To Read, Perchance To Think

Shakespeare purists will perhaps forgive my titular, out-of-context paraphrasing of a famous line from Hamlet, but it occurred to me yesterday and today as I read two fine essays published in The Toronto Star.

The first, by former Globe writer Michael Valpy (strange how that 'newspaper of record' has either lost or terminated so many good writers in the past decade), appeared in yesterday's edition. Entitled Canada’s new politics of discord could carry a heavy price, it reflects on the implications of the breakdown in Canadian social cohesion both promoted and exploited by the Harper government as it works tireless to incrementally impose a right-leaning ethos on the country.

Valpy asserts that this wouldn't be happening if so many educated people had not disengaged from the political process:

If Canadian voters — that is, Canadians who actually vote — were all under age 45 and university-educated, there would be no Harper government, there would still be the long-form census, the Canadian Armed Forces would never have become mythologized as warriors, the country would not have become a side-taker with Israel in the Middle East, we probably still would have failed to keep our commitments under the Kyoto Protocol but at least we wouldn’t have withdrawn from it and we would not have advanced down the road to gutting federal environmental assessments.

While I do not necessarily agree that progressive values are the exclusive domain of the educated, his points about the consequences of disengagement are well-taken.

The second essay, found in today's paper, is by Alex Goldfarb, one of our most important and progressive voices. Entitled The mean test: Have we stopped caring about Canada’s most vulnerable?, Himelfarb's piece evaluates how successful Canada is via the following thesis:

How we measure our success as a country matters. It tells us a lot about what we value most. It shapes what we ask of our politicians and how we judge the performance of our governments. It shapes politics and policy.

Going beyond the standard economic criteria, he asks the question of how well we treat the weakest amongst us. By historical standards, Himelfarb asserts, we measure up pretty well, but he notes some very worrisome contemporary developments:

- Attawapiskat Chief Theresa Spence’s hunger strike has drawn attention again to the suffering of her community, part of a growing movement, Idle No More, which got its impetus from the omnibus budget that weakened environmental protections without consultation with aboriginal communities;

- A few doctors and other health providers have also been leading protests against recent changes to refugee regulations, changes that mean more, including children, are subject to automatic detention and the separation of families...

- As for unemployed Canadians — too many of whom are young, often indebted graduates — cuts over the last 15 years have meant fewer are eligible for EI benefits or training;

- thousands have also protested the government’s punitive crime agenda, which, while politically popular, marks a sharp departure for Canada at a time when crime rates are going down;

- internationally, apart from freezing aid, our Parliament recently said no to a bill promising cheap drugs to poor countries, choosing, as Stephen Lewis put it, patents over people.

These changes, along with others he discusses, leads Himelfarb to conclude that we have become a meaner country, a country where the focus on short-term fiscal prudence is contributing to an erosion of our traditional national character. He calls for a real discussion about what we mean by the good life, the purpose of the economy, the kind of Canada we want. The opportunity for such a discussion, unfortunately, seems remote under the current regime.

My brief blog post only highlights some of the points made in these two important essays. I hope you will find the time to read both of them in detail.

But We're A Peace-Loving Country

My, my, my, the sins that are committed in our name.

Industry Self-Regulation - Another Update

Last week I wrote two posts on the Harper regime's ideological decision not to impose mandatory reporting of drug shortages on the pharmaceutical industry. The government instead has placed its market-driven faith on a voluntary system, with results nearly as disastrous as those in Canada's food industry, which also enjoys a high degree of autonomy from government oversight. Hopefully, the debacle of XL Foods has not yet faded from public memory.

Today's Star reports yet another dire consequence of forsaking the protection of public health in favour of fealty to the private sector:

The last time Alena Rossnagel walked on her own, it was following long-awaited kidney surgery in April 2011.

A drug shortage had forced her to use a substitute antibiotic in the final two weeks leading up to her procedure. But the substitute left her legally blind, caused severe inner ear damage and forced her to rely on a walker.

“I was left with this body that couldn’t do anything,” Rossnagel said from Portage la Prairie, Man. “The new ‘normal’ has become the use of a walker, no driving, being cognitively impaired, hearing loss, visual impairment and myriad of other symptoms.”

The drug that she had been taking to treat a persistent infection was Trimethoprim, but in the weeks leading up to her surgery a shortage developed, and she was given Gentamicin, known for its toxic side effects. Probably the most disturbing aspect of this tale is that neither her doctor nor pharmacist had advised her of an impending shortage of her drug of choice. Says Rossnagel:

...if there had been a mandatory system to report drug shortages in April 2011, “I would be a normal person, I wouldn’t be living in this totally bizarre other world.”

As I wrote in my earlier posts, Health Canada had strongly advised against a voluntary, as opposed to mandatory system of drug-shortage reporting. But due to the inertia/incompetence/ideology of the Harper government, people like Rossnagel must pay the consequences.

The final ugly truth is perhaps best summed up by Health Canada spokesman Sean Upton, who said it was the responsibility of the drug maker to make the post online, but that if they don’t, there is no legislation that can punish a drug company if they don’t.

Just one more indication, I suppose, of how the Conservative Government of Canada really feels about the people it 'serves.'

The Good News: It's a New Year - the Bad News: Expect More of the Same

Best wishes to everyone in 2013. I would like to express my hope that all will enjoy a prosperous 12 months ahead, but given both domestic and international realities, I know that will not be the case for many.

This, despite the self-congratulatory tone Stephen Harper frequently strikes when talking about how Canada is doing so well vis-vis the rest of the world. Yesterday, this boast was placed in its proper context by The Globe's Lawrence Martin, who offers the following observation:

If Canada’s doing well compared with other well-functioning economies, it’s something to boast about. But if the barometer is basket cases, let’s not get out the pompoms. It’s no great measure of success.

He points out, for example, that only a half-point separates our unemployment rate (7.2%) from that of the United States (7.7%).

Martin suggests that our real economic state is hidden:

We have a manufacturing sector that’s in steady decline, leaving an economy overly dependent on staples and their price fluctuations. It’s chiefly our natural resource endowments that have helped us outperform others. Should we pat ourselves on the back for that? What country, blessed with such abundances, couldn’t have done the same?

His piece goes on to adumbrate our myriad failures both internationally and domestically, a few of which I reproduce below:

- On climate change, this great green land has taken on the reputation (Liberal governments share the blame) of a black sheep.

- In regard to first nations, the acute adversities find little alleviation.

- We left Afghanistan with our mission mostly unaccomplished. We now witness the F-35 muck-up.

- On foreign affairs, our long-time open-minded country is now steering closer to a path of unilateralism. Our self-righteousness is striking, and we’ve become a United Nations basher.

- While other jurisdictions move progressively on criminal justice, we renew our emphasis on incarceration. While other jurisdictions move to decriminalize soft drugs, we maintain a war on them.

Martin ends his piece by reminding us of how much our beloved democracy has suffered under the Harper cabal. It does not take a long memory to recall unnecessary omnibus bills, parliamentary prorogation, and the contempt shown both inside and outside of parliament for those who dare disagree with the Tory agenda.

I am well past the age where I make New Years' resolutions, but my resolve is the same as it has been since 2006, when these renegades first came to power: to do everything I can to inform as many as possible about the true nature of this government, and to encourage as many as possible to engage or reengage in the political process.

May it be a productive year.

Noam Chomsky Reflects on Contemporary Education

Despite the fact that it was fraught with a marking load I would not wish on anyone, my career as an English teacher offered many satisfactions, not the least of which was the opportunity to explore issues that are increasingly considered off-limits in the classroom: contemporary politics, the use and abuse of language for manipulative and sinister purposes, environmental degradation, etc., all within the context of the literature we were studying. However, by the time I retired six years ago, thanks to curriculum changes in Ontario, many disciplines became locked in a race to cover the material at the expense of what I would consider an essential part of learning: an open and informed discussion and the concomitant development of critical thinking skills. Structure began to supplant imagination, and I think students became the poorer for it.

I recently came across a very interesting interview on Alternet with Noam Chomsky, the famed linguist, political commentator, activist, and iconoclast. A man rarely heard these days in the mainstream media thanks to his seemingly endless capacity to challenge what passes for conventional wisdom, Chomsky reflects on his own upbringing and education, and has some very pointed observations about the current overemphasis on test results:

...the great educational innovation of Bush and Obama was 'no child left behind'. I can see the effects in schools from talking to teachers, parents and students. It's training to pass tests and the teachers are evaluated on how well the students do in the test - I've talked to teachers who've told me that a kid will be interested in something that comes up in class and want to pursue it and the teacher has to tell them - ' you can't do that because you have to pass this test next week'. That's the opposite of education.

Chomsky suggests that at its best, education is essentially subversive, in that it challenges the corporate demand for trained but passive and submissive workers. The cultivation of such an education model is regarded dimly by the elite, a fact he demonstrates by reference to a report and book produced in 1975 for the Trilateral Commission called The Crisis of Democracy. Its conclusion? ... the problems of governance "stem from an excess of democracy" and thus advocates "to restore the prestige and authority of central government institutions."

Says Chomsky:

[The] commission that put together this book was concerned with trying to induce what they called 'more moderation in democracy' - turn people back to passivity and obedience so they don't put so many constraints on state power and so on. In particular they were worried about young people. They were concerned about the institutions responsible for the indoctrination of the young (that's their phrase), meaning schools, universities, church and so on - they're not doing their job, [the young are] not being sufficiently indoctrinated. They're too free to pursue their own initiatives and concerns and you've got to control them better.

That an independent-thinking citizenry should be regarded as a threat speaks volumes about the power of a real education. I'm glad I was a part of it for 30 years, and while I ardently hope that a reasonable balance can be struck between the needs of industry and the larger needs of society, I must confess that I am not especially hopeful about education's future.

What A Man Must Be

"What a man can be, he must be." - Abraham Maslow

Whenever I taught Mary Shelley's Frankenstein, I also taught my students about Abraham Maslow's hierarchy of needs, his theory of developmental psychology which posits that the final stage of development, self-actualization (the realization of our full potential), can be achieved only after all of our other needs have been met. It is a process that Shelley's amazingly articulate and introspective creature undertakes.

Those who control our broken world, I suspect, have a vested interest in inhibiting the achievement of self-actualization. By keeping wages low, cultivating resentments that keep us sniping at each other (eg. anti-unionism), and empowering oligarchical governments that ensure daily life is a struggle for so many, corporations, in their pursuit of profits at any price, leave a debris field of social, economic and environmental problems in their wake for others to worry about.

It is easy to become discouraged and cynical in such an environment, easy to forget that there is another dimension entirely to our existences, a dimension where the primacy of the self gives way to concern for the other. This broken world abounds with such examples, and every so often we need to be reminded of that fact.

That is why I was pleased to read a story in yesterday's Star by Catherine Porter about actor Sean Penn's ongoing direct and very personal involvement in the rebuilding efforts still underway in Haiti almost three years after its devastating earthquake.

A man who 'has it all' by Hollywood standards, Penn seems to have abandoned that comfortable life to work virtually full-time to help the island nation through the Jenkins/Penn Haitian Relief Organization (J/P HRO) which he formed with funding from Californian philanthropist Diana Jenkins. Hard-headed, pragmatic, and clearly not afraid of hard physical work, Penn understands that the rebuilding process will take many years, and uses a project-based approach to ensure tangible results, including

... two community health clinics, a bakery and, Penn’s favourite, a community centre. “Any day, you can see 50 kids taking judo classes and dance classes while adults are taking computer classes. It’s community, volunteer driven. We staff two supervisors,” he says. “I’d like to see it used as a model.”

And what does Penn get out of all of this? As he explained to Catherine Porter,

“The hardship that’s here allows an individual to feel alive with a clearer lens and more honest perspective” ... “You feel your life while you are living it.”

Has Sean Penn achieved self-actualization? I don't know. But without doubt, he has found real meaning in his life. May we all be so fortunate.

Industry Self-Regulation - An Update

Yesterday I wrote a post about the plight of Ryan Harrington, the young man who, were it not for a drug called Celontin, would suffer upwards of 200 seizures a day. Because the Harper regime opted for a voluntary system instead of a law requiring companies to report drug shortages, Harrington had only a one-week supply of the drug left.

The Toronto Star today reports that his family has been able to secure a one-month supply of the drug from the U.S., no thanks to our government. Says Brigitte Harrington, Ryan's mother:

“It’s a band-aid” ... “We’ve applied another band-aid to the layer. We have not addressed the problem. We have not cleaned up the mess.”

Despite the shortage, Health Canada denied three separate applications from Harrington to acquire the drug from the U.S.

When asked why the first three requests were denied, Health Canada spokesperson Sara Lauer responded, “Initial requests … were not fulfilled because the manufacturer, ERFA, informed Health Canada the product would be on the market until December 2012 and it was working to avoid any potential back-order.”

I would like to think that our political 'leadership' has learned something from this episode, distressing in its wider implications, but experience suggests that in the battle between marketplace ideology, so beloved of the Harper regime, and the public good, we the people are pretty much on our own.