"Cowardice asks the question...is it safe? Expediency asks the question...is it politic? Vanity asks the question...is it popular? But conscience asks the question...is it right? And there comes a time when one must take a position that is neither safe, nor politic, nor popular but one must take it because it is right." ~Dr. Martin Luther King

Tuesday 28 February 2012

An Exchange...Civil..,I don't think so

Subject: Re: Aurora Cultural Centre
Good Evening Mr.Broughton
 
I have received your e-mail. Thank you for taking the time. I am glad you recognize the symbol Church Street School was intended to be when the town invested several millions of dollars in its renovation.
 
The primary purpose was to restore the Aurora Museum  to it's rightful place. in a  setting befitting  its importance to our community
 
Long before the Culture Centre Board was created ,the Aurora Historical Society invested hundreds of thousands of dollars in specialized architect plans for the renovation. Volunteers spent hundreds of hours doing rough and dirty work in preparation for the renovations and to save on costs.
 
The 2006 Council supported a resolution proposed by myself to use funds from  the sale of our Hydro asset to complete the work started by the Historical Society which had ground  to a halt because of insufficient funds.
 
The vision was for cultural activities to take place along with  the museum program.
 
The vision was frustrated by the Culture Centre Board when  they froze out the Historical Society from the building.
 
They were aware of the community's dissatisfaction. Yet they volunteered neither a  change nor an explanation of their decision.
 
The agreement  between the town and the board has been reviewed by the town's  solicitor. It is severely deficient. There must be a change.
 
It is entirely inappropriate for an appointed  Board  using a beautiful  building owned by the town, paying neither rent maintenance heat or light and receiving $356,000 of town funding, to  organize a  campaign of opposition against  Council's authority to conduct the town's business in the best interest of the municipality . 
 
You have enjoyed this building because the  Historical Society  and  the town made  huge investments in our future
 
You will enjoy it more when the original vision is realised. 
 
Mr.Broughton's response
 
Dear Ms Buck,
Thank you for your candour.  You are the first person to have admitted that this council's objective is to dismantle the Aurora Cultural Centre and particularly for political/antiquated reasons.  As I am sure you are aware, the constituency that voted for you is conservative and as a rule has little interest or appreciation for art or new ideas.  I suspect you treat the Board as an assault to your power, so I utterly grasp your initiative.  Please attempt to see your folly.  Police, jails, wars, militarization, attacks on our privacy and the middle class are the purvey of the federal government.  Surely you could see it in your heart to protect a little culture in Aurora, while the country goes mad in a sea of fear, greed and safety.  Your bleak boorish legacy can be resurrected!
Thanks, 
Peter Broughton
 
My response though my mother would have said "Just ignore the beast"

*Good Morning Mr. Broughton,
 
I note your bad manners.
 
Let me assure you. I do not presume to speak for Council. 
 
 I speak for myself and the people I represent. I expect every  member of council to do the same.
 
 You on the other hand, may speak only for yourself. You do little to promote your own argument.
 
 I suspect nothing  would elevate your thinking, not excluding the  fine art and culture you purport to support

Now I'm done.

13 comments:

Anonymous said...

WHACK!

Anonymous said...

Wow....

I wonder if Mr Broughton appreciates the fact that he emailed you about a topic and you have in turn replied and published the reply in a public forum like this. I wonder if he expected the public wrist slap for bad manners.

It would be different if he published his email first but I think unless you have received his approval to post this email conversation, you have violated the confidentiality of email.

People wonder why there is so much anonymous postings.

Anonymous said...

WTF!
I hope Mr. Broughton does not plan to repeat any of that crap at the meeting. Does the Mayor have the authority to evict individuals who launch person attacks? That guy is one very sick puppy!

Anonymous said...

Two possibilities - Certifiable or Plastered. Either way, a huge error. If you Google him in Aurora, his letter is already up there for posterity. There was no information before - now he has to live with that letter.

Anonymous said...

That is about the worst case of self-destruction I have ever had the pleasure to witness.

Anonymous said...

Instant Karma! Must have one mother of a hang-over!

Anonymous said...

"If you Google him in Aurora, his letter is already up there for posterity."

Really.... I don't see it. Maybe he has taken it down.

Anonymous said...

If Peter Broughton is representative of the Culture Club Vultures, he extinguishes his good sense, if he ever had any, and replaces it with with swamp rot.

Are those of us who wish to see a proper and effective agreement between the town, the cultural community and the historical society being tarnished with the brush of "police, jails, wars, militarization, attacks on our privacy and the middle class" as Mr Broughton states?

This is blatant crap. And for good measure he goes on to state "Surely you could see it in your heart to protect a little culture in Aurora, while the country goes mad in a sea of fear, greed and safety."

Perhaps Mr. Broughton should consider relocating to Sudan or Somalia, where he could truly experience a sea of fear and greed and where there is no safety; if they are a bit too far he should try Syria.

Never before have so many become so addle brained over so little in such a short time.

Possibly this is all the result of a form of climate change due to our unseasonably mild winter.

Whatever it is, let's hope it's not contagious.

Anonymous said...

1:57 PM
There are now two places if your Google him . Don't think he can take it down. Otherwise Ballard would have removed all of the Christopher Watt's items you get when you Google his name. I'm new to this but it seems this stuff just sits for ever.

Anonymous said...

Will everyone just remember that it was Ballard and his team of directors from the Vulture Centre who made all this possible. We should all go out of our way to show our appreciation and maybe the councillors could have a wee chat with the lad about dragging them into his sewer pipe. All very friendly, of course, no bullying.

christopher watts said...

There seems to be interest brewing with regards to the control one has over internet search page ranking.

The idea of "posterity" as it relates to content on the web is a curious one. Stuff on the internet isn't static. It is managed, and juggled, often between servers and platforms. It takes resources to maintain.

When content gets pulled a cache of it exists that can be accessed, albeit a greater effort is required to do so.

Google search is not unlike 99% of the other search engines. They all operate by using meta tags to flag content for indexing. This in nothing new. It has been done since the late 1990s.

What is new is that search is being personalized, to the extent that no two Google searches are alike.

If you Google someone, or something what is returned to you is a result of many algorithms returning content it believes to be relevant to a profile it has created of you.

It is important to understand how this impacts us as content producers and consumers. I posted materials including a TED talk on this subject in a post here: http://christopherwatts.posterous.com/living-in-bubbles

Clr. Ballard does not have the capacity to "remove all of the Christopher Watts items you get when you google his name" because they are not created or curated by him.

He has the ability everyone does to apply tags to content he creates or curates so that they could be considered relevant by search indexes.
Whether he chooses to do so is up to him.

Anonymous said...

If you Google Peter Broughton Aurora you now find 2 articles by Christopher as well as his letters to and from Evelyn. H is listed as ' proprietor ' of A Rolls, a company which appears to have no records available.

Anonymous said...

"H is listed as ' proprietor ' of A Rolls, a company which appears to have no records available."

I don't understand the relative merit of this statement? There are thousands of companies that exist without "records available". Nothing secretive going on, trust me.