The Citizen, 2010-03-04, Page 5THE CITIZEN, THURSDAY, MARCH 4, 2010. PAGE 5.
Here’s a story for our times: An
American citizen is confronted by
police officers, guns drawn, in New
York City. She is handcuffed and taken into
custody where she is detained and questioned
for several hours.
Ultimately she is released.
Her crime? Doodling. On her school desk.
The would-be felon is Alexa Gonzalez, a 12-
year-old elementary school student. She had
written – in erasable ink – “I LOVE MY
FRIENDS ABBY AND FAITH. She then
signed it: LEX WAS HERE, 2/1/10.
Police??? Handcuffs????
School officials later allowed that perhaps
Alexa’s arrest was a mistake.
“Based on what we’ve seen so far,” said a
school official, “this shouldn’t have
happened.”
Well, duh.
We live in paranoid times. The same
newspaper that carried the tale of Alexa’s run-
in with the Keystone Kops in New York ran a
story of a similar happening a little closer to
home. That story concerned the mass
evacuation of a public school in Saanich, north
of Victoria, B.C.
Not so surprising, really. Saanich lies on the
dreaded fault line, along which seismologists
assure us a major earthquake will occur sooner
or later.
Perhaps a tremor had shivered through the
school auditorium? Or maybe there’d been a
cougar sighting? Or a serial killer alert?
Nope. What triggered the mass evacuation
of students was a note discovered in a girls’
washroom which contained “threatening
language”.
Classes were suspended, school buses were
summoned, students and faculty took the rest
of the day off, while a full police investigation
was launched.
Over a piece of paper in a girls’ washroom.
Times change. I remember back in my
public school days when a fellow student
named Ivan ‘went postal’. Ivan was a tough
cookie even in Grade 8 and he had a lot of
energy to burn off.
On this particular day he chose to chill out
by punching out the lower windows in one of
the school portables. He was pretty good at it.
I think he did 12 or 13 before Mr. Creighton,
the shop teacher, grabbed him by the scruff of
his shirt and hauled him off to the school
nurse.
Schools handled ‘threats’ differently then.
The nurse stitched Ivan up, the principal
kicked him out of school; his parents got a bill
for the broken windows and the rest of us
didn’t even get the afternoon off.
I can’t imagine what might happen to Ivan if
he tried that stunt today – particularly if he
chose an airport in which to ‘act out’.
Consider the case of Jules Paul Bouloute.
Mister Bouloute is a 57-year-old Haitian who
had just come from his devastated homeland,
landed at Kennedy Airport and, in the noise
and confusion, not to mention signage in a
foreign language, made the mistake of a
lifetime.
Mister Bouloute attempted to go through the
wrong door.
It was only an emergency exit which would
have put Mister Bouloute back on the tarmac
but the airport officials responded as if the
man’s underpants had exploded. Sirens
whooped, alarms blared, security staff
scrambled and deployed, and Mister Bouloute
was, of course, arrested.
He’s lucky he wasn’t tasered into a crispy
critter. That can happen at airports these days.
Well, perhaps not so lucky. Mister Bouloute
was tackled and shackled, then arraigned
on charges of first-degree criminal tampering
and third-degree criminal trespass. He
faces, as of this writing, up to seven years in
prison.
Can’t you hear the conversation in the prison
exercise yard?
“What you in for, man?”
“Murder.”
“Bank job.”
“Assault with a weapon.”
“How about you, buddy?”
“Um, I tried to go through the wrong
door…”
As a not unrelated aside, I got an e-mail
from my old pal Krieno this week. Krieno and
I went to journalism school together many
moons ago.
“Do you recall,” he wrote, “when we
carefully stuck a lit cigarette onto the fuse of a
cherry bomb*, placed it in a locker outside the
cafeteria, then retired to our favourite lunch
table to await the inevitable outcome? The
explosion bent the locker door and happened,
as luck would have it, at the exact moment the
dean of journalism walked by with a
delegation of visitors. Today, such a stunt
would undoubtedly bring the full force of the
law streaming onto the campus…and
we’d be doing six to 10 on a terrorism
charge.”
Indeed. We might even be sharing a cell with
Monsieur Bouloute.
(*cherry bomb: a sort of firecracker on
steroids).
Arthur
Black
Other Views Big brother is watching us
It was supposed to be Canada’s Olympics.
The “Own The Podium” initiative gave
Canadians something to cheer about and we
were going to dominate in Vancouver in 2010.
But it didn’t start out that way.
An athlete lost his life on a luge track that
warranted adjustments, there were malfunctions
at the opening ceremonies, severe weather
concerns and Canadian athletes hardly came out
of the gate with their guns blazing.
Other nations were laughing at us and
mocking the brazen and confident statement
that we would own the podium. People said it
was unlike Canada to make such a bold
statement and Canada was mocked because
halfway through the Games it looked like the
only thing it would own would be the ground
beneath the podium.
But like true Canadians, our athletes
persevered, overcame adversity and delivered
on the high expectations.
It started with Alex Bilodeau, who won
Canada’s first gold medal on Canadian soil. He
celebrated emotionally with his older brother,
who he called his best friend and his inspiration.
After his victory Bilodeau wept alongside his
brother, who is living with cerebral palsy.
Figure skater Joannie Rochette lost her
mother to a heart attack just days before the
biggest performances of her life and fought for
the success her mother would have wanted for
her, earning a bronze medal for her country.
And when Canadians were on the podium,
they were criticized for celebrating too much.
Jon Montgomery, Canadian gold medalist in the
men’s skeleton, took a swig of beer from a
pitcher handed to him as he walked the streets
after his big win and our women's hockey team
enjoyed drinks and cigars in an empty stadium
on the very ice they had dominated just hours
earlier. Both moves were scrutinized.
However, through all of the fog on the ski
hills and over all the naysayers, the sounds of
spontaneous renditions of “O Canada” from
curling fans and the endless celebrations in
streets could be heard all over the country when
Sidney Crosby potted Sunday’s overtime
winner so quickly, he even took a few seconds
to realize he had won. And we had won.
Sure the United States had 37 medals, 11
more than Canada, whose 26 medals earned
them the bronze in medal standings, but it was
the top step of the podium that Canada owned,
with our athletes stepping up to the top of the
podium more than athletes from any other
nation. Ever.
Canada’s 14 gold medals has earned a spot in
history. Our country has won more gold medals
than any other in a winter Olympics, more than
Norway in 2002 and more than the USSR in
1976. We’re also the most successful host
nation, beating the record from 2002 set by the
United States.
So as we share in Canada’s hockey victory, it
is our victory too. And while we may not have
the medals to prove it, we have the pride and
patriotism that came along with these games.
And while Crosby’s overtime goal earned me
a free round of golf from my cousin Mike in
New Jersey (who is a big hockey fan and was
convinced his home nation could play Canada’s
game better than Canada), it was the pride in
watching the medal ceremony and the playing
of our national anthem that I’ll remember.
So while Canada quietly put together one of
the most dominant performances in Olympic
history, you could say we did own the podium.
Or we could just put it this way: Germany and
the United States may have more floor space for
their cubicles in the business of the Olympics,
but it’s Canada that sits in the corner office.
Tories pick strange issue to back
True patriot love
Ontario’s Progressive Conservative
leader is under pressure to come up
with some catchy new policies, but is
going to extremes in pushing for spectacles in
which muscular young men kick opponents to
the floor and batter their prostrate bodies with
fists and elbows.
Tim Hudak has been accused fairly of
offering few policies of his own since being
chosen last June and merely criticizing those
of Liberal Premier Dalton McGuinty,
particularly his increases in spending in a
recession and the province’s sales tax by
harmonizing it with its federal equivalent.
Hudak is now suggesting the province allow
professional contests of what their advocates
charitably call mixed martial arts (MMM),
which already are permitted in some provinces
and parts of the United States.
In these, contestants are allowed to kick
opponents, punch them with barely padded
fists, pound them with elbows and knees that
particularly damage, and choke them until
they surrender by tapping out.
Ontario traditionally has permitted boxing,
in which participants can strike only with fists
in more padded gloves, and specifically
forbids kicking, tripping, holding and hitting
opponents when they are down.
The province more recently has authorized
kick-boxing, in which combatants still are
barred from striking with elbows and
knees and hitting opponents when they are
down.
The MMM events draw huge audiences
where they are permitted and on pay TV and
stations that otherwise offer mainly re-runs of
violent crime shows, while audiences for some
sports including boxing are declining.
The Conservative leader said McGuinty is
missing an opportunity to make money by
attracting tourists and is too intent on banning
things such as pit bulls and candy sales in
schools, and called him “Premier Dad.”
McGuinty countered by saying, permitting
MMM events is not a priority and a
spokesman for the premier added the province
has to review any new sport to ensure it
is safe.
MMM allows methods of hurting opponents
not permitted in Ontario rings before and in
any bout seen on TV at least one contestant
winds up with face badly cut and blood
smeared over him and the floor. Its organizers
have not produced records showing these
injuries do not leave permanent effects,
but two U.S. fighters have died of injuries
sustained in such contests in the past
10 years.
It can be argued severe injuries occur in
hockey and football and there was a death in
the luge event in the winter Olympic Games,
but in these sports the sole aim is not to smash
opponents to the ground and render them
unable to continue.
There also have been deaths over the years
in boxing, where participants aim to hurt
opponents enough to prevent them continuing,
and the most admired boxer of modern times,
Muhammed Ali, who was noted for his agility
with words, was struck so often it is
considered one reason he now has difficulty
speaking.
A case can be made for banning professional
boxing, which is dying in Ontario anyway, but
its continued existence cannot justify
introducing an even less desirable form of
violence into the province.
Nor can the fact many watch MMM
elsewhere or on TV. Many would watch
executions in China if they were on
TV here, because they are drawn to the
macabre, but that would not justify screening
them here.
Mixed martial arts is not a sport, which
dictionaries define as a recreational activity,
game or competition requiring physical
activity, because almost none of those who
watch it perform in it, but a show put on by a
few who risk health for money.
Its most public advocate here is former
Liberal premier David Peterson, whose law
firm lobbies for it, but was last seen discussing
the sporting life dressed elegantly in riding
habit and musing on the joy of trotting around
his Caledon estate – he will not experience the
blood and pain of mixed martial arts.
Many Ontarians also are quietly proud
Ontario sometimes is more civilized than
other places and will not be upset
McGuinty is discouraging these back alley
brawls.
Eric
Dowd
FFrroomm
QQuueeeenn’’ss PPaarrkk
Shawn
Loughlin
SShhaawwnn’’ss SSeennssee
Living is a constant process of deciding
what we are going to do.
– Jose Ortega Y Gasset
Final Thought