The Long and shorts of responsibility

The Long and Shorts of Responsibility

Whom or What to Blame When There is Great Fear in the Land

First, let me say I never, ever, thought I would be commending Jason Kenney for anything. But his recent use of the term "personal responsibility" has rung my chimes:

Globe&Mail - Oct 26/20: While Quebec, Ontario and Manitoba have toughened restrictions on certain businesses and activities in recent weeks, Mr. Kenney has said his government prefers encouraging personal responsibility over imposing new shutdowns on Alberta’s frail economy.

Personal responsibility would, I assume, involve "social" distancing, something I am happily willing to do. Unfortunately, mask wearers too often don't see the need of distancing, so I'm the one who has to step out into the road while they stay put, blank-eyed and with impunity, because they see themselves as the saints in this scenario and me as the ingrate.

Conversely, whenever I see a bare-faced walker heading my way, I know there's going to be eye contact and a friendly smile as both of us move aside to create more room for each other.
 
I have a friend (well, had a friend, I guess) who says bare-faced people are irresponsible and self-centred.  He literally expects everybody in his city to worry about his personal health; consequently, he doesn't go out at all and gets his food ordered in. I think it's making him balmy; he thinks the bare-faced traitors are more than balmy; they are criminals.

He says the maskless should be marked for life so everyone will always know how reckless they have been with the lives of others. He's also a Ph.D and he believes the CBC has no reason or inclination to tell lies.

Having no children of his own, it doesn't cross his mind that kids are being deprived of proper schooling and banned from playgrounds and extra-curricular activities, nor does he express concern for the thousands of people who've lost their jobs in the Great Reset. He doesn't identify with his peers in old folks' homes (where masks did not prevent their deaths) because he's still lucky enough to be able to stay in his own house and have his food delivered.
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When a population doesn't know who its enemy is, I guess it's natural for them to start blaming one another.  Culprits must be found and punished.

When I was a young, divorced mother, I hung out with other young, divorced mothers, one of whom had a six-year old with an interesting view of situations he didn't like; he saw beyond them to their primary source. 

For instance, when his Halloween hat fell apart in his hands, wrecking his carefully chosen costume idea, he angrily shouted, "I hate the man who made this hat!"  He also hated the man who made his bathing shorts because the waist elastic broke and they almost fell down. We used to smile when he denounced the makers, and when I remarked that he sounded rather like a judge or a king, his Mom laughed and said, "Yeah. Hang the man who made this hat!"

That young fellow is not so young these days. I talked with him a year or so ago and he raised the subject, maybe to see if I remembered, and we both said in unison, "Hang the man who made this hat."  And we laughed together, and it made us feel a tiny, tiny bit better that his mom had just died. He wasn't blaming anybody that she was gone; he knew what she'd say: that's life and we have to get on with it.

But it was kind of insightful, his theory of attribution of blame, not the hat nor the swim trunks for their poor quality, but the maker for his sloppy work.  And maybe not even the maker, but the owner of the business who placed speed and quantity above quality.

What's happening nowadays certainly isn't Life as we knew it or wished it, but it doesn't seem right to me that anyone should put the onus for one's personal health on anyone other than oneself.  If we believe that other people can kill us just by breathing on us, I would have to say that seems a bit extreme, since people have been breathing on one another for eons and the world population is growing, not dying off due to over-population  and shortage of food as predicted by Malthusians.

Severe shortage of food was also predicted to occur during this continued "pandemic".

Still, there's a simple solution called "distancing".  (The WHO says 1 metre; the Government of Canada says "at least 2 metres" (does Trudeau wear a belt AND suspenders?), and it does not say that masks are mandatory, though our PM and Ontario's Premier have dictated otherwise.

It should be nobody else's business if people agree to congregate without masks. If one fears the maskless, all one has to do is keep one's distance. I'm reminded of an old activism mantra: The people, united, can never be defeated. But, we're not united are we? And our governments seem to like us that way.

Forget trying to figure out whom to blame. It wasn't the man who made the shorts, it was the man who ran the factory and paid his employees peanuts, making them work long hours for short pay and short lunch breaks; encouraging staff to compete with one another rather than assist. He was most to blame and most to benefit.

In other words, we're on our own out here on the factory floor.  We can choose to backstab others in the same boat, or we can try to understand where they're coming from. Our politicians claim to work for the people, but who's calling all the shots these days? All it took was the word "novel" and a massive, ongoing fear campaign.

If you think our leading politicians aren't heavily invested in the vaccine business, you might try thinking again. You might begin to wonder if instilling abject fear in the general population serves their interests far more than ours.

As far as I'm concerned, if people choose to congregate, that's their choice, and so far, we've not seen any appreciable increase in deaths attributable to that.  We're told of plenty of "cases"; that is, people who've tested positive, but by now we know this doesn't mean that anyone is actually sick - as demonstrated, time after time, by the astoundingly quick "recoveries" of major celebrities in that category.

Hate is a self-damaging emotion, but if we're going to indulge in it, then the one to rail at is the "leader" who looks doe-eyed at us and decrees that we should make utter fools of ourselves (and quite possibly damage our own pulmonary systems) on the very slim chance that failing to do so could spread a virus that has proven itself to be harmless to more than 98% of the population.

If people can be forced to wear masks, then by that reasoning, of course, no one should be allowed to operate a vehicle (oh, but think of the zillions from the sale of those), and the booze stores should definitely be shuttered so that people can't drive drunk ... but that would be too logical.

Didn't the mandatory use of seat-belts ring a tiny bell with regard to a gradual encroachment on certain personal freedoms and the introduction of Big Brother?  Think of that next time you hear the little "click".

It boggles my mind the things that officials put down to human rights and those they don't. For instance, it's your human right to die of exposure in an Ontario bus shelter, therefore we have no legal right to move you gently into a warm, caring, nurturing environment. TorontoStar

Where is this warm, caring, nurturing environment?  Nowhere, of course. Dignified, caring homeless shelters aren't money-makers and people like Bill Gates and his cult followers make no secret of their interest in population reduction as an answer to the ills of the world. And maybe that's the one thing that people need to keep in mind when they look around and see who's really falling victim to illness -- despite all the mask wearing and elder caring.

We can't "hang the man" who made the mask; s/he is  legion now.  One needs, instead, to question the motives of those who say we must wear it -- or else.

Because, back when masks were scarce, those same entities decreed they weren't necessary. 

One last thing: I've called Bill Gates a "Malthusian" in that he espouses the theories held out by population reduction enthusiasts from the writings of Malthus down to Erlich's "The Population Bomb", and is given free rein in Africa to test out his vaccines and his biometric ID system. Ironically, his most active opponents are fanatical anti-abortionists who are happy to concur that the over-population theories have been proven incorrect.

Ironic, isn't it, that there's a war going on for total control of human reproduction - one to stop it and the other to enforce it -- hidden nicely behind the deliberately induced, abject fear of a "novel" virus. 

​Hang the man who made that fear!  Metaphorically speaking, of course.

It's not as if we weren't warned by the Wizard of Oz injunction to "pay no attention to the man behind the curtain".  Or in the warning in the song that spoke of Freedom being "just another word for nothing left to lose".

Don't hate the man; don't hang the man. Ignore him/her and take care of yourself and your children as your innate life instinct tells you to, and your country's Bill of Rights allows you to, and let others do the same.

An Act for the Recognition and Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms

• (a) the right of the individual to life, liberty, security of the person and enjoyment of property, and the right not to be deprived thereof except by due process of law ...  

  
Yeah, see that "except by due process of law"?  They can't make it a crime and they know that, but they count on most people not knowing it.

It's too late to hang the man who set out that document and made lawbreakers of our elected representatives.  It would be better if we just respected the Act and one another as individuals with different ideas, maybe, but the same needs and personal rights -- come hell or high water.