I agree we should do more for our homeless on our home front.
However, our people fight hunger and the elements.
The refugees flee bombs and gunfire, as well as brutality and tortur
Posted by Dave to Our Town and Its Business at 28 November 2015 at 08:15
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Oh ....our people fight more than that. Cruelty, brutality and indifference to suffering is all around us.
Freedom is far more apparent than real.
As well, there is no question about the generosity of Canadians.
The main concern raised in this conversation has Ben the competence of our politicians or lack thereof.
Re-settling refugees has been done before. The outstanding question may be ...has it been done well?
Etobicoke might be a good place to look.The Borough was forefront in the news last year.
How well were Ethiopians assimilated in the borough in the thirty years since their arrival?
I don't raise the question as a reason not to rescue Syrian refugees or to slow Canada' s response to the tragedy.
I just worry the obvious solution is not always as simple or obvious as first appears. I remember a feature in the Star Weekend Magazine about the government re-settling Ethiopians in a condo building and impact on non- Ethiopian condo owners in the same building. It wasn't pretty.
It's been years since I have had newspapers delivered to my home. i got tired of the bulk and crises content in places that I could do nothing about.
I dread week-ends and faces of heart-broken mothers in Toronto whose sons are stabbed or shot to death on city streets and even by stray bullets going through the wall of a home into the bedroom of a small child.
Years go by and the situation does not improve. Now we have videos added of police brutality to horrify our senses.
Last year, the police used a helicopter to tail the City's Mayor. Charges were laid against the Mayor's companion. They were dismissed recently.
They videos the Mayur peeing against a tree and putting empty liquor bottles in the trash.
Tom Friedan,an award winning New York journalist has been writing about Asia for years. Last week he was a guest of Charlie Rose, talking about the logic of home-grown terrorists being responsible for the Paris atrocities.
He pointed out the high percentage of Muslims in France and limited opportunities for the young.
They have many of the benefits of western upbringing and none of the rewards. They are without employment or hope for a future and represent an easy target for recruitment to ISIS .Who train them, pay them, provide them with wives, a purpose in life and rewards in paradise in the certain event of their death,
More young women are joining than before.
Of course , I don't know these things in my own right. I am obliged to listen to a man who has made
a career of peering jnder rocks and into the nooks and crannies of Asian lifestyle, as varied as that is.
But I am inclined to believe everyone needs to feel they belong where they live.Whether at home with family, in the classroom, the playground, the work place, in a place of worship and in the world around them. They need to feel hope.
With evidence at hand, I'm not sure we've done or can do a particularly good job of that assurance.
Simplistic solutions of the past solved the immediate problem and created a different one down the road.
And it was not for the want of good intentions.
I think we might have done a decent job with the vietnam and tamil refugees. maybe because they were not
ReplyDeleteisolated in a specific area. Hopefully some of the lessons Evelyn high-lights will be considered and implemented
with those on their way to Canada. I am quite sure that the media will be hovering over every single move looking
for a wedge of controversy. Not necessarily a bad thing.........
The American are dealing with their own home-grown monsters. For the most part the guys with the guns going on
ReplyDeleterampages have been educated white guys who were able to get jobs. But their politicians are all focusing on the
refugees and a growing list of undesirables.
It gets quite complicated when motives are assessed. In the case of the Paris shooting. the suspects are described as being
ReplyDelete"quite normal in their communities until some time when they become radicalized ''.But there was no lack of intelligences, several spoke a number of languages and read widely. It makes no sense to throw that all away for a bunch of promised
virgins. What does a female suicide killer receive as reward in her after life ?
From what I understand some have also been promised that their families will be taken care of monetarily.
ReplyDelete22:44
ReplyDeleteThat would assume there was a group capable of keeping records and having any interest in paying it on ?
Maybe we should talk about the Santa Claus parade ? I think it went well. It is nice to have the emergency vehicles going
ReplyDeleteslowly on Yonge for a change.
I'd like to hear about the card collecting club meeting and the book sale at the old armoury. What was the turnout like for them? Did the sale raise a lot of money?
ReplyDeleteMaybe our Town Curator can provide an update (as they were both held under her auspices)?
Any measure of success would be challenged.
DeleteSo, really?
Christopher has a funny [ well, to me, anyhow ] bit on the tennis folk wanting their own facility.
ReplyDeleteThese might be some of the same individuals for whom Mr Gallo was acting when he rejected that bubble.
He really did not do too well for that sport, I guess they did not know he also got the town to stop work on the David English
courts.
They might get a pseudo-promise for a few courts at Mavrinac. A building or bubble not likely. anytime soon.
It's pretty disappointing how so many feel entitled to so much. This entitled is like a virus in todays society.
Deletehey, they had a chance for a bubble structure that would already have been in use. Blew that opportunity, the next
ReplyDeletetime might be a looong time coming.
In reply to whom, 11:29?
ReplyDelete11:29
ReplyDeleteI did not write that comment but it looks benign to me. I would be interested in that too.
A book sale is always fun. One of the banks has a deal now that people bring in books and take some with
a donation to the United Way.
@11:29
ReplyDeleteIf people put themselves out there, they're going to attract scrutiny.