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HomeMy WebLinkAboutThe Citizen, 2017-11-16, Page 5THE CITIZEN, THURSDAY, NOVEMBER 16, 2017. PAGE 5. Other Views I was never cut out for the big time When I graduated from journalism school, way back before people began questioning if journalism was even relevant, I couldn't wait to come home to living in the country, giving up any possibility of becoming a big-time reporter. Good thing, I've realized since, because I don't have what it takes to be a media star. What most of us do in community newspapers would hardly be credited as journalism by the standards of big time professionals. We go to meetings and report on what happened. Seldom do we grill local councillors or mayors, taking it for granted that just by being politicians they must be out to manipulate us and the public for their own benefit. When we interview someone, we generally let her or him say what they want, not subjecting the person to a rigorous cross- examination. Most community journalists are a conduit to inform readers, not shapers of the news. That doesn't seem to be the case for the star reporters for the high-profile newspapers and television networks who often seem devoted to setting the agenda, not reporting it. Now sometimes this is a good thing, such as when a politician is trying to ignore the issues that the public is really concerned about while spouting the party line. In such cases it's in all our interests for tough- minded journalists to prevent him/her get away with highjacking the issue with political discussion. But sometimes it seems journalists are determined to decide what the public should be concerned about. I was really uncomfortable about the contortions CBC reporters went through to implicate Prime Minister Justin Trudeau into the "Paradise Papers" revelations about thousands of people worldwide who invested in off shore tax havens. Some 3,000 Keith Roulston From the cluttered desk Canadians were involved in these offshore trusts, which by the way are perfectly legal, but only one seemed to matter, because he could be connected to the Prime Minister, as a wealthy friend who had raised money for the Liberal Party. It seemed to be guilt by association to a man who is not even guilty of any crime. The Paradise Papers story is so complicated that few people will actually read or listen beyond the headline, or the first few paragraphs of explanation. How many people, I wonder, who just surfed the headlines got the idea that Justin Trudeau himself had money invested in some illegal offshore scheme to avoid taxes? Then there are the reporters who like to lay traps for public figures in the hope they will trip themselves up — even if it's not in the public interest. Before he left on a fact-finding trip to Myanmar and the Rohingya refugee camps in Bangladesh, special envoy Bob Rae was asked repeatedly by a CBC interviewer if he didn't think Canada should revoke the honorary citizenship it had granted Myanmar leader Aung San Suu Ky back in 2012. It might have made a good headline if Rae had taken the bait but it would hardly have helped him do his job of trying to improve the situation for the refugees if he had insulted one of the very people to whom he needed to talk. A canny old campaigner, Rae repeatedly sidestepped the trap. Similarly Chrystia Freeland, Minister of Foreign Affairs, was sharp enough, as a former journalist herself, not to get sucked into giving reporters what they wanted in a news conference following the most recent NAFTA negotiations last month. Freeland had already spoken forcefully about Canadian negotiators not giving in to the U.S. demands in a manner that would hurt Canadians but a reporter tried to egg her into saying something more inflammatory. Freeland smiled at the reporter and said she could see the headline that he was trying to achieve if she hardened her language but she wasn't going to make negotiations even more difficult by becoming more negative. And that's the case in both the Rae and Freeland interactions with the media: if they had given the reporters what they wanted, it wouldn't have resulted in what's best for the common good. What's more, both would probably have been chastised in the opinion pages of the newspapers for having said something irresponsible if they had given reporters the quote they hoped to get. If you like controversy, or you're happy to see the reporters causing problems for politicians you don't agree with, then you're likely to be fine with this activist sort of journalism. As a naive country journalist, however, I can't help thinking that the current disregard, and downright distrust of the media south of the border has at least some of its roots in the desire of reporters to have an active role in shaping the news, not just reporting it. There are times when investigative reporting does a great service to democracy but reporters who want to make the headlines risk undermining the very system they want to preserve. In for a penny, in for a pound n recent months, I've noticed that I haven't been living quite as healthily as I did at the same time last year. The primary reason for that, I guess is that we had a bit of a domestic argument at our house several months back between my daughter Mary Jane and our dog Mikayla. Mikayla, an older dog who is a little set in her ways (probably why we get along so well), didn't take kindly to Mary Jane trying to play with her paws — she growled and snapped and that was the end of her tenure at my house for the forseeable future. You can't take a chance with safety, so Mikayla found a new home with a relative and my wife and I are very grateful for that because it means Mikayla still gets to be in our lives. It also means that, some day, when Mary Jane's lexicon grows beyond "Hi", `Bye-bye", "Oh -oh", "Mommy", "Daddy", and "Kitty", we might be able to bring Mikayla back. Unfortunately, when Mikayla wasn't there, harness in her mouth waiting for me to walk her, it became really easy to stop getting that twice-daily physical activity. It wasn't that I made a decision not to be active, it was just that I had other things to take care of first thing in the morning (diapers, bottles, baby food, sleep, etc.), and so, my physical fitness level began to decline. Anything worth doing isn't easy, or so I'm told, so it's tempting to stop doing it and without Mikayla, the walks stopped. Lately, I decided I wanted to try and remedy that. I pulled out some fitness equipment and started following some exercise routines. Every night, instead of queuing up some television show, I would start doing some quiet exercise so I won't wake Mary Jane. I'd only been at it for three days when my stomach decided I should take a night off. I sat there, upset stomach gnawing at me, and had to make a tough decision: I know if I don't keep on with the physical fitness routine this early into it, I'm doomed to fail in the long run so, grunting, groaning and complaining to myself, I started to warm up. As I sat there, considering the impact of missing that session, I realized that you have to make the big efforts and the small efforts if you want to succeed. Take, for example, saving money. Acquiring savings isn't just saving money on big ticket purchases like new houses, vehicles or renovations, it requires small savings as well. At the end of a year, saving a few grand on a house could pale in comparison to the savings from switching to no -name products (except for coffee and toilet paper — some things you just don't cheap out on). Cutting big expenses is only a part of the equation — small savings also need to be realized to really drive home the idea of trying to grow savings. It would seem that North Huron Council should be reminded of such endeavours. Take, for example, a recent meeting at which North Huron Council approved the purchase of flowers and trees for its ratepayers. Both purchases were hotly contested by the same few members of council, though they swapped sides for the two issues. The flowers, and accompanying hanging baskets, cost $5,700 while the trees cost $1,840. Both purchases were approved. Deputy -Reeve James Campbell and Councillor Ray Hallahan fought for the tree program and against the flowers while Councillor Trevor Seip fought to suspend the tree -planting program, but, for the $5,700, going so far as to say that more money should be spent to beautify other urban areas in the municipality. Hallahan and Campbell said that the flowers and hanging planters should be bought by the host communities, similar to how the Auburn Horticultural Society single-handedly beautifies that community. Seip said if savings could be found by suspending the tree program for a year, it was worth pursuing. He also said that denying the flower purchase wasn't as grand a service as he had originally envisioned when suggesting council consider services to save money. From my seat in the den, however, I can say all three of them are wrong ... or right. The approximately $7,500 for the two projects should not be spent if council is truly committed to saving money. This isn't like council's ill-advised attempt to cut garbage collection in urban centres, this is a service that could be matched by community groups that are constantly looking for ways to help out. Trees, flowers and planters are the perfect projects for a Business Improvement Area (BIA) or service club to tackle because they focus on improving their community instead of the municipality as a whole. I applaud council trying to reduce costs, but finding savings needs to be a commitment. Whether it's $5,700 or $57,000 or $570,000, every chance to save should be reviewed. The only caveat to that statement is if a majority of the people disagree (see the garbage collection idea) you aren't cutting where you should be. Shawn Loughlin Shawn's Sense This can't continue There's something really disturbing going on around the world right now, but the other side of the coin is that there's something very heroic happening around the world right now as well. To be more specific, the "disturbing" side of the coin has been going on for decades and it's only now that women have been stepping up, hoping to bring their abusers to justice. It began with allegations against powerful Hollywood producer Harvey Weinstein, uncovered by The New Yorker and The New York Times. What followed were murmurs of support from thousands of women on Twitter that soon grew into a full-fledged movement. Those who had also been abused over the course of their lives began using the "#nietoo" hashtag, which then grew even further, in many situations, to these women — and in some cases men — also telling their stories. Now, many high-profile men in Hollywood have been fingered as alleged serial abusers. No one, it seems, can hide from the skeletons in their closet any longer. There is no other reaction than to applaud these women for coming forward and being brave enough to tell their stories. In the face of a male -dominated industry and the potential consequence of losing work in their chosen field as a result of their whistle -blowing, they have stood up and said "no more". Actions like this have always disturbed me, just as they should everyone else in the world. What has always really upset me, however, has been the institutionalization of abuse like this. When I was growing up, the hope was that when wrong is being done by those outliers in society who would seek to wrong, society would rise up. You like to believe that if you see a student being bullied that his fellow students would help him and end the threat. The first one that really turned my head was the rampant pedophilia in the Catholic church. Growing up in the Catholic church, I was taught to trust priests. These men, I was told, were God's hand-picked assistants on earth and you could trust them with anything. When I was old enough to find out what was going on in the church, it crushed me. Not only were these men abusing their position, but they were doing so with our most vulnerable and impressionable citizens: children. And while that was a hard enough pill to swallow, what truly made me sick was that others within the church would cover for these criminals They moved them from church to church, they intimidated and gagged victims and worked tirelessly; not to help those who had been wronged and had their lives changed forever, but their buddies and co-workers. These new allegations in Hollywood come against this backdrop as well. Hearing of spies and investigators being hired, how rampant and brazen abuse was in many of these cases makes you wonder why no one stood up for the victims. They all turned the other way and, in some cases, actively worked for the abuser, single-handedly enabling the abuse to continue and ensuring that the victim list would grow. We're living in a time when the U.S. President is embroiled in his own abuse scandal, only to be protected by his network of liars and goons. If it's happening at the highest level, it's easy to wonder what hope we have. As much as this pains me, the world will always have its share of perverts, predators and abusers, but we need to stand up to these people and do our part. Whether they're family, friends or co-workers, an abuser is an abuser and these people can't be enabled to continue hurting people. Not on our watch.