Tag Archives: politics

Two wolves, 15 years later

The memory dates back 30 years, to the summer of 1993. The original writing dates back 15 years, a reflection on Remembrance Day 2008.

It’s one of my favourite pieces I’ve ever written, and it seems more relevant today than it did 15 years ago. I fear that we are farther away from peace in the Middle East than we have been since the 6 Day War of ’67, the summer before I was born. I wish there was a peaceful way forward, but I don’t see it. The good wolf is going hungry.

I’m not 100% sure the ‘two wolves’ story is Cherokee, and it’s sometimes shared as being told by a grandmother, not a grandfather. No matter the origin, it is the perfect backdrop to my post, and it speaks to the idea that these themes are nothing new to humanity. Unfortunately we don’t truly learn from our mistakes, and so history repeats itself… I hope that enough people will feed the good wolf that maybe, just maybe, we can find ways to live and love in harmony, rather than focus on hate, anger, and our differences in a way that make us act more like animals, and less like humans. Less like hungry wolves, no matter their disposition.

Two wolves

An old Cherokee is teaching his grandson about life. 

“A fight is going on inside me,” he said to the boy. “It is a terrible fight and it is between two wolves. 

One is evil – he is anger, envy, sorrow, regret, greed, arrogance, self-pity, guilt, resentment, inferiority, lies, false pride, superiority, and ego.” 

“The other wolf is good – he is joy, peace, love, hope, serenity, humility, kindness, benevolence, empathy, generosity, truth, compassion, and faith.” 

“The same fight is going on inside you – and inside every other person too.” 

The grandson thought about this for a minute and then asked his grandfather, “Which wolf will win? 

The old Cherokee simply replied, “The one you feed.”

It was the summer of 1993 and I was in Israel playing Water Polo at the Maccabiah Games. Certain memories stick with me to this day:

  • 40,000+ cheering fans at opening ceremonies
  • Floating in the Dead Sea
  • Having a semi-automatic machine gun unintentionally, but repeatedly bumping into me on a dance floor
  • Masada
  • Visiting Jerusalem and the Wailing Wall

My first visit to Jerusalem held a surprise. We had a day off before the semi finals and our team decided to take the bus tour to Jerusalem. I was ‘tagging along’ rather than being one of the people who chose what we did, so I neglected to read the advertisement for the bus tour. I neglected to notice that the bus first stopped at the Holocaust Museum.

I hopped on the bus, camera packed, ready to visit the sights of this ancient city. Imagine my surprise when the bus pulled into the parking lot of the Museum. “Where are we?”

My happy-go-lucky-tourist-with-camera-in-hand attitude hit a plexiglass wall the moment I walked in the door. There in front of me, on a pedestal, was a plexiglass cube about 40cm³ filled with gold teeth. Early on in the concentration camps these were pulled from the mouths of Jews on their way to the gas chambers, but it was quickly realized that dead Jews don’t scream and so they started pulling these valuable gold teeth out after the Jews had been gassed.

The Hall of Names containing Pages of Testimony commemorating the 6 million Jews who perished in the Holocaust. Photo credit: David Shankbone

The museum tour was quiet and solemn. Two translated letters, one from a German Commandant and the other from a German Captain,  also stick with me to this day. Forgive my paraphrasing, this was over 15 years ago.

The one from the German Concentration Camp Commandant was sent to another Commandant inviting him to come and see the new gas chambers where they could now, ‘efficiently exterminate 2,000 rather than just 750 Jews at a time.”

Dehumanize the targets.

The one from the Captain was giving advice to other Captains and it said, ‘Be sure that when executing Jews by firing squad to have at least two of your soldiers shooting at each Jew. Although this may seem like a waste of bullets, it removes the guilt that your soldiers feel since they know that even if they did not shoot, that the Jew would still be terminated. The cost of the extra bullet is worth the removal of guilt from your soldiers and the boost in morale.’

Depersonalize the deed.

Both of these perverse letters have had a lasting impression on me because in their own sick way, they make perfect sense. If you are going to be in the business of murder, it makes sense to think of it as extermination, as we do not think twice about exterminating bothersome bugs. If you are going ask soldiers to be obedient and murder for you, it makes sense that you remove guilt from their task.

Rationalize evil.

We do that today, after all we have ‘counter-terrorism’ and we do illegal things in the name of ‘national security’ and our soldiers die in ‘friendly fire’ and of course we don’t support this, rather we ‘support our troops’.

Which wolf are we feeding?

I’ve taught a student of the Bahia faith, whose family had to flee Iran in the middle of the night for fear of being murdered.

I’ve taught a student who hiked for three days in the mountains of Afghanistan with his pregnant mom, younger brother and father, as they fled the new regime. Mom was a teacher in Afghanistan, but when I met her she was washing dishes in a restaurant.

I’ve taught a Serbian who did her Grade 8 public speech on the cruelty of the United Nations. Her Grandfather and best friend were blown up in a crowded shopping mall by a UN plane. Her life was spared because she forgot her purse in the car and went running back to get it.

Who is the enemy?

My life has been very different. As an immigrant to Canada I moved to a mostly Greek neighbourhood and had three close friends that welcomed me into their houses and their lives. I followed these friends to a High School where, for different reasons, they all left by Grade 11, leaving me to fend for myself for Grades 12 and 13, (Ontario had Grade 13 back then).

I left high school with 5 very close friends: A Canadian born of Scottish decent, a German, an African Born Shiite Muslim, a Canadian Sunni Muslim, and a Canadian Jew with East Indian decent. Oh and as for me… my wife describes me as a Chinese Jew from Barbados… (I describe myself as Heinz57 or a mutt).

I wore a kilt in the wedding party for Ross, the Canadian Scott, and I lived with Kassim, the Shiite Muslim, in his house for 5 days leading up to his wedding, living as a surrogate brother and participating in every ceremony.

And as for being a Jew, I think most Jews would say that I am not Jewish. You see, Judiasim is a matriarchal religion and my Grandmother, my Mother’s Mother, is to this day a Catholic. She was happily married, a role model marriage like few I’ve seen, to my Jewish Grandfather until he died.

We can co-exist.

When I read Thomas Friedman’s The World Is Flat I was drawn to the ideas in his very powerful final chapter where he talks of cultures that are stuck on History rather than Hope. There can never be peace in the Middle East if History trumps Hope. Jerusalem taught me that: As a city with great historical significance to three very different religions, Jerusalem should be a sacred and holy place, not a place of hostility and tension.  But where we have ‘anger, envy, sorrow, regret, greed, arrogance, self-pity, guilt, resentment, inferiority, lies, false pride, superiority, and ego,’ we have evil, and we will never have peace.

We remember.

There are parts of History we should not forget. After all, World War One was the ‘war to end all wars’… And so I am writing this on Remembrance Day for a reason. Whether it be concentration camps and the Holocaust or Hiroshima and Nagasaki or genocide in Russia, Rwanda, or East Timor… or any tragic historical event worth remembering… we choose to remember so that we do not repeat our mistakes. We must want and hope that things can be better. We must see lessons learned, not resentment and mistrust. The past will repeat itself if we do not see ‘joy, peace, love, hope, serenity, humility, kindness, benevolence, empathy, generosity, truth, compassion, and faith’… faith that tomorrow can be better than today.

And the battle continues…

“The same fight is going on inside you – and inside every other person too.” 

The grandson thought about this for a minute and then asked his grandfather, “Which wolf will win? 

The old Cherokee simply replied, “The one you feed.” 

May you always feed the good wolf.

Related: In Remembrance 2019.

It’s about the nuances

Today I ran into a teacher that was a favourite of my two daughters. He brought up a current geopolitical issue that I won’t discuss here, because there is too much nuance and I’m not prepared to write a dissertation of my thoughts… and anything else will only cause me grief. In fact, even a dissertation would cause me grief because I’d be bound to garnish disagreement and even anger. Why? Because no matter what position I hold, no matter how nuanced or not, it will upset people.

We’ve reached an impasse in public conversation when nuance is not part of the conversation. Everything is black & white, and any shade of grey is ‘othered’ to the opposing view. This is unhealthy. Very unhealthy.

It took my conversation today, where we agreed yet were equally reserved, to realize that a more public conversation can’t happen for me. I’m not knowledgeable enough. I haven’t done the hard work to have a strong and well defended view of a sensitive issue. I ask questions that could and would piss off people on either side of the issue.

I’ve said before,

“We want to live, thrive, and love in a pluralistic society. We just need to recognize that in such a society we must be tolerant and accepting of opposing views, unaccepting of hateful and hurtful acts, and smart enough to understand the difference.”

I don’t believe that distinction is being made right now. I don’t see an openness to nuance. I don’t see a way forward where we are moving in the right direction. An upcoming election in the US coupled with AI generated fake news, and the bi-polar positions on the left and right, are going to lead to a shitstorm. It’s going to get ugly, it might get violent, and it will not get better until it gets worse.

We need to find a way to bring back nuanced debate and conversation… where different opinions are met with interest not scorn, with acceptance not ridicule. Discourse can be had without anger, and nuanced opinions will lead to solutions where now we only find conflict.

One world under God

Imagine a world where everyone who prayed believed that no matter what religion anyone practiced, that the higher being they prey to is The Creator. Can an all powerful God not manifest Him/Her/Itself in many ways to many peoples? Does this God need to share their understanding with every tribe, in every language, and in every culture identically? Would that even make sense?

If there is One God then could we not see the Good in all holy texts, and recognize our similarities? Recognize the kindness to strangers all these books profess? Recognize that living a spiritual life means spreading love and kindness rather than raising arms against our brothers, sisters, and other children of the same God?

If The Creator is the same creator, no matter the religion, then why would we be fighting? It can not be in God’s name. So it must be a weakness of our species that creates the hatred. It is the territorial animal in us that overpowers our humanity.

A spiritual, kind, and loving being does not attack fellow beings; does not send their children to war; does not treat children as pawns or collateral. Since religions can not bring our world together I have to wonder what can? What can bring our people, all of our tribes together?

I want to believe that we can see ourselves as a species that is kind. I want to believe that we can see ourselves as a species that is loving. I want to believe that we can see ourselves as a species that is peaceful. I want to believe that humanity is more powerful than our animal instincts and that we are wise enough to solve our problems without the need to kill our neighbours, here on this planet with so-called ‘intelligent’ life… that one God created.

Bridging metaphors

In a conversation with Joe Truss yesterday, we were talking about bridging metaphors, and how they connect ideas in ways that simple comparisons do not. It occurred to us that the idea itself of a bridging metaphor is a metaphor… the word ‘bridge’ takes the physical idea of a bridge and transforms a relationship into something more tangible to understand.

The world is filled with metaphorical bridges. When we make a transition we often use a bridge metaphor of ‘crossing over’ or taking us from one place to the next. Or we find bridges as meeting points in arguments or negotiations.

Whether we are ‘meeting half way’, ‘not worrying until we have to cross that bridge’, or building bridges between people or ideas, we are using the bridge as a metaphor. We are constructing a way to get us over a challenge.

In many ways the idea of a metaphorical bridge is more powerful than a physical bridge. We yearn for metaphorical bridges. A perfect example of this is the discrepancies between Newtonian Physics and Relativity. We seek the bridge. We want to know why the math for each do not mesh and we want that unifying theory to ‘bridge the gap’. We seek bridges to make sense of the world, of relationships between people (connection and communication) and ideas, not just geography.

The biggest challenge we face in the next few decades is that of bridge building. It seems the terrain is getting tougher to pass rather than easier. Countries at war, religious beliefs fostering hate, political parties not willing to show any sign of cooperation, of ‘meeting part way’.

As a species we seem to spend more time tearing down bridges than building them. We need to change this. We need to be metaphorical bridge builders. We need to construct ways of getting over the challenges we face. We need to support ideas that bring us closer together.

((And in case you missed it, both of the last two sentences are bridging metaphors.))

Fictional assassins

I’m reading one of Mark Greaney’s Gray Man books, Sierra Six. It’s a spy novel with a rogue CIA agent fighting against evil terrorists. It brings to life how a handful of people can wreak havoc in the world.

It also makes me think about a few other things:

1. We like to support an underdog.

2. Vigilantes with a virtuous agenda make great underdogs.

3. Nefarious criminals have the upper hand in that most people don’t expect others to act in an evil way, and so bad scenarios are harder to defend against.

4. Assassins have amazing technology at their disposal, and I’m surprised more assassinations don’t happen.

On this last point, don’t get me wrong, I don’t want to live a world where vigilantes and assassins take justice into their own hands, but I also don’t want criminals doing the same… and criminals doing this are far more likely than good people.

How long before we see a political figure being killed by a drone, or from a weapon more than a mile away? What kind of world would we live in where any political figure needs to constantly think about personal threats to themselves when out in public?

I know that books like this are about larger than life heroes, victims, and criminals, but the technology described in these books are usually real and/or possible. I know most people are smart enough to know that the vast majority of criminals get caught, and a life of crime doesn’t usually pay. But it only takes a few angry people to really disrupt the world we live in… and there are specific tragedies we can all think of that prove this.

Fictional assassins tend to have intelligence, physical strength, and top of the line high tech tools. Real assassins probably aren’t the full package that makes a storybook character, but they are probably getting access to similar weaponry. The threats they could pose are only getting worse. We shouldn’t need to live in fear, but we should never doubt the threat of people willing to do bad things for bad reasons. And maybe, just maybe, a vigilante do-good-er could come out of fictional imagination and into the real world to make the world a safer place.

Now back to my book!

Free speech in a free society

There are a few people I really hate to listen to. They annoy me with their persuasive rhetoric and popular-sounding rifts and quotes that speak to a target audience and to no one else. That said, I don’t think I have a right to silence them. I can be outspoken about what they are saying that I think is wrong. I could choose to block them on social media platforms, and I can even call them nasty names, if that’s a game I want to play, (I don’t), but I don’t get to shut them up.

On the other hand, I think hate speech has no place in a good and decent society. In other words, we should only be intolerant of intolerance:

The paradox of tolerance states that if a society is tolerant without limit, its ability to be tolerant is eventually ceased or destroyed by the intolerant. Karl Popper described it as the seemingly self-contradictory idea that in order to maintain a tolerant society, the society must retain the right to be intolerant of intolerance.

And so when I see news like this, it upsets me. It doesn’t matter what your politics are, whether you are on the left or right, or whether or not you think our Prime Minister is doing a good job or not… He should not have to shorten an event because of angry protesters.

I will defend anyone’s right to protest. Not screaming protesters preventing a speech they don’t want to hear, not things being thrown at speakers, and not disrupting a planned event and making the event impossible to run. Unless the person speaking is spouting hate, we need tolerance. The only thing that should be disrupted is hate speech and intolerance. That’s it. That’s all.

We undermine our own freedoms when we prevent people with different views from speaking. We don’t have to give them a platform ourselves. We do have to recognize their rights and freedoms to think differently than us. Don’t like the the Prime Minister? Then be active in the next election. Do research and speak from a knowledgeable place about his policies you dislike and promote another candidate. Share your opinion, dedicate your time, and change things in the next (free) election. But don’t heckle, scream, and disrupt that person’s planned event. Want to hold up signs and protest, go ahead. Want to share your opposing opinion on social media? Go ahead. But don’t be a jerk and prevent a planned event from happening… save that for groups with names like Hitler Loving Nazis. If that’s a hate group giving a talk, the paradox of tolerance comes into play, and by all means disrupt and prevent that hate speech from happening. Anything less than that, then preserving free speech is far more important than anything you have to say in a disruptive protest.

Performances and life

We watched The Prom last night at Theatre Under The Stars (TUTS). It was an excellent performance, with clever comedy and fun songs. It was also a nice, cool night for outdoor theatre. My wife and I had a wonderful night out.

This morning I thought a little bit about the play’s theme: “The musical follows four Broadway actors lamenting their days of fame, as they travel to the conservative town of Edgewater, Indiana, to help a lesbian student banned from bringing her girlfriend to high school prom.”

While the town is fictional, I can’t help but be disappointed that this story doesn’t play in my mind as an era piece. It doesn’t come off as a 1960’s hick, small town story from yesteryear. Instead, it feels incredibly relevant to some of the stories coming out of small towns, and whole states, south of our Canadian border.

That equality and equity are still basic rights being fought for today is sad to the point of tragic. That there is relevance to the play’s message, and it’s not a piece about a long gone era is upsetting. However this was based on a similar story in a small town in Mississippi in 2010.

2010!

Good theatre tells stories that are relevant, I just wish this performance was less relevant today, and more of a historical telling.

1984 in 2024

First they came…

First they came for the socialists, and I did not speak out— Because I was not a socialist.

Then they came for the trade unionists, and I did not speak out— Because I was not a trade unionist.

Then they came for the Jews, and I did not speak out— Because I was not a Jew.

Then they came for me— and there was no one left to speak for me.

~ German Lutheran pastor Martin Niemöller (1892–1984)

— — — — — — — —

I watched a short video about a school board voting down an attempt to ban books. I thought it was an American video about the the ultra-conservative movement in Florida. I was wrong. This was in Manitoba, and while the book ban was denied, I was struck by the realization that this was something being voted on in Canada.

There is hate in this world. It is driven by fear. It’s driven by the idea that someone getting more rights, more choice, and more opportunity somehow removes those things from someone else… from someone privileged.

I salute the community of Brandon Manitoba for standing up against such prejudice and hate. I salute everyone who speak out against hate, tyranny, prejudice, and ignorance.

Over the past few months I’ve rolled my eyes and wondered how the ‘land of the brave and home of the free’ down below our southern border could become so much more fearful and so much less free? Banning books, stripping away women’s rights, and creating policies based on ignorance and hate… This isn’t conservatism, it’s fascism. It’s oppressive and un-democratic.

In Florida you won’t find George Orwell’s 1984 in school libraries any more. They’ve entered an era where a dystopian novel about government control is being banned by the government; an era where history is being whitewashed; an era where hospitals can deny needed services that don’t meet the ruling party’s oppressive guidelines. And these ideas are spreading.

The people of Brandon Manitoba got to say ‘No’! No one in Florida was given the same choice. I could name a few countries in the world where I’d expect to see this, none of them on this continent until now. I fear that the US election in 2024 is not about political parties, it’s about democratic ideology… it’s a choice between living in an open and free society or a state controlled and restricted society.

The interesting thing in both Canada and in the United States is that these battles are not just being fought in national elections, they are being fought municipally in local elections including school board elections. We saw it here in my city when, last year, I broke my non-partisan ‘it’s your duty to vote’ message to speak out against a (fringe, close minded) group of school trustee candidates. (They all lost their bid.)

We can’t wait until deeply un-democratic but politically active people take away our books, and our rights and freedoms, before we act. We need elected officials like the ones in Brandon Manitoba to be in the positions they were in. And if we can’t step up, we need to vote for the ones who do.

In Canada voter turnout has decreased since 2015. It dropped from 48.8% in 2019 to 44.5% in 2021. The voter turnout rates were much higher in the close race of 2020 in the US, but 1/3 of the eligible population still didn’t vote. In both countries local municipal elections have even less people turn up to vote. If ever there was a time to show up and vote, if ever there was a time to step up and take on an elected position, this is it.

The beauty of a democracy is that everyone has a voice… the scary thing about a democracy is that everyone has a voice.

I may not want a Orwellian 1984 government, but I do want my future grandchildren to be able to read that book in their public school library. I want my grandchildren to learn about multiple historical perspectives. And I want my grandchildren to live in an open, inclusive, and accepting society, not one that limits their rights and freedoms.

We need to speak for them, and for everyone who is having their liberties stripped away, before our chance to speak up, even to vote, is lost.

Down the Social Media Rabbit Hole

I made a mistake last night. I was on Twitter and clicked on a video of a guy knocking down a surveillance camera on a street light in Australia. I then scrolled to the next video and went down a right wing rabbit hole. The first video was a voiceover of Tucker Carlson recently ‘dismissed’ from Fox News, and it was essentially trying to make humourous jokes about a transgender host taking over. Next was a Republican semi-automatic gun wearing black man praising the NRA and claiming the democrats are ‘coming for our guns’. Then came a Sean Hannity clip that I didn’t watch. Then came my first Canadian content with a clip bashing Justin Trudeau. And finally I called it quits after watching a geologist bashing climate change… in case you didn’t know, carbon dioxide is ‘plant food, not a pollutant’.

These crazy social media algorithms, and the deep fakes I spoke about a few days ago, are going to absolutely polarize us, paralyze us, and completely undermine us.

Don’t ignore opposing views, measure them. Don’t jump on the bandwagon, figure out if you want to travel the exact same route. Don’t criticize, question. Don’t SHOUT, disengage until cooler heads prevail.

Don’t pretend the algorithms aren’t already influencing you, be savvy and question why posts and videos are algorithmically chosen for you. You are either trying to be digitally literate or you are probably being manipulated and steered towards an extreme view.

From the horses mouth

I’ve already seen some really good deep fakes of famous people that both look and sound real. That was over a year ago and the technology is far better now. I just watched this NBC Nightly News clip on TikTok:

The whole video is cautionary and a little scary, looking at Artificial Intelligence (AI) as a possible threat to Humanity. At the 2:17 minute mark this was said,

“AI tools can already mimic voices, ace exams, create art, and diagnose diseases. And they are getting smarter every day.

In two years by the time of the election, human beings will not be able to tell the difference between what is real and what is fake.”

It occurred to me that the lead up to the next US election is going to include countless deep fakes that will be virally shared and reposted and re-shared, which will be far more convincing than anything we’ve seen so far. The clever ones won’t be far fetched in content, they will be convincing because they will subtly send people down a specific narrative without being outrageous or egregious and easy to spot. For example: Biden supporting and endorsing some ultra-left wing, ‘woke’ group the makes the right outraged. Or Trump speaking to a friend about how he hates guns and the NRA. Each of these can be completely fabricated and completely convincing.

This is really scary because where you get your news will be vitally important. Hopefully major news outlets would vet the videos and verify authenticity before sharing, but digital newspapers are always worried about missing the scoop and letting other networks go viral. Many less reputable sites will share the fake videos just because it fits their narrative. Other sites will knowingly share the fake videos because their intent is to mislead, and to feed anger and vitriol to their naive followers.

Conspiracies will be magnified and any mention of the videos being fake will be counter argued that reports of the video being faked are just the way the government is trying to keep the truth from you. The message being, the fakes are real and the reports of them being fake is the fake news. People already believe fake articles with no fact-checking, they are going to be completely fooled by extremely convincing fake videos.

My advice, find websites that you trust and make sure the web url is correct. Follow people you trust and question anything suspicious from them that isn’t from your trusted sites. If it’s not from your trusted site, if it’s not right from the horses mouth and it seems suspicious, consider it fake until you verify.

How serious is this? You don’t have to be famous to be deep faked. Here is a story of a mom thinking she was talking to her kidnapped daughter, convinced it was her voice on the phone with her kidnappers, but it was a fake and her daughter was upstairs in her room. The point of the video is to have a safe word with your family because anyone’s voice can be easily faked.

We are entering a time when people are defining truth differently, when fakes seem more like truth, and when sources of information are going to be as important as the information itself.