Hugh Mackenzie
Huntsville Doppler
In many ways, the last four months have been traumatizing. Our lives have been disrupted and many aspects of it will never be the same. The COVID-19 pandemic, of course, is a large part of it. However, it has also acted as a catalyst that has unleashed pent-up anger and frustration that is demanding change in many areas of society.
That in itself, properly managed, is a good thing not a bad thing. It is always helpful to look at where we have been, where we are now, and where we should be going. It is equally important, however, to avoid knee-jerk reactions: adopting a ‘my way or the highway’ culture and labelling or shaming people just because they have a differing point of view.
In that context, I have been thinking about some of the ‘trends’ I have been seeing in recent weeks and months. Some of them I like and some I don’t. Here are a few of my observations.
The first is this whole notion of defunding the police. I am against it. I know there are bad cops just as I know the vast majority of them are there to serve and protect and are prepared to risk their lives in doing so. Law and order, properly executed, is a fundamental requirement in a democratic society.
I do think that policing needs to be modernized and reformed and frankly that may take more money rather than less. Some of these reforms should include extensive psychological testing of all potential recruits for police services, as well as a substantive increase in recruits from so-called minority areas of our society. College and other educational venues that offer police qualification and preparation certification should be required to mandate courses in dealing with people with mental health issues and courses in understanding and dealing with diversity in the community.
There should be zero tolerance for bad police. Disciplinary hearings and their results should be public. There should be some non-police involvement and oversight in disciplinary matters. Bad cops should be weeded out and the ability of police unions to protect them should be severely limited. Finally, mental health consultants should have an important role to play in police forces. These initiatives would go a long way toward reforming much-needed police services. But to defund them is simply the wrong approach.
Another matter that has caught my attention recently is the difference between demonstrations and rioting. I fully support peaceful demonstrations. I have seen them work.
Remember the peaceful demonstrations in Huntsville and Bracebridge, Save Our (Hospital) Services? They made a difference. I also appreciate the respectful manner in which Huntsville people have been demonstrating about some of the more recent issues such as Black Lives Matter.
What I do not appreciate, what I do not support, is violence, breaking windows, setting cars on fire, destroying or defacing public property, looting, and harming individuals. We are seeing too much of that lately. That is not demonstrating. That is rioting and that is wrong. Some will say it is necessary to effect change. I say there is never any justification for violence and rioting. It does not effect positive change. Rather, it inhibits it. We should encourage peaceful demonstrations. We should not tolerate rioting.
And that brings me to this new trend of cancel culture. I have trouble with it. It comes from both sides of the political spectrum.
Erin O’Toole is a candidate for the leadership of the federal Conservative Party. I will likely vote for him. But I disagree with his plan to completely defund the CBC. I do see an argument that CBC television news, which has become too partisan, should be made to compete with all other news sources by being funded through advertising and not subsidized with taxpayer dollars. However, there is a huge cultural aspect to many of the other services offered by the CBC, especially CBC Radio. These should be preserved. To do otherwise, in my view, is to promote cancel culture.
Leslyn Lewis is not yet a household name, but I predict that in time she will be. She is a scholar, a lawyer, a proud member of the black community and she, too, is a candidate for the leadership of the Conservative Party of Canada. Here is what she has to say:
“Cancel culture is ruining our understanding of the past and until someone is willing to stand up to it, we will see our history washed away in a tidal wave of ‘progressive’ revisionism… As long as humans have tried to achieve great things, humans have also been failing. The best way to build a stronger and more united society is to build upon those who have gone before us while learning from their failures. Washing away their mistakes simply means we will forget our history and will be doomed to repeat it.”
In my view, history and current events should record both the good and the bad. We cannot and should not hide from either. I am not aware of any politician or public figure with whom we cannot find something wrong. As well, I cannot think of any journalist whose language or opinion I have at some time or another not found offensive or contrary to my beliefs. And I have no problem, when they step over a reasonable line, in calling them out.
But let’s not go overboard. In recent weeks cancel culture has deposed a number of journalists and commentators, none of them perfect but whose overall contributions to Canadian media have been generally well regarded.
I have also heard of calls to get rid of statues of Samuel de Champlain, Sir John A. MacDonald, Sir Winston Churchill, and even Pierre Elliott Trudeau, all people with meaningful flaws and errors in judgement and yet all of whom also changed the course of history in a significant and positive way. (For my Tory friends, Trudeau the Elder repatriated our Constitution!) As well, there are cries to rename a street now honouring John Wayne because, as a famous actor, he portrayed a cowboy at a time when they were often on opposite side with First Nations people. I even noticed a movement to banish the long-lived TV series Law and Order because it promoted police. Enough already!
Clearly, we are in a time of change. Let’s do this the Canadian way and make sure the change is balanced and fair to all.
We do not want the cure to be worse than the disease.
Hugh Mackenzie
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Hi Ray.
The image that accompanies this post is in reference to the content, specifically cancel culture.
Your previous comment was not published because it violated our community guidelines, which you can review here: https://doppleronline.ca/huntsville/doppler-community-guidelines/
Why dose it say CANCELED on this . And why was my comment not posted Is it because Doppler disagrees with what some of us say . Makes me wonder just how many more post’s just don’t show up on here.
Mr. Jim Smith, my views are closely aligned with yours. I will not consider voting Conservative until the party includes more women and more science, then I will view their policies.
If I understand correctly, Denmark has worked with coalition governments for many years, so it is possible. By contrast, we need only look south for the challenge of a 2-party system to governance, which appear to behave as tribal antecedents to civil war.
Hugh, I think you have highlighted many of the important issues of the day and prompted some civil discussion. We can all be reminded that the words we choose to express our views can be heard in ways we did not intend; keep the communication open in civil discourse can help us to check on how we are understood. That sensitivity can help us to understand others.
No profession is without bad apples; my hope is in the statutory governing bodies which over see our professionals and public service. However, there was great failure from the overseeing bodies in the nurse Wetlauffer horrific murders of seniors in Ontario. This must keep us vigilant. Many of the oversight regulations were put in place for reasons. For example, can you imagine de-regulating seat belts in vehicles, yet remember the uproar?
The irony is that when de-regulation is used to save money, there is no replacement. The assumption that people will behave ethically, reasonably, legally in the wake of deregulation is limited at best, false at its core — until the next event.
As for monuments, put them in a museum, complete with a history lesson of the context, rather than outside as larger than life idols to worship. By the way, revisionist history is not new; however, we can use the past to bring the present to mind and hope to the future – if we use it as such.
Thanks for opinions shared, I have learned something new.
Yes, there are some bad cops, they are but a very small percentage of the overall group, however there are also some very bad teachers, doctors, lawyers, business people and politicians to name but a few, it’s very hard to weed these individuals out due to the support they receive from their unions or professional associations. There are very bad protesters as well, most are protesting a a cause they believe in but then there are those who join in to destroy and loot an area, again a few, but they get the attention.
On another subject, those who like to dis the conservatives should recall that many of the cutbacks were forced on us by the excessive spending of liberal governments. Stephen Harper left the country in pretty good shape following the past recession, how will it look after J.T. gets finished? A senator mentioned that Bill Moreau is the weakest finance minister in history because all of the financial decisions are made in the prime ministers office, before being elected PM Justin Trudeau was a drama teacher, not an economist.
It doesn’t matter which of the four federal Conservative candidates you vote for , as none of them represent the majority of Canadians today. Even though Peter MacKay is moving ahead, his Conservative party is stuck in the past. Support for the Conservative party across Canada will remains at 30 % as its base is largely old , white , and rural . Majority of urban , suburban , and non white Canadians do not support the right wing Conservative values . The days of the Conservative party being a big umbrella for all Canadians is gone. What basically remains is the old Reform party.
Markham , Ontario
Canadians are becoming more aware of systemic racism. I see it in the title of this article, ie it’s not so bad that we actually want to do something.
Since you brought it up, I don’t think Conservatives can fix the problem. They don’t see it, or at least don’t think it is actually worth fixing.
It is not about weeding out bad apples, it is about changing the system.
Conservatives have no problems defunding health care. They were defunding public health instead of preparing for a pandemic. They spent the winter trying to defund education. They defunded the governance of long term care and our seniors are suffering their final years. They campaigned on a platform of defunding health and education in a province that spent the least per capita on those things in Canada.
But defund police, oh no, that just won’t do. Unfortunately, that philosophy is the problem.
Hugh, you and I have had our principled disagreements in the past; but this week we’re entirely onside, save a few minor qualifiers.
Your astute comments regarding police defunding and rioting need no embroidering. Your very particular defence of CBC radio (the only station I listen to) was appreciated.
Personally, I’m against the removal of any and all statues: At the time of their erection, it was a thoughtful and meaningful process. History, however, can be unkind. In the case of Sir John A., I cannot forgive his implementation, and continued support, of the residential school system. I feel that either a plaque on the statue (or nearby) should commemorate this fact; and its role in eventually leading to the Truth and Reconciliation Commission. Concerning Mr. Trudeau, a mention of his Charter of Rights and Freedoms forming a vital portion of that repatriated Constitution, would have given the man his due.
As a footnote, I would add that he was vehemently opposed to the “Notwithstanding Clause”, which we have seen abused recently by our Premier.
Hugh, I agree with most of your comments and would like to reinforce a couple of them. As you point out, everything can be improved including the CBC. But the CBC is one of the anchors that keeps us well informed and thereby keeps some sanity in our country. Without the CBC (and PBS in the USA) everything would become like FOX News and CNN; both owned by billionaires that control the agenda of THEIR megaphone. No thanks!! It is disappointing that Erin O’Toole has chosen to hang his hat on that bad idea.
Certainly as you say, while a very high percentage of police officers do a fine job, there will always be a few that need a tune-up, just like there are always a few supervisors in any large public or private organization that need a tune-up. But simply defunding police without first investing up front in corrective measures would be like jumping out of an airplane without first putting on your parachute. Can you imagine the chaos?
One of the root causes of violence involving police is that there are simply way too many guns coming across the southern border and onto our streets. When police are called to a scene, they have no idea what they are about to face, and too often they are afraid for their own safety. Who among us would not overreact in that situation? Minister Blair, the architect of Canada’s new regulations restricting the sale and possession of military-grade weapons knows that only too well from 30 years of police work at all levels. It is disappointing that Peter Mackay has chosen to attack those regulations without offering any sensible alternative.
I hope you vote for Leslyn Lewis.
I’m old enough to remember the CBC News from the 60’s
It was uninterrupted by any commercials.
The news was read from paper of course and if they had a clip of video or pictures that would help show the situation, they showed them and explained what one was looking at in relation to the news.
It was all over in less than an hour and then we went on to the weather, saving the sports for last.
These days it is hard to find any news period on TV where the broadcast is not interrupted for commercials every few minutes. This distracts and drags out the time it takes to “watch the news” into at least an hour, time a lot of people do not have to spend. The ultimate foolishness is to interrupt the news with a commercial for that very news show! This is a regular occurrence.
If you go to the Frantic States of America you get mostly the most vivid video clips that last maybe 3 to 5 seconds, the ones with the blood and gore. You always get a notice that takes nearly as long as the clip that says squeamish people might not want to watch this….. for what that is worth as almost 100% of the audience is tuned in precisely to see the video of the accident.
At the end of the day, “news” has been done a great disservice by all this. It is lacking in scope and the video clips are so short as to be essentially useless and the distraction of all the ads plus the general political bias introduced by each network renders the whole process next to useless.
Generally after this fiasco we get a set of longer interviews, in the States they are generally with some person who may, perhaps, possibly have witnessed or gained access to some video of what happened. They may have zero expertise to share but they provide “content and an attempt to capture the local feeling” about the story. Not always successfully.
In Canada we like the anchor to gain a usually poor quality video of a couple of “experts” and ask them questions on a split screen. Often the questions are such that they lead to the conclusion favored by that network. At least CBC seems to use some reputable experts and they tend to load the screen with varying viewpoints much more so than in the USA where sometimes the desired viewpoint is so obvious as to be almost embarrassing.
So people curate their news with their cell phones. They go after and get the news that “they want to hear” and leave out all the rest. Again a dangerous situation for any attempt at the truth.
For a lot of these reasons, the ancient CBC should be handled with caution. It’s funding allows it to be more impartial than advertiser funded shows. It has a (probably expensive) mandate to try to cover the whole country and add a bit of cohesion, which I think it does.
Better to keep the CBC, keep funding it publicly and take a long hard look at the quality it puts out than to just toss it out and replace it with the junk they are stuck with south of our border.
Thank you for your response Hugh. I in no way follow your differentiation. I applaud your vision for equality of people and agree that all people should be equal. I believe that while there are many shared experiences that all Canadians have your choice of languages does not adequately address the fact that while we can and in many ways do share equality under the law, equality of opportunity does not exist. I do not believe that a quota or rigid system that values one’s inclusion in a group over a person’s ability to do a job is the solution and I also believe that our work forces especially when it comes to policing should reflect the community it serves in all ways that that community is diverse. Therefore in my opinion your choice of language is dismissive of the fact many groups face different hurdles in our society and to hide behind equality as the reason is in poor taste. Simply because we believe something should be one way does not mean that it is. I do not follow why a term derived from mathematics adds a negative connotation in your mind and I respect that that is your opinion. Your choice of language struck me as dismissive to an alternate point of view and dismissive of the discussion that is ongoing in terms how police can best serve our community. With respect.
Thanks Andrew: I am not particularly comfortable referring to people as minorities but that seems to be the common language, My personal opinion is that we are all equal and just because a person is different than I am, that does not make them a minority. To me, minority has a negative connotation.
Hugh, as usual, a fair and balanced op-ed piece. While I might not agree with your choice of party, the fact that you can discuss the differences in a rational manner is important. Revisionism is not the way to address history. Don’t glorify past mistakes, but don’t sweep them under the rug or whitewash them either.
Those who ignore history are doomed to repeat it. – G. Santayana
Hugh
Can you please clarify what a “so-called minority” is, please?
Thanks
Omg, you had me until you went down the Conservative rabbit hole of who you would vote for. Problem is Conservatives do not have a leader with vision, they can or will not win an election with the garbage that they spew. We need solutions that are current and post pandemic viable in health care, education and business. Neither Erin O’Toole or Peter McKay have the goods. Gone are the days where the boys club of old dictate the outcome! Give it up! No one is listening! !