; 6. Her mother hit Francesca on the head with a book; 7. Her mother pulled Francesca’s hair; 8. Her mother scratched Francesca with a comb.
Oppressive Letter from Dan Berg, Assistant Program Manager, Winnipeg Child and Family Services
In the meantime, I received a letter from Dan Berg, assistant program manager, Intake and Early Intervention Program, of Winnipeg Child and Family Services. It was dated January 22, 2004.
Here is the content of the letter:
My name is Dan Berg. I am an Assistant Program Manager with the Branch of Winnipeg Child and Family Services based out of 835 Portage Avenue, phone number is 944-6750.
I recently reviewed the referral letter sent by yourself on January 5, 2004, regarding Francesca your daughter receiving a bruise on her leg resultant of her mother Veronica Harris allegedly hitting her with a remote control on her leg.
As a standard practice in our Abuse Unit we review the entire file on each family, their background history with our Branch to inform our current decision to investigate a matter or not,. I personally took on this responsibility given the extensive history of involvement our Branch has had with your family
Frankly, as an Assistant Program Manager with over twenty years in the child welfare field, I am very concerned about the number of referrals you have made to our office regarding your ex-wife.
We as a branch have consistently interfered in your wife’s affairs resultant of these referrals to our Agency by yourself. Investigations continue to be unfounded and your daughter has been subjected to numerous interviews and medically examined a very intrusive measure on more than one occasion.
We as a Branch, will not be investigating your most recent disclosure regarding your daughter and your ex-wife.
I will instruct our Crisis Response Unit to screen all calls from yourself from this date forward particularly if they reference your wife and and the quality of care of your daughter Francesca Harris is receiving. As a Branch responsible for child welfare matters in the city, we will respond to legitimate calls.
If in the future our Branch staff follow up on a referral call from yourself and we determine that the call is unfounded and malicious in nature, we will be consulting our legal counsel and the police to consider legal action.
You should give some serious consideration to exploring Family Conciliation Counseling so your daughter does not have to continue to be caught in the middle of your differences. Children of separated and divorced parents can learn to cope quite well if the parents put their child’s needs first.
I trust future referrals to our Agency will be seriously screened by yourself to their validity in the future. I am available for you to contact me directly at 944-6750.
Sincerely,
Dan Berg Assistant Program Manager Intake and Early Intervention Program
Patrick Harrison Program Manager Intake and Early Intervention Program
cc. Diva Faria, CRU Supervisor Diana Verrier, CRU Supervisor
I have included the letter as written–including its grammatical and punctuation errors.
Evasive and Oppressive Letter from Manitoba Ombudsman
Among other communications from Manitoba Ombudsman, I received the following, dated May 12, 2005. I will not quote all of it since the main points are the following:
Our office has investigated the concerns you raised and have concluded that the position taken by WCFS as outlined in their letters of January 13, 2003 and January 22, 2004 is not clearly wrong or unreasonable. Accordingly there is no recommendation that can be made on your behalf.
In the January 13, 2003 letter, Rhonda Warren, assistant program manager to the Winnipeg Child and Family Services, stated the following:
Whether we agree or not regarding the issue of corporal punishment, it is not illegal for a parent to use such practice and in absence of injury Child and Family Services does not have the authority to demand change. It appears from your lengthy correspondence that you and … [the] mother have very different childrearing practices.
This implies that Francesca’s mother was using corporal punishment. However, just a year later, Dan Berg implied that I was making false allegations of physical abuse–like the social worker who wrote the court-ordered assessment. Why is that? The letter from Manitoba Ombudsman does not explain how it drew the conclusion “that the position taken by WCFS as outlined in their letters of January 13, 2003 and January 22, 2004 is not clearly wrong or unreasonable.”
How is it reasonable to claim that Dan Berg’s refusal to further investigate my complaints of physical abuse by the mother and his threat of consulting legal counsel and contacting the police was reasonable when Rhonda Warren, who held the same position as Dan Berg the year before, implied use of corporal punishment by Francesca’s mother for at least six years?
By the way, the claim by Rhonda Warren, assistant program manager to the Winnipeg Child and Family Servicesthat that “it is not illegal for a parent to use such practice and in absence of injury Child and Family Services does not have the authority to demand change” is hypocritical. I was living in a bachelor’s suite, with a separate bed for myself and for Francesca but in the same room, obviously (I could not afford at the time a one-bedroom apartment)–after I had been falsely accused of sexually abusing by both the mother and Winnipeg Child and Family Services. Francesca would sleep with me despite having her own bed, and I did not think anything about it. The mother apparently complained to WCFS, and the WCFS contacted me, implying that if I did not stop sleeping with Francesca, they would take Francesca away from me. I had to force Francesca to sleep in her own bed–and that included spanking her–for the first time. Both of us were crying. The WCFS abused both Francesca and me–despite a child sleeping with a parent not being “illegal.”
The conclusion that I drew from this is that the legal provisions for the protection of children were being used to justify conclusions that were already formed beforehand. The “rule of law” so much by the social-democratic left and liberals is a farce–just as was the court-ordered assessment (see my critiques of the “Marxist” Herman Rosenfeld, who claimed that what was needed was somehow a “transformation” of the police rather than their abolition in the series of posts on the reform or abolition of the police (for example, Reform or Abolition of the Police, Part One).
In a follow up letter, dated January 9, 2006, Manitoba Ombudsman indicated the following:
As you are aware, the Ombudsman is an independent Officer of the Legislature whose duty is to investigate administrative acts, decisions or omissions of a departments and agencies of the provincial and municipal governments.
The Winnipeg Child and Family Service did not consider that Francesca needed protection and that the threat to consult legal counsel and phone the police was reasonable. Both judgements were “reasonable” according to the Manitoba Ombudsman.
Of course, what is reasonable is very dependent on the point of view of those who interpret the law–and a citizen’s interpretation is irrelevant unless they have the money to pursue the issue in court.
The Winnipeg and Child and Family Services is supposed to protect children from physical abuse. On page 2 of the January 9, 2006 letter from Ombudsman Manitoba, they quote the following from “the law”:
Child in need of protection
17 (1) For purposes of this Act, a child is in need of protection where the life, health or emotional well- being of the child is endangered by the act or omission of a person.
Illustrations of child in need
(17 (2) Without restricting the generality of subsection (1), a child is in need of protection where the child …
(b) is in the care, custody, control or charge of a person …
(ii) whose conduct endangers or endanger the life, health or emotional well-being of the child
(c) is abused or in danger of being abused …
(e) is likely to suffer harm or injury due to the behaviour, condition, domestic environment or associations of the child or a person having care, custody, control or charge of the child;
(f) is subjected to aggression or sexual harassment that endangers the life, health or emotional well-being of the child.
Protection of the informant
18.1 (1) No action lies against a person for providing information in good faith and in compliance with section 18.
What happens when the definition of child abuse differs between a citizen and the capitalist state or government–or an official of the capitalist state or government? Since I considered all my complaints to the WCFS to be instances of child abuse, and the WCFS did not, the default is–with the government. I would have had to appeal, probably, up to the Supreme Court (if I could)–and I did not have either the knowledge nor the money to do so.
The same could be said of any appeal of the Manitoba Ombudsman decision.
In relation to the WCFS’s threat to take legal action and to phone the police, how could the Manitoba Ombudsman, in its letter dated May 12, 2005 conclude that “the position taken by WCFS as outlined in their letter of January 22, 2004 is not clearly wrong or unreasonable?”
So, despite section 18.1 (1) providing protection for those who provide “information in good faith,” the threat of Dan Berg and the WCFS to consult its legal counsel and to phone the police was “not clearly wrong or unreasonable.”
Like the Manitoba Registered Social Workers Institute’s rejection of my complaint against the social worker who wrote the court-ordered assessment, the farcical nature of the whole process of filing a complaint against unfair treatment was becoming ever clearer.
It is true that In the letter by Ombudsman Manitoba dated January 9, 2006, they did indicate that I could still make complaints to the WCFS if I had concerns about the way her mother treated Francesca. In the same letter, however, they wrote the following:
WCFS is now aware that the tone and choice of wording of the letter in question gave you the impression [note how Ombudsman Office makes the matter look like a mere question of interpretation–gave you the impression”–as if others would not have interpreted the letter from Dan Berg, assistant program manager of the WCFS as a threat] that they felt your complaints were not legitimate and that you would be subjected to police involvement. We have confirmed that WCFS will respond to you as specified in The Child and Family Services Act.
I responded, verbally I believe, to Ombudsman Manitoba that it was not the “tone and wording of the letter in question” was not the issue–but the real threat of phoning the police. That real threat will be the topic of future posts.
Further Physical and Emotional Abuse of Francesca Subsequent to Dan Berg’s Letter and the Lack of Action of the Winnipeg Child and Family Services
Subsequent to Dan Berg’s letter in January 2004, in June, 2004, Francesca indicated to me the following: Francesca’s mother hits Francesca in the nose, causing it to bleed as well as the mother throwing a wooden stick near Francesca’s face.
On July 5, 2004, I took Francesca to the Children’s Advocate office, where Francesca was interviewed. The person who interviewed her, Janet Minwald, then talked to me. She indicated that there had been a disclosure this time about physical abuse. Apparently, it took the WCFS several months before it interviewed Francesca (ironically, only the WCFS had the authority to inquire into allegations of child abuse–not the Children’s Advocate).
However, the last time that I complained to the WCFS was after the June 2004 incident. Francesca had told me that her mother had kicked her in the back. I took Francesca to the WCFS, and the response was: “There was no mark” so they could do nothing. From that time onward, I saw no further point in filing complaints to the WCFS. The institution was oppressive and, in fact, contributed to the physical abuse of Francesca–and all this with the blessing of Ombudsman Manitoba and indeed, indirectly, the Minister of Family Services and Housing and the head of the provincial government, Gary Doer.
The Responsibility of the New Democratic Party for Francesca’s Continued Physical and Emotional Abuse
I had sent a letter to the Minister of Family Services and Housing on May 1, 2005 since I had not yet received a response from Ombudsman Manitoba. I received this response:
Mqy 18, 2005
Dear Mr. Harris:
Thank you for your letter to Premier Gary Doer dated May 1, 2005, regarding the report you have been expecting from the Office of the Ombudsman. As the Coordinator of Issues Management for the Child Protection Branch, your letter has been referred to me for response.
I understand from your letter you were anticipating that a report from the Office of the Ombudsman into your complaint against Winnipeg Child and Family Services was to be ready by February 18, 2005. I further understand that to date, this report has not been received. As the concerns that you are experiencing are related to the Office of the Ombudsman, by copy of this letter, I am referring this matter to the Office of the Ombudsman and request that they respond to you directly.
Thank you again for bringing this matter to our attention. I truest that the Office of the Ombudsman will be able to respond to your concerns.
Sincerely,
Shelley Sorin, Coordinator Issues Management
cc: Premier Gary Doer Honourable Christine Melnick, Ministry of Family Services and Housing Ms. Irene Hamilton, Ombudsman
Gary Doer was the New Democratic Party (NDP) premier (head of government) of Manitoba at the time. The NDP is a social-democratic political party in Canada.
More General Political Considerations Concerning Government Oppression and the Social-democratic Left
This is one of the reasons why the right has increased in strength–because the left idealizes public services and fails to acknowledge and to take into account oppressive experiences of regular people when such people deal with the government. Many people perceive the policies of expanded public services as an expansion of oppressive powers of government–with reason.
Indeed, the social-democratic or social-reformist left simply ignore the tentacles of the oppressive capitalist state that have spread throughout civil society or the so-called non-state and non-market sector. Indeed, Marc Mulholland (2016), in “Revolution and the Whip of Reaction: Technicians of Power and the Dialectic of Radicalisation,” Journal of Historical Sociology, has rightly criticized such ignorance. Pages 2-3:
Social science analyses of historical revolutions often concentrate upon the destruction of the central executive government, what we might call the regime, without paying sufficient attention to the machinery and personnel of governance extending throughout the state territory. Laws, rules and regulations comprise the technical machinery of power, but this machine requires skilled operators sufficiently familiar with the technique of practical governance. These skilled operators are the vital intermediary between the executive directors of power on the one hand, and the instruments of power – soldiers, bailiffs, police, office-administrators, propagandists, etc. – on the other. We may call these intermediary strata the technicians of power. The technicians of power do not design or construct the machinery of political and social administration, but they maintain it and they know how it works and how they like to see it working. Technicians of power are not randomly selected. They are drawn from particular social classes and have their own political predilections and the power to act on them. …
A regime might be decapitated, but its servants throughout the land cannot be so easily removed. Revolution cannot scatter its opponents at one blow. This is perfectly understandable once we appreciate that the structures of established governance run deep through society, and resist easy transformation.
Ignoring the extent to which the capitalist state is extended through various agencies formally outside the state or government underestimates greatly the difficulty of overcoming the power of capitalist class both before taking power and after taking power. For example, as I indicated in an earlier post (see Exposing the Intolerance and Censorship of Social Democracy, Part One: The Working Class, Housing and the Police), the movement to defund the police here in Toronto (and undoubtedly elsewhere) will unlikely be successful for various reasons. One of the reasons is its neglecting the various oppressive powers and structures linked to the police that support the police function in various ways. Their moral critique of the police lacks an engagement in inquiry into those forces linked to the police that support the police in various ways; their target for defunding is one-sided and limited and therefore will unlikely be successful.
Conclusion
My experiences with the WCFS, from the initial false allegation of sexually abusing Francesca in 1996, to the last time I complained to the WCFS about Francesca’s mother kicking her in the back, were mostly oppressive. Furthermore, the WCFS Ombudsman Manitoba and the government did nothing to protect Francesca.
In my next post, I will fast forward to 2007-2008, when Francesca skipped school so much that she was obliged to repeat grade eight in 2008. By that time, not even her mother could control her. Nor could I. Francesca had been violent towards me since 1999, when her mother refused to let me see Francesca or let Francesca to see me for almost three months.
In 2008, I obtained a position as a permanent teacher in September 2008, in Ashern, Manitoba, a very small town about 160 kilometers north of Winnipeg. Francesca’s mother agreed to have Francesca live with me since her mother could no longer control her. I decided to home school Francesca while living in Ashern and teaching there. I enrolled Francesca in distance education courses in June 2008, and I gave her the courses. She then left with her cousin, Laura, for Kelowna, a city in the province of British Columbia. I expected Francesca at least to work a bit on the distance education courses during the summer of 2008. She never did. That was the beginning of our problems.
What happened subsequently will be the subject of other posts. In the next post in this series, though, I will expose my own limitations–as father of Francesca. The left needs to learn to criticize itself.
This is a continuation of a previous post that illustrates how politically biased the capitalist government or state and its representatives (such as social-democratic social workers) are when it comes to determining real situations–especially when a person self-declares as a Marxist.
Just a recap of part of the last post: I filed a complaint with the Manitoba Institute of Registered Workers against a social worker who had written a court-ordered assessment concerning my wife at the time, myself and my daughter, Francesca Alexandra Romani (ne Harris). I am using the initials S.W. for the social worker. Mr. S.W., claimed that my claim that the mother of my daughter was using a belt and a wooden stick to physically abuse her, was “somewhat ridiculous.” Mr. S.W. was much less concerned about determining the truth of this claim (which is in fact true) than with my so-called indoctrination of my daughter in my “Marxist ideology.”
Since the civil trial in April 1999, my daughter complained of the following (as of February 18, 2000): 1. Her mother was using a wooden stick on her buttocks; 2. Her mother used a belt to spank her on the same area; 3. Her mother grabbed Francesca and forced her into the apartment building; 4. Her mother had grabbed Francesca’s throat in the elevator and warned her not to tell me that her mother had hit her; 5. Her mother shoved Francesca to the floor on two separate occasions; 6. Her mother hit Francesca on the head with a book; 7. Her mother pulled Francesca’s hair; 8. Her mother scratched Francesca with a comb.
This contrasts with Mr. S.W.’s allegation, as noted in the last post, that ” Mr. Harris’ explanation for contacting the Agency [Winnipeg Child and Family Services] was somewhat ridiculous. He said that the child had made some vague indications that she may have been spanked.”
Mr. S.W. was much less concerned about the truthfulness of Mr. Harris’ claim (which is true) than with Mr. Harris’ Marxists ideas.
This is the last part of the series in relation to my complaint against the social worker who wrote the court-ordered assessment–but not the end of the series since the saga continued afterwards in other forms.
Mr. S.W. characterized my accusations of physical abuse (and various other accusations) as ridiculous–and false. It could therefore be concluded that not only were my accusations false but also not genuine. How did he characterize the following accusations made by Ms. Harris?
In April, 1996, during a mediation meeting between Mr. Harris and Ms. Harris, Ms. Harris (falsely) accused Mr. Harris of sexually abusing Francesca; apparently, Winnipeg Child and Family Services obliged Ms. Harris to accuse Mr. Harris of this. In November, 1997, again through Winnipeg Child and Family Services, Ms. Harris accused (falsely) Mr. Harris of sexually abusing Francesca.
In 1998, Mr. Harris obtained telephone access rights (in addition, Francesca could sleep over once a week, on the weekend). Ms. Harris, on June 8, 1998, had her lawyer send a letter to Mr. Harris’ lawyer, “explaining” why she refused telephone access–because Mr. Harris had sexually abused Francesca once again.
She refused telephone access–but not physical access. A rather curious fact–but Mr. S.W. omitted the June 8, 1998 letter in his list of documents used. Mr. Harris showed Mr. S.W. Judge Diamond’s order indicating that he had the right to have telephone access every Wednesday.
Note that Mr. S.W. first interviewed Mr. Harris on August 4, 1998. Ms. Harris had not complied with the court order for over two months. Mr. Harris informed Mr. S.W. of this. Is there any mention of this in his assessment? Why the suppression of relevant evidence? Did he query Ms. Harris? Coupled with the letter dated June 8, surely, Mr. S.W., if he had been unbiased, should have inquired further. A parent who does not deny physical access but denies telephone access–how genuine could an accusation of sexual abuse be? Any rational person would have suspected that Ms. Harris’ accusation of sexual abuse was not genuine. What was Mr. S.W’s interpretation of the situation?
From pages 20-21 of Mr. S.W’s court-ordered assessment:
Her [Ms. Harris’] concerns about the possible sexual abuse of her daughter appeared to be genuine. She was able, however, to accept this writer’s opinion that there did not appear to be any evidence of sexual misconduct on the part of Mr. Harris. Ms. Harris was very reasonable when discussing this writer’s opinion on custody, and she was obviously trying to act in the best interests of Francesca. She indicated that she simply wanted the legal issues with Mr. Harris settled so that she can get on with her life.
So, my accusations of physical abuse, according to Mr. S.W., were “ridiculous” and obviously not genuine; they were both false and not genuine. On the other hand, according to Mr. S.W., Ms. Harris’ accusation of sexual abuse (with the help of the Winnipeg Child and Family Services in two instances) was genuine but false.
Here is the carrot to get me to accept the assessment. Despite all the lies and distortions contained in the assessment, the accusation of sexual abuse would be put to rest–and I would gain greater access to see Francesca (and I would be able to take Francesca to Calgary to see her grandmother).
Unfortunately for Mr. S.W., Ms. Harris’ subsequent actions provided further evidence of the biased nature of his assessment. When I read the assessment, I could not believe the number of lies, distortions and omissions contained in the document. Instead of containing an objective inquiry, it expressed the political bias of Mr. S.W. I was faced with either accepting these lies, distortions and omissions, or never seeing Francesca again. I called my lawyer to see if I could have another assessment. He replied that no social worker would contradict what Mr. S.W. wrote. I subsequently called Ms. Harris, indicating that I would never see Francesca again.
However, I did not last very long since I loved Francesca. I called my lawyer, indicating to him what I had said to Ms. Harris. He stated that I should call her back, indicating that I had not abandoned my access rights. I did so. I subsequently went to Ms. Harris’ townhouse to pick up Francesca for her overnight stay over. Ms. Harris refused me access. I went to the police, but since I did not have the court order, they did nothing.
The following week, I had the court order, but Ms. Harris still refused, apparently indicating that the reason why she refused access was because I was a Marxist (so I was told by the police. She probably showed them the assessment by Mr. S.W.). I spent around three hours in the back of the police car while the police tried to gain access. They failed. Ms. Harris was arrested, I believe, for failing to comply with the court order, but there was no further action. She refused access for around three months, until February, 1999, when a judge found her guilty of contempt of court. I then gained access to see Francesca again.
Mr. S.W.’s suppression of the document accusing me of sexual abuse is in itself evidence of Mr. S.W’s bias. If we take into account his claim that Ms. Harris’s accusation was genuine though false, his bias becomes even more evident. His further claim that Ms. Harris wanted to only resolve the legal issues and put them behind her and that she was obviously looking out for the best interests of Francesca is further evidence of his bias. Ms. Harris’ subsequent refusal to provide Mr. Harris with access to Francesca provides even further evidence of the biased nature of the court-ordered assessment.
Given that the refusal of access by Ms. Harris contradicted so blatantly the court-ordered assessment written by Mr. S.W., my lawyer was able to set up a meeting with Mr. S.W. and myself. we were to have another observation of Francesca with me after I had gained access in February. Of course, I knew by then that I had to avoid any political education. I even shook his hand at the end of our meeting (I had to fake it since I felt extreme disdain at deferring to his “authority.”)
The subsequent observation went well, according to him.
However, I was afraid that it would not go well. When Francesca finally saw me again (before the second assessment), she was evidently angry and asked me why I did not want to see her. She also started punching me and acting violently. I did not connect up Francesca’s violent behaviour and what she told me later on because I did not, at the time, believe her (I will explain in another post why I did not initially believe her).
Fortunately, she did not act like that when Mr. S.W. observed our interactions.
Mr. S.W.’s characterization of Ms. Harris as being”very reasonable when discussing this writer’s opinion on custody, and she was obviously trying to act in the best interests of Francesca. She indicated that she simply wanted the legal issues with Mr. Harris settled so that she can get on with her life” was in shambles not only because of Ms. Harris’ refusal to permit access but also because she now insisted that there be a civil trial and that she wanted reduced and supervised access.
The civil trial, held in April 1999 (on the insistence of Francesca’s mother, who now used Mr. S.W.’s initial assessment as a weapon to justify refusing me access and proceeding to civil trial) displayed further just how bias and inaccurate the assessment was.
I was the first to testify under oath. I saw Francesca that night. Ms. Harris testified the following day. She testified, under oath, that I had sexually abused Francesca the day before–the day that I testified. I allegedly had Francesca masturbate me (a fourth false accusation of sexual abuse).
Even Judge Diamond had to recognize that Ms. Harris was lying. She indicated to Ms. Harris’ lawyer that she was lucky that she still would have custody of Francesca.
Mr. S.W.’s assessment of the situation was in shambles–and yet his initial assessment formed part of the “evidence” used to justify Ms. Harris’ continued custody of Francesca. I gained greater access–provided that I took an anger management course (not Ms. Harris) and could take Francesca to Calgary so that she could see her grandmother and that her grandmother could “see” her (my mother was legally blind at the time).
The issue of the physical abuse of Francesca was buried by this political bigot.
Let us now listen to a “radical” leftist here in Toronto, Herman Rosenfeld, about the law in a society dominated by a class of employers:
In reality, though, bourgeois democratic institutions are not simply a façade for a bloody and murderous dictatorship over the poor and colonized. Yes, there are instances of state acts of murder and even terrorism. The liberal democratic state and institutions facilitate private capital accumulation and are structured in ways which seek to repress, diffuse and co-opt alternative political and social movements, but these are mediated by the necessities of legitimating capitalism. The relative power, political ideology and organization of the working class and colonized Indigenous peoples also affect the character of liberal democracy (and in the subordinate strata, there are forms of class differences and other contradictions that also matter).
Apart from the extremely vague nature of this paragraph, its reference to the need for “legitimating capitalism” does not even recognize that part of the nature of legitimating capitalism is, firstly, hiding the real nature of the “liberal democratic state and institutions.” Yes, I obtained some of my goals–preventing Francesca’s mother from ever falsely accusing me of sexually abusing Francesca ever again, gaining greater access to see Francesca and having the right for Francesca and her grandmother to see each other.
But at what cost? Francesca’s mother continued to abuse her physically–and the assessment was used to justify doing nothing about it. The façade of “justice” being done was maintained. Many of the “left”(such as Mr. Rosenfeld) here in Toronto (and undoubtedly elsewhere) persistently idealize the capitalist government or state. The oppressive nature of the capitalist government is subsequently captured by the right, who at least recognize that people often experience the government as oppressive.
Mr. Rosenfeld and similar leftists, however, present such oppression as “instances” rather than as a regular part of the situation of those have dealings with the government.
The Manitoba Registered Institute of Social Workers “inquired” into the situation (the complaint was double spaced and amounted to around 100 pages, with supporting documentation).
They interviewed me, and their questions centered around whether Mr. S.W. had raised his voice towards me or showed any signs of physical threats. The issue of the systematic abuse and bias contained in the court-ordered assessment was never discussed. The Institute rejected my complaint–without any justification other than indicating that Mr. S.W. did not contravene the Institute’s ethical principles.
Such are the ethics of social-democratic social workers and their institutions.
This post ends direct references to my complaint about the court-ordered assessment to the Manitoba Institute of Registered Social Workers. However, after having been convinced of the farcical nature of the legal system and farcical nature of the Manitoba Institute of Registered Social Workers and their ethical principles, I proceeded to file a complaint against the Winnipeg Child and Family Services with the Ombudsman’s office.
This is a continuation of a previous post that illustrates how politically biased the capitalist government or state and its representatives (such as social-democratic social workers) are when it comes to determining real situations–especially when a person self-declares as a Marxist.
Just a recap of part of the last post: I filed a complaint with the Manitoba Institute of Registered Social Workers against a social worker who had written a court-ordered assessment concerning my wife at the time, myself and my daughter, Francesca Alexandra Romani (ne Harris). I am using the initials S.W. for the social worker. Mr. S.W., claimed that my claim that the mother of my daughter was using a belt and a wooden stick to physically abuse her, was “somewhat ridiculous.” Mr. S.W. was much less concerned about determining the truth of this claim (which is in fact true) than with my so-called indoctrination of my daughter in my “Marxist ideology.”
Since the civil trial in April 1999, my daughter complained of the following (as of February 18, 2000): 1. Her mother was using a wooden stick on her buttocks; 2. Her mother used a belt to spank her on the same area; 3. Her mother grabbed Francesca and forced her into the apartment building; 4. Her mother had grabbed Francesca’s throat in the elevator and warned her not to tell me that her mother had hit her; 5. Her mother shoved Francesca to the floor on two separate occasions; 6. Her mother hit Francesca on the head with a book; 7. Her mother pulled Francesca’s hair; 8. Her mother scratched Francesca with a comb.
This contrasts with Mr. S.W.’s allegation, as noted in the last post, that ” Mr. Harris’ explanation for contacting the Agency [Winnipeg Child and Family Services] was somewhat ridiculous. He said that the child had made some vague indications that she may have been spanked.”
Mr. S.W. was much less concerned about the truthfulness of Mr. Harris’ claim (which is true) than with Mr. Harris’ Marxists ideas.
“Indoctrinate” is used several times in the assessment. The term indoctrinate is quite strong. Is Mr. S.W. ready to substantiate such a charge? Apparently not. Mr. Harris, in a meeting with his lawyer and Mr. S.W. in February 1999, requested that Mr. S.W. provide Mr. Harris with some material which indicated that such “indoctrination” would harm his daughter–because Mr. Harris does not want to harm his daughter. He indicated that Mr. S.W. merely had to provide general material on the subject and not so specific material that it related to Marxism as such.
The [civil] trial took place from April 6 to April 8, 1999. Mr. S.W. stated, on the witness stand, that he had told Mr. Harris that he would try to obtain material relevant to whether Mr. Harris’ “indoctrinating” his daughter with Marxist ideas harmed a child. Mr. Harris phoned Mr. S.W. about one week later, asking whether Mr. S.W. had found any material. Mr. S.W. replied that he had not, but that he was still searching. Almost six months later–no word from Mr. S.W. [Almost twenty years later–and still no word from Mr. S.W.]
The charge of indoctrination is quite interesting. On what grounds does Mr. S.W. make it?
Indoctrination tries to narrow the horizon of a person’s awareness of the world and context in which we live. Does this blog testify to such narrowmindedness? If so, how so?
When Francesca and I used to go to the Subway restaurant to have a subway sandwich, I would teach her the productive circuit of capital (since it is more understandable, in that context, than the money circuit of capital). I would point out to her that the worker’s act of placing the meat, the tomatoes, lettuce, green peppers, etc. on the bun was the process of production, or P, which required time. I then pointed out that the product of this act of production was not the property of the worker but the owner of Subway. Next, I pointed out that the worker then sold the subway to us for money (which was not hers/his). Finally, I pointed out that the money was then used to purchase the meat, lettuce, green peppers, bun, etc. as well as hire the worker–to begin the capitalist production anew (in terms of the symbols used in the money circuit of capital, we have: P…C’-M’-(Mp+L)…P).
My daughter probably does not remember this, but she at least was exposed to Marxian theory and to an understanding of the basic process of capitalist production. I doubt that Mr. S.W.–and many social democrats–can say the same.
Some lessons to be drawn, when dealing with social workers, the courts, the police and other representatives of the social system:
Expect the interests of children to be less important than political oppression of Marxists.
Unless Marxists record everything, expect social workers to either be incapable of understanding the situation which you face, or expect them to distort it, or even to lie. (And even if you record it, they will try to interpret the situation in such a way that tries to show Marxists to be irrational.)
Do not expect that your efforts at telling the truth will prevail over lies by others since the representatives of the class of employers will assume that the lies of others are the truth and that your telling the truth is a lie.
In reality, though, bourgeois democratic institutions are not simply a façade for a bloody and murderous dictatorship over the poor and colonized. Yes, there are instances of state acts of murder and even terrorism. The liberal democratic state and institutions facilitate private capital accumulation and are structured in ways which seek to repress, diffuse and co-opt alternative political and social movements, but these are mediated by the necessities of legitimating capitalism. The relative power, political ideology and organization of the working class and colonized Indigenous peoples also affect the character of liberal democracy (and in the subordinate strata, there are forms of class differences and other contradictions that also matter). We don’t live in a fascist dictatorship.
No, we do not live in a fascist dictatorship (although I leave open what that means–Mr. Rosenfeld does not enlighten us on that score), but to what extent do many people in “bourgeois democratic institutions” actually experience the oppression that I experienced? Is my case an exception? Mr. Rosenfeld provides no evidence that he even is aware of just how oppressive the government is–which feeds into the popularity of the right since there is denial by the left, on the one hand, of what many people experience and, on the other, the left idealize the public sector.
When Mr. Rosenfeld speaks of “the necessities of legitimating capitalism,” he does not inquire into the extent to which such legitimation is based on the illusion of legitimacy. How many cases of government or state oppression is the public aware of? Should not the left expose such oppression? I sent Mr. Rosenfeld some of the facts of the case surrounding the court-ordered assessment when we were both engaged in providing a workshop for Toronto Pearson airport workers. His response was–silence.
The legitmating function of the capitalist government and state may well, at least in part, be a function of the suppression of many cases of oppression by the “public sector.” That would require inquiry by the left to search for such cases and bring them to light–rather than using such vague terms as “the necessities of legitimating capitalism.” Surely it is one of the tasks of the left to expose such oppression–rather than cover it up with such phrases as “the necessities of legitimating capitalism.”
Perhaps there are other lessons to be learned. If so, please indicate what other lessons can be learned from this.
I will, in the future, write one more post specifically related to my complaint against Mr. S.W. to the Manitoba Institute of Registered Social Workers. That will end my account of that complaint (although there were more than six points to my complaint) –although it will not end the situation that I and my daughter faced in relation to representatives of the capitalist government or state. That situation will be described in additional posts that continue the series in order to illustrate the oppressive nature of the society in which we live.
Injuries, disease and death are the common experiences of many Canadian workers–and undoubtedly workers in all countries dominated by the power of a class of employers. This is so since, on the one hand, profit is the driving force of human life in such societies (see The Money Circuit of Capital for an explanation of this). On the other hand, workers in such a society are themselves costs, on the same level as the machinery, buildings, computers, raw material and other objects they use to produce commodities. The pandemic has shown this, unfortunately, to be the case, especially in the United States, as workers have been sacrifice in order to open up an economy dominated by a class of employers.
Even apart from the pandemic, the fact that human beings are both living beings and self-conscious living beings is used by the class of employers in order to obtain as much profit as possible in the shortest possible time. To do so involves a reduction in the costs of production by reducing the number of workers or by reducing the costs of the means of production. By intensifying work through the reduction of the number of workers to the bare minimum, employers produce conditions that can easily result in injury, disease or death. By focusing on cutting costs to the maximum by, for example, not purchasing necessary safety equipment, employers also produce conditions that can easily result in injury, disease or death.
This situation is not generally recognized by capitalist governments or states. The sacrifice of workers for the benefit of the class of employers is often hidden–with the implicit or explicit collusion of the capitalist government or state. Thus, Bob Barnetson points out, in The Political Economy of Workplace Injury in Canada, page 173:
The purpose of this book was to examine how Canadian governments prevent and compensate workplace injury, who benefits from this approach, and how they benefit. The first four chapters suggest that governments do a poor job of preventing injury. The use of ineffective regulation appears to represent intentionally prioritizing profitability over safety. And the state has contained the ability of workers to resist this agenda by shaping the discourse around injury and the operation of these systems. Examining injury compensation reveals how seemingly neutral aspects of claims adjudication and management financially advantage employers and limit the ability of workers to resist unsafe work.
Together, this analysis suggests that the prevention and compensation of workplace injuries are not solely technical or legal undertakings, but intensely political ones that entail serious consequences — most often for workers. This conclusion is quite upsetting. But the facts are difficult to dispute. Whatever the drawbacks of Canadian injury statistics, they demonstrate that hundreds of thousands of workers are injured each year on the job. This raises two fundamental questions. First, why are so many seriously injured every year? And, second, why don’t governments do something about it?
Unions, of course, do seek to protect workers from the more vicious forms of health and safety violations. However, although the intentions of union reps may be praiseworthy, should we not wonder why they fail to question the basic source of injuries, disease and death in workplaces in modern society: the existence of a class of employers that uses human beings as means for purposes not defined by those who work?
All radicals should ask union reps the same questions: “First, why are so many seriously injured every year? And, second, why don’t governments do something about it?” They should also ask them: Why do union reps use such clichés as “decent work,” “fair contracts,” “economic justice,” “fairness,” “fair labour laws save lives” when the situation workers face, whether unionized or non-unionized, is indecent, unfair and unjust–a situation that leads to so many injuries, diseases and deaths?
This is a continuation of a previous post that illustrates how politically biased the capitalist government or state and its representatives (such as social-democratic social workers) are when it comes to determining real situations–especially when a person self-declares as a Marxist.
Just a recap of part of the last post: I filed a complaint with the Manitoba Institute of Registered Workers against a social worker who had written a court-ordered assessment concerning my wife at the time, myself and my daughter, Francesca Alexandra Romani (ne Harris). I am using the initials S.W. for the social worker. Mr. S.W., claimed that my claim that the mother of my daughter was using a belt and a wooden stick to physically abuse her, was “somewhat ridiculous.” Mr. S.W. was much less concerned about determining the truth of this claim (which is in fact true) than with my so-called indoctrination of my daughter in my “Marxist ideology.” Since the civil trial in April 1999, my daughter complained of the following (as of February 18, 2000): 1. Her mother was using a wooden stick on her buttocks; 2. Her mother used a belt to spank her on the same area; 3. Her mother grabbed Francesca and forced her into the apartment building; 4. Her mother had grabbed Francesca’s throat in the elevator and warned her not to tell me that her mother had hit her; 5. Her mother shoved Francesca to the floor on two separate occasions; 6. Her mother hit Francesca on the head with a book; 7. Her mother pulled Francesca’s hair; 8. Her mother scratched Francesca with a comb.
It should not be forgotten that these incidents occurred since the trial in April, 1999. There were, of course, several other incidents of physical abuse by the mother before that.
This contrasts with Mr. S.W.’s allegation, as noted in the last post, that ” Mr. Harris’ explanation for contacting the Agency [Winnipeg Child and Family Services] was somewhat ridiculous. He said that the child had made some vague indications that she may have been spanked.”
Mr. S.W. was much less concerned about the truthfulness of Mr. Harris’ claim (which is true) than with Mr. Harris’ Marxists ideas.
The extent of Mr. S.W.’s political bigotry can be seen, in addition to his absurd characterization of my genuine (and true) complaints about Francesca’s mother’s physical abuse of Francesca and his lying concerning the language issue as outlined in previous posts.
Further evidence of his political bigotry was his lack of concern about the accuracy of characterizing what occurred when Francesca’s mother took Francesca to Guatemala (Francesca’s mother was born in Guatemala). It was (and still is) my belief that Francesca’s mother, although she did not kidnap Francesca in the sense of initially taking Francesca away to Guatemala against my will, did in fact abduct Francesca by remaining in Guatemala for three and half months past the agreed upon time for her return to Canada. I did not know whether I would ever see Francesca again. Mr. S.W. dismissed my contention that Ms. Harris had kidnapped Francesca.
From the court-ordered assessment written by Mr. S.W.
“Page 12: Mr. Harris agreed that his wife and child should accept the offer of free transportation, and Mrs. Harris left for Guatemala.”
The context was (I will provide details in another post) that we had reconciled in February, 1995 after a separation from October 16, 1994.
I agreed to have my wife take my daughter from mid-March until mid-April 1995 to Guatemala; her parents were to pay for the return flight (I was receiving student loan at the time). My wife, however, refused to return to Canada at the agreed-upon time.
This is what Mr. S.W., the political bigot, had to say:
Page 12 of the assessment: “In April of 1995, Mr. Harris states that he received a phone call from his wife saying that she wanted to come to Winnipeg. She then asked him for money for an airline ticket home. He said he became angry at this and told her to obtain her money from her parents. Ms. Harris states that her parents could not raise the money at that time and so she was forced to remain in Guatemala.”
On page 20 of the assessment, Mr. S.W. states the following:
“Ms. Harris presented as honest and forthright.”
Why would Mr. S.W. believe Ms. Harris’ version? She herself admitted that her family was financially stable. On page 6 of the assessment, Mr. S.W. writes, and I added, in the complaint:
Page 6: “She [Ms. Harris] states that her parents earned enough money to provide for financial stability and a relatively good lifestyle.”
Not true historically, but true at a later date, certainly in 1988 when Mr. Harris went to Guatemala to meet them and also at the time of Ms. Harris going to Guatemala in 1995.”
When Ms. Harris’ mother came to Canada in 1997 (this fact was conveniently suppressed by Mr. S.W.–Mr. Harris mentioned that Ms. Harris’ mother came to Canada in 1997–another “silence” on Mr. S.W.’s part that can probably be explained by Mr. S.W.’s political bias), Ms. Harris’ mother stated that there was no economic problem.
There was plenty of evidence to contradict Ms. Harris’ version. The issue was twofold Firstly, did Ms. Harris’ parents likely have sufficient funds to pay for an airline ticket? Secondly, if they did not, would it have been reasonable for her to request that I pay for an airline ticket given our economic situation?
I already have provided some evidence that Ms. Harris’ parents evidently had sufficient funds to pay for an airline ticket. I provided further proof of their economic situation in the complaint. From pages 48-49, where I indicate:
Ms,. Harris and Mr. Harris had agreed beforehand that Ms. Harris’ parents would pay for the flight back. Why did Mr. S.W. not query the obvious contradiction between the claim that Ms. Harris’ family in Guatemala were financially secure and the supposed incapacity of her family to raise sufficient funds to send her and Francesca back to Canada? (Ms. Harris’ father and mother had visited Canada in 1993. Ms. Harris’ parents had gone on a trip to Europe a few years before that. In 1994, Ms. Harris’ mother came to Canada. in 1994. Again, in 1997 she came to Canada. Sometime in late 1997, her sister and brother-in-law–who live beside Mr. Harris’ parents–sent two of their children to Canada for a visit. The same parents sent two of their children this year–they stayed with Ms. Harris in October and November. A family in dire circumstances indeed.
I further indicate, on page 49:
Ms. Harris left Canada for Guatemala via a car. If she did not have the money, why did she not return by car? But Ms. Harris’ behaviour is never “bizarre,” only Mr. Harris’ behaviour.
As I indicated on page 46 of the complaint:
Ms. Harris–by “coincidence”–had the opportunity to go to Guatemala by car.
Mr. S.W.’s remark on pages 11-12 of the assessment and my commentary in the complaint (on page 46):
“About the same time Ms. Harris was offered a free ride to Guatemala by a church pastor whom [sic] was travelling there by car.”
It is interesting to note that Mr. S.W. neglected to mention–Mr. Harris did mention it to Mr. S.W.–that the church pastor was a Guatemalan and a cousin to Ms. Harris (Justo Orellana). An irrelevant fact, it would seem, according to Mr. S.W. since he neglected to mention it (just as he neglected to mention that Ms. Harris’ mother came to Canada in 1997). Why the omission?
Mr. S.W. characterization of Ms. Harris as honest and forthright, on the one hand, and the evidence that her family would have had sufficient money to pay for a return flight contradict each other. What explains such a contradiction? Could it because Mr. S.W. is a political bigot? That Mr. Harris self-identified as a Marxist and therefore must be the opposite of “honest and forthright?” Or that my wife at the time, since she was not a Marxist, must be “honest and forthright.”
The second issue has to do with my own economic situation at the time–something which Mr. S.W. never even considered. Why would he not consider my economic situation at the time when considering what was reasonable? Perhaps because he is a political bigot?
On page 48 of the complaint to the Manitoba Registered Institute of Social Workers (MIRSW), I wrote the following:
It is interesting to note that Mr. S.W. did not even inquire into Mr. Harris’ economic status at the time, in April 1995. Mr. Harris was a student at the Faculty of Education of College universitaire de Saint-Boniface. He had received a student loan.The student loan was from September 1994 until–April 1995. Ms. Harris knew that Mr. Harris did not have the money. Why did Mr. S.W. not (1) not query the reasonableness of Ms. Harris asking Mr. Harris for money when Mr. Harris did not have the money; (2) query the obvious contradiction between the claim that Ms. Harris’ family in Guatemala was financially secure and the supposed incapacity of her family to raise sufficient funds to send her and Francesca back to Canada?
I further wrote, on page 49:
Mr. Harris told Mr. S,W. that when Ms. Harris’ mother was in Canada in 1994, after he had an argument with her concerning who was to be the parent of Francesca, her or him, he overheard her suggest that her daughter go to Guatemala–implying in Mr. Harris’ mind that perhaps she wanted her daughter to return permanently to Guatemala
This double neglect on the part of Mr. S.W–of accurately determining the probability of Ms. Harris’ family being able to provide airfare in April and whether it would be reasonable to request that Mr. Harris provide the funds necessary to purchase airline tickets for Ms. Harris and Francesca–can probably be attributed to his political bigotry.
Needless to say, the kidnapping of Francesca caused me great emotional distress.
The issue of the kidnapping of Francesca becomes more complicated because Ms. Harris did indicate, by telephone, that she would return to Canada on May 13, 1995. She gave me both the flight number and the time, and I showed up at the Winnipeg airport, expecting to see Francesca.
From page 45 of the complaint against Mr. S.W. to the Manitoba Institute of Registered Social Workers (MIRSW):
In early May, 1995, Ms. Harris gave Mr. Harris a flight number and the time. She had already booked her flight. She then told Mr. Harris on the phone, on May 13, that she had cancelled it because she promised her parents that she was going to have Francesca’s birthday in Guatemala (document 20, photo of Francesca on her first birthday. Mr. Harris wants the photo returned.)
Here is Mr. S.W.’s comment:
This writer [Mr. S.W.] asked Mr. Harris why he had not simply got on the phone to find out what had happened. He argued that there was no point in discussing anything with his wife.
My comment in the complaint to the Manitoba Institute of Registered Social Workers:
There seem to be three possibilities here. Either Mr. Harris did not explain himself well enough, or Mr. S.W. did not understand what Mr. Harris had said, or Mr. S.W. distorted what Mr. Harris had said.
Mr. Harris did call his wife on May 13. Mr. Harris begged Ms. Harris to return to Canada. Ms. Harris categorically stated that she was going to have Mr. Harris’ daughter’s birthday in Guatemala, and she refused to return. Mr. Harris threatened to divorce her. She replied that Mr. Harris was always threatening to do that. Mr. Harris replied: “Alla Ud. y alla su familia.” The equivalent is, more or less: “You and your family know what you can do.” Mr. Harris never expected to see his daughter again. As for any point discussing the issue, obviously there was no point in discussing it. Ms. Harris “categorically” refused to return.
Mr. S.W. did not care about the truth. He had evidently already condemned Mr. Harris and judged his claim that Ms. Harris kidnapped Francesca to be an indication of Mr. Harris’ “insecurity” and used his Marxism as an excuse to cover up his own insecurities.
Ms. Harris refused to indicate when or if she would return. When I called again, her father answered, and stated: “Ni siquiera puedes mantener a tu propia hija.” (“You cannot even maintain your own daughter.”) Practically, I guess it is justifiable to kidnap a child if the other parent lacks the funds necessary to “maintain” the child.
As pointed out previously, Mr. S.W.’s characterized me in the following terms (from page 21 of the court-ordered assessment written by Mr. S.W.):
Mr. Harris presented as an emotionally insecure individual who attempted to cover his insecurities through confrontation and intellectualization of his problems.
Mr. S.W. further characterized me in the following terms:
“As noted earlier, Mr. Harris tends to intellectualize and rationalize his own personal problems (within a rigid framework of Marxist ideology), and tends to see them as the inevitable result of living in a so-called bourgeois milieu.”
Ms. Harris did finally return to Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada–on July 31, 1995–three and half months after the agreed-upon date of her return. When I tried to hug Francesca, she began to cry; she did not recognize me.
What lessons can be learned from the above?
Do not expect anti-Marxists to accurately determine the truth.
Expect sloppy inquiry (which is really sloppy thinking since thinking requires inquiry) when it comes to the Marxist’s version of the situation.
Do not expect any sympathy for Marxists–regardless of what the Marxists have experienced.
Expect character assassination and ridicule.
When it comes to the physical abuse of a child, expect anti-Marxists to discount the Marxist’s version and to accuse the Marxist of lying.
The Abolitionary 