It seems like it must be possible to actually chart the degree to which he is famous for music vs. the degree to which he is famous for being a little dickweed. Obviously the crossover point was reached long ago, but how long until nobody remembers that he ever was famous for music?
Probably depends on how old he is when he ODs.
I hope it's not when he's 27. Only the very greatest talents are allowed to OD at 27.
Crack-smoking deathmatch with Rob Ford at age 25.
4: it almost happened once already.
Maybe they need to bring back Hollywood Squares. Back when I was growing up, that seemed to be the final destination for the famous-for- being-famous set. Hollywood Squares would probably be even better with profanity and fistfights.
6: and in addition to all the local talent filming in Toronto would save them money.
I think he had one hit song in 2010. So, he's as worthy of being famous as the Pussycat Dolls or Cali Swag District.
Bieber somehow makes Ford seem sympathetic. Also further evidence that when Canadians go off the rails, they really go off the rails. There doesn't seem to be any intermediate between perfect upstanding citizen and bus passenger decapitator or Toronoto mayor.
9: There were some Canadian army scandals, the exact nature of which I've forgotten, that made me think the same thing -- that once a Canadian strayed off the beaten path at all, they were liable to do anything you could think of.
-o. One of them, anyway.
10 would be a great premise for an action movie (or: no worse a premise than we usually see). A team of fallen Canucks (but don't call them that) as a rogue mercenary squadron.
Basil Liddell-Hart thought Canadians were prone to committing atrocities.
Speaking of atrocities and teams of fallen Canucks
Toronoto 2: The Second One was a bit of a let down after all the hype.
My Neighbor Toronto, the long-awaited Miyazaki / Guy Maddin collaboration?
A temporary lapse of attention, lasting exactly 15 pixels, caused me to read 10 as:
There were some Canadian army sandals, the exact nature of which I've forgotten, that made me think the same thing -- that once a Canadian strayed off the beaten path at all, they were liable to do anything you could think of.
Clearly these were very robust sandals, wearing which a rogue Canadian soldier was virtually unstoppable.
This thread has suggested a way out, a consolation for the feeling I get reading the other thread, that I may be the most earnest and petit bourgeois person who has ever lived: I'm just building up steam for the mother of all atrocities.
I dunno, before Rob Ford my sense was that most Canadian scandals were incredibly small-bore and dismal. When I was a kid there was an advisor in the Peterson govt (of Ontario) who had to resign for getting a discount on some housepainting.
Though there was also the Trudeau era cabinet minister who broke various laws to procure an abortion for another cabinet minister's wife.
There was that one time Trudeau flipped off a bunch of prairiefolk.
The big Canadians go nuts stories are Robert Pickton (the pig farmer serial killer) and Russell Williams (the military officer serial killer). I don't know much about the Pickton case, but I remember reading about Williams, and that was one weird dude.
Pamela Anderson seems rather ordinary at this point.
I dunno, before Rob Ford my sense was that most Canadian scandals were incredibly small-bore and dismal.
Well, they did have the Quebecois separatist terrorists to liven things up. Although I suppose terrorism doesn't quite fit under the heading of "scandal". Or maybe the Quebecois don't count as real Canadians.
16: Given the climate, a Canadian who chooses to wear sandals is clearly a terrifying individual.
25: I was just reading about that. Seems to have been pretty serious.
Scandals are small bore, but they seem to have quite a few serial killers; perhaps more per capita than in the US. (It's almost certainly true that the percentage of murder victims in Canada who are victims of serial killers is higher than in the US.) Also that sexist murderer who killed many female college students in the 80's.
The army scandal you are probably thinking of is this one: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Somalia_Affair
Soldiers from the Canadian Airborne Regiment tortured a Somali prisoner to death in 1993. Bizarrely to modern eyes, this led to a massive scandal, several soldiers were convicted, and the regiment was disbanded in disgrace.
28: Bizarrely to modern eyes, this led to a massive scandal, several soldiers were convicted, and the regiment was disbanded in disgrace.
Ugh...it's incredibly depressing to think how unlikely such a response would be today. Although I suppose in the US maybe it was always unlikely.
My Neighbor Toronto, the long-awaited Miyazaki / Guy Maddin collaboration?
please please please
There doesn't seem to be any intermediate between perfect upstanding citizen and bus passenger decapitator or Toronto mayor.
Would the young Joni Mitchell or Neil Young count?
Canadians are uniquely susceptible to antinomianism.
Wow, ok, now I know about this. The main thing I can't get past is JB's terrible hair choices. I can almost say I don't know how a single song of his goes except having said that to someone a few years ago I got on youtube and listened to the first thing I could find ("Speaking in Tongues: A Rap Song" or words to that effect) and it was so terrible that I listened a few more times and kind of remember it.
To wit: he keeps congratulating himself on how well he is rapping.
34: I had never heard that because when Nia went through her JB phase we limited it to posters and the streaming Netflix documentary, no cds, but wow, awful. And really Justin Bieber does not get to call people "yellowbones."
I harbo(u)r the bitter expectation any notorious second-rater will turn out to be Canadian.
29 - Allow me to introduce you to "The Battle Hymn of Lt. Calley", #37 on the Billboard Hot Singles of 1971.
Curiously, nobody got rich off "The Battle Hymn of Warrant Officer Thompson".
We took the jungle village coastal enclave exactly like they said
We responded to their rifle fire rockets with everything we had
And when the smoke had cleared away a hundred souls lay dead
Sir, the soldier that's alive is the only once can fight
There's no other way to wage a war when the only one in sight
That you're sure is not a VC Hamas is your buddy on your right
OCCASIONAL MISTAKES ARE MADE. LUCKILY YOU ALWAYS SEEM TO WELCOME OUR REJECTS.
I've read that Canada has had a number of ridiculously terrible mayors other than Ford. I don't remember any details.
My dad would have cited Charlotte Whitten as an example. Couldn't believe her being treated as a feminist icon. Wonder what Jane thinks?
This year [2012] was a bad one for mayors in Canada.
Toronto Mayor Rob Ford was ordered out of office for conflict of interest over an improperly solicited donation to his football charity. He's still mayor pending his appeal of the decision, but is also facing a $6-million libel case.
Three mayors in Quebec - Montreal Mayor Gerald Tremblay, Laval Mayor Gilles Vaillancourt and Mascouche Mayor Richard Marcotte - resigned after they were implicated in the Quebec corruption scandal that allegedly saw construction contracts awarded to companies that offered kickback.
London Mayor Joe Fontana was charged with breach of trust, fraud and uttering forged documents after cheques to pay for his son's 2005 wedding appeared to come from federal funds, and Winnipeg Mayor Sam Katz faces a court case over a party he held for city staff at a restaurant he owns.
OK, that was a little dry, so:
'[I]n Ottawa this week, incumbent Mayor Larry O'Brien apologized for his first two years in office--a "complete disaster," the mayor bluntly admitted. "I probably made every single major political mistake that was possible--I even made quite a few mistakes that, quite frankly, were impossible to replicate," ... O'Brien couldn't say whether he was Ottawa's worst-ever mayor because, as he explained, he doesn't know all of them. ... What was remarkable was that this was not an exit speech, but a campaign speech.'
'"Hurricane" Hazel McCallion, who last month announced her intention to seek a 12th term as mayor on Oct. 25, while calling for "change," has stared down her own share of controversy this year, with allegations of conflict of interest stemming from a development deal involving her son Peter. McCallion, who turns 90 next year and once complained her local ER was "loaded with people in their native costumes," has again refused to run a campaign.'
The Montreal mayor Tremblay's interim successor lasted six months before he was indicted on 14 charges.
All these mayors seem to get indicted on a remarkable number of charges, including something called gangsterism.
My dad would have cited Charlotte Whitten as an example. Couldn't believe her being treated as a feminist icon. Wonder what Jane thinks?
Jane's dad was also no fan of Charlotte Whitton.
I think she was what earlier generations called "a strong-minded woman," who lived long enough, who stayed long enough on the scene, to earn the unmerited title of distinguished. Her anti-Semitism is well-documented, and quite ugly.
Also: Charlotte Whitton sort of reminds me of the headmistress of a girls' school in an Enid Blyton novel.
but I remember reading about Williams, and that was one weird dude.
Seriously, scarily weird. And all the more terrifying for seeming so "well-adjusted" and "normal" for the first 45 years of his life or so. And from the "Canada really is the world's largest small country" files: my mother had a friend whose daughter worked on the same military airbase as Williams.
I have not watched the entire clip, but the way that OPP (Ontario Provincial Police) detective Jim Smyth got a full confession out of Russell Williams in an interview at the Elgin St. police station in Ottawa is an oddly fascinating document. No violence, no threats of violence (or none that are shown, at any rate). Williams starts to break at about 46 minutes in, and begins to confess at about 54 minutes.
And from the "Canada really is the world's largest small country" files
Here's mine: around the time of the 1st Gulf War, there was much brouhaha about the "Super Gun" outlaw Canadian weapons designer Gerald Bull was supposedly building for Saddam Hussein. Bull was assassinated by some western intelligence agency in Belgium, I believe. Anyway, I'm watching a Frontline on Bull and who should be interviewed about what kind of guy he was but the former superintendent of my Sunday School, friend of our family and the first adult I ever met who built model planes. I'd asked him on a visit to his house who the boy was and he said he was. He was a defense intellectual. Ottawa was a really small city in those days.