anigo | I am Canadian (Reply)

An angry teenage boy walks into a school and starts shooting. In my eyes you can do one of two things. You can spend 100 Simoleons and put metal detectors in every school. You can have armed guards at every door. I can guarantee you that nobody's going to get shot at that school any more. It doesn't, however, guarantee that nobody's going to get shot at the mall. So you spend 100 Simoleons to have metal detectors and armed guards there too. Then another 100 Simoleons at the theatres. Then all the churches. The market for guns and body armour goes sky high.

Or

You can spend 1000 Simoleons and invest in the community. More recreation centres. More public health care taking care of mental health issues. More time. More investment. Less body armour.

This is simplification of course.

There have been a couple events in my fair country recently that have people wondering. As recently as today in my own city there was a gunman at large. Yesterday I was in Toronto while not 400 km thataway a man was being shot as he stood as an honour guard in our nation's capital. I'm proud of my country the way we're reacting. Because in the minutes and hours afterwards there was a real opportunity to put the proverbial metal detectors and body armour in every church, park and mall across the country. But we took a collective deep breath and let calmer heads prevail as we began a grieving process for a man who, as far as I can tell, was one big walking smile.

"... but let there be no misunderstanding. We will not be intimidated. Canada will never be intimidated" - Stephen Harper, October 22, 2014

I have no patience whatsoever for our Prime Minister, but those words right there earned my respect. There's a difference, however, between not being intimidated and being a bully. Not being intimidated means we will continue to walk freely, feeling comfortable without armed guards in the streets. We will continue to be a peace loving country. We will continue to support and nourish patience and tolerance, and it will continue to thrive here. We won't wear the body armour. We won't hide in the bathroom stalls.

And that's why I love this country.

There's been a lot of discussion in the news about "Lone Wolf Terrorism". There's controversy because it's difficult to arrest terrorists before the act because "We cannot arrest someone for thinking radical thoughts; it’s not a crime in Canada." I've been thinking a lot about that the past couple of hours. Should we arrest somebody for thinking bad thoughts? What constitutes a bad thought?

To be clear, thinking about killing randomly because you hate stuff is a bad thought.

But think about it for a second.

It wasn't very long ago that thinking about marrying outside of your race was a bad thought. It wasn't that long ago that even considering voting if you were a woman was a bad thought.
Even today, thinking about ending somebody's life early if they're suffering and ready to die is a bad thought.

I'm not suggesting that the thoughts that these radical individuals are having are good thoughts. But they could be. (Ok, they're not. But hang with me for a second...) Once upon a time a couple of people said, hey. I think it might actually be a bad idea to sell somebody into slavery. This, at the time, was an extremely novel idea. And most people disagreed. Then conversation ensued. And maybe a few fist fights. And more conversation. And some radical actions. And voila, slavery became illegal. (Again with the oversimplification. Humour me.)

Maybe what these radical groups are missing is a good PR firm. Because quite frankly, the world as a whole tends to be a bunch of sheep. Play your cards right, market yourself accordingly and the majority will go for anything. (look at the Spice Girls or One Direction!) But seriously. What these radical groups are missing is the concept that a good argument and some common sense is MUCH MORE POWERFUL than a stupid gunman blowing a couple of people to smithereens.

You want to convince me that your radical theory is the best way to go? Convince me! Don't try to scare the hell out of me. It may be effective in the short term, but long term you can't win.

And that's all I got to say about that.