In recent weeks with the media chock-full of stories about injustice, terror, human rights and entitlement, I again come to the realization that society has created too many victims in our country. Don't get me wrong, I am not saying that there isn't injustice creating hardship in our society. It is just that we have become obsessed with how most of us are victims of something or other. Maybe we should all stop for a moment, shut off the 24-hour news cycle, stop Face-booking and Tweeting, put our 鈥淪mart-Phones?鈥� away and feel sorry for me.
I think I must be the enemy in our modern Canada. After 150 years as a country of nations, it seems that the only thing we can all agree on is that we all need to 鈥渉eal鈥� or 鈥渞econcile鈥� from the abuses and 鈥済lass ceilings鈥� created by me. Yes, I am 鈥淭he Man,鈥� a 鈥渂aby boomer.鈥� I am Caucasian, male, heterosexual, over 50 years old, establishment, educated, Catholic, English-speaking, former educator and of course, a voter/taxpayer.
Yes, it鈥檚 me, the central focus of all the evil done to every other person who has a grievance. Do you feel sorry for me?
In this era of entitlement and reconciliation; terms I use with some considerable trepidation, our society has begun to trip over itself to find the evil that must be present in Canada. Yes, it鈥檚 me. I was raised in a Catholic family by parents who lived by the 10 Commandments and who took me to church every Sunday and saw to it I was educated in a school system that instructed me with 鈥淐hristian values.鈥� I was a white middle-class child raised in a predominately white middle-classed neighbourhood.
I didn't set out to hurt anyone; simply live my life according to what I was raised with and according to the morals and influences of my parents, community and my friends. Who could have known in the 60s and 70s that we were all doing it wrong and our successes were made upon the suffering of those who were not like us? I guess I thought my life was normal and not based on evil or greed, sexism and homophobia, or chauvinism. I guess I was all wrong. Do you feel sorry for me yet?
By now I am sure you all know where I am going with this. Let me get to the point.
From an early time in my life, one lesson that my family instilled in me was that this time and place is my life. I have a present and hopefully a future but all I really have is my life; here and now. I have been taught to live my life in the present and not dwell on all the losses and hardships in my life. Kids who bullied me or experiences I have had that left me troubled and sad at the time for the most part have been left behind and require no 鈥渉ealing.鈥�
All I have is the present and the gift my God, the creator has given me is: I can enjoy and do now. Looking for pity or reconciliation or fairness from past injustice or misunderstandings is a waste of my limited time. Our common life experience should teach us all that there is little each of us can control.
Does this mean we should forget and ignore injustice? No. However, we should be cautious about placing blame. My parents are good people, their parents were good people and I am sure, did the best they could for the times they lived in. Did any of us hurt others by living our lives? Probably. Intentionally? Probably not. Are some in our society, trying to say my kind are to blame? Probably. But most of my ancestors with all their flaws are dead and gone and if you think I will shoulder the blame for their lives you are probably wasting your precious time on this planet.
Oh yes, by the way, 小蓝视频 a Catholic Christian puts me in plenty of contact with all sorts of clergy; priests, and teaching nuns who at times scolded and corrected me, sometimes with corporal punishment but in my experience they were good and devoted people, not monsters or predators. I am certain there might have been some but not in my experience as a student, altar boy or member of a children's choir.
So I return to my original question: Do you feel sorry for me yet? I don't. It would be a waste of a life anyway.
Gary Gabel
Madge Lake
