At some point during this absence, I hit a milestone. So a big thank you to each and every one of you for taking a moment to read this blog as I've hit the 10,000 views mark. Never would have thought in a million years that you'd find my writings that enjoyable. Or maybe you read it just to get angry. Either way, glad you're along for the ride.
Anyways, a lot has happened recently in our world so I thought I'd take a couple minutes just to address them.
#1. Fort McMurray vs. Environmentalists
This became a thing during the wildfires. Environmental groups, including Occupy Toronto, decided to take glee in the fact that the city at the centre of Alberta's oilsands was burning. While lives were being changed, ruined and risked, some were celebrating. Some of those accounts were conveniently deleted, others just deleted the posts, while the remainder stood behind their comments. Here's the trouble: the debate over getting to cleaner energy should happen. Maybe I'm alone on this in our fine province, but we should make movement towards improving our carbon footprint. We should always be striving to be better to the world so that we leave it in a better place for generations to come. But why try to force that conversation down the public's throat in the middle of a disaster? As I've said to some of those who felt the need to post those kinds of comments (and on-air), these kinds of comments actually do more harm than good to the cause. Even beyond the comments, those who think that the taps need to be turned completely off right now should think about that for a second. Think about the number of products that are created with petroleum-based products. Until we have found a way to be sustainable and mass produce these products in another way, is it realistic to think we can just say "no more oilsands immediately"? Again, it's a goal we should be aiming towards, especially if there's a cleaner way of doing things. But we also need to start being realistic about all aspects of this debate, including environment, economy and sustainability. These are not mutually-exclusive terms.
#2. Elbow-Gate
First off, can we stop naming everything _______-Gate? There is no doubt that this is a story that needs to be told. We all know the details. The Prime Minister was in the wrong on this. The House of Commons is supposed to be a place for all Canadians and should be a place of higher standing. MP's were actually debating serious legislation. Yet no one knows what that legislation was about because it's been overshadowed by what transpired. Can it be worse? Absolutely (we've seen it in other countries). But that doesn't make what happened okay. That all being said, the Prime Minister apologized and from what I've been able to gather, the MP has accepted that apology. So can we move on? What more should happen? I'm not asking to be flippant. I'm asking because we have a lot of serious issues that are supposed to be debated in the House, such as help for Fort McMurray and the struggling economy (just to name two). Yet the story that's garnered the most headlines is this. I'm not trying to minimize what happened. But I am trying to put it into perspective. Hopefully journalists on Parliament Hill see that and get back to reporting on the issues facing this country before too long.
#3. Memes For Days
I went on a bit of a Facebook rant a while back about how political supporters seem to really be ramping up their rhetoric. It had to do with all the rumours being spread surrounding the Fort McMurray wildfire. Before I continue, I'd like to clarify that I'm a political free agent. If you don't like a certain politician, that's totally up to you. I'd rather have a good politician in an opposition role than a bad politician with the party in power. But as I said in that post: "We all need to take a deep breath here and put some serious thought into what's going on in the world around us, instead of letting the basis of your thoughts be formed from a meme. And just because a meme or a "viral post" fits your already-formed opinion on a situation, that doesn't make it true." We don't seem to put critical thought into anything. We're easily distracted by those who speak loudly, rather than taking those who speak seriously and thoughtfully seriously. We think in 140 characters or less. And this isn't just politics. Look at how often we see stories about police brutality that turn out to be unfounded, despite the fact there's a "viral video" showing how bad it was. The thing is: that video almost always captures the aftermath and never captures what led up to the altercation. But you know. Whatever gets your point across quickly. I guess.
Obviously, I'm looking forward to the day when we return to a world of civility and critical thinking. Because we're not getting anywhere with grandstanding, temper-tantrums and cute memes.
See you next time!
