I didn’t write about this week’s big political drama because I’ve been too depressed, at the finger-pointing and lack of introspection. The desire for power at the expense of principle. How common it is to refuse to distinguish between fact and propaganda. How society conflates arrogance with competence, at least when it comes to white men.
I had things to say but I was too discouraged to say them.
We make choices every day. We can choose to help people who need it, or we can pretend the only people who matter are “middle class” or richer. We can listen when people point out our actions are causing harm, or we can ignore them and continue to cause harm.
It can be discouraging to point out when people are causing us harm. We’re told we don’t matter. We’re told we’re too sensitive, too needy. We’re told it’s too much work to fix. Sometimes we’re accused of being the problem, because we pointed out the existence of harm. Often we’re told that we should be grateful because the harm could be worse; often that comment comes with threatening subtext. But staying quiet means things will never get better.
I can’t make people listen if they’re determined not to understand. But I can concentrate on reducing the harm I cause myself, and some other day I might have the spoons to try again.
Quick update on pharmacare
I’ll do a quick update on pharmacare, though, since I have the facts to hand after the last few days of trying to get Liberal supporters to admit that it doesn’t actually exist yet. (They’ve proven even less receptive to the facts that (1) Justin Trudeau introduced the bill only under significant pressure from the NDP, after nine years as Prime Minister, and (2) the text is considerably less impressive than their talking points.)
I compared the bill as introduced to the bill as it currently exists in the Senate and my earlier analysis stands. The only changes made to the proposed law so far are to reduce the Minister’s discretion a tiny bit, by turning two “may”s into “must”s (ss. 6(1) and 7) and by imposing a tabling requirement with time limit (new s. 11(3)). Those are fine amendments – there’s no reason, for example, that the Minister should be permitted to bury expert reports or refuse to pay out after entering into an agreement with a province – but they do nothing to speed up the process of Canadians getting support with medical expenses.
The only path to that is for politicians to start privileging the needs of their constituents over their own egos.
Making political games out of people’s lives
I didn’t write about this week’s big political drama because I’ve been too depressed, at the finger-pointing and lack of introspection. The desire for power at the expense of principle. How common it is to refuse to distinguish between fact and propaganda. How society conflates arrogance with competence, at least when it comes to white men.
I had things to say but I was too discouraged to say them.
We make choices every day. We can choose to help people who need it, or we can pretend the only people who matter are “middle class” or richer. We can listen when people point out our actions are causing harm, or we can ignore them and continue to cause harm.
It can be discouraging to point out when people are causing us harm. We’re told we don’t matter. We’re told we’re too sensitive, too needy. We’re told it’s too much work to fix. Sometimes we’re accused of being the problem, because we pointed out the existence of harm. Often we’re told that we should be grateful because the harm could be worse; often that comment comes with threatening subtext. But staying quiet means things will never get better.
I can’t make people listen if they’re determined not to understand. But I can concentrate on reducing the harm I cause myself, and some other day I might have the spoons to try again.
Quick update on pharmacare
I’ll do a quick update on pharmacare, though, since I have the facts to hand after the last few days of trying to get Liberal supporters to admit that it doesn’t actually exist yet. (They’ve proven even less receptive to the facts that (1) Justin Trudeau introduced the bill only under significant pressure from the NDP, after nine years as Prime Minister, and (2) the text is considerably less impressive than their talking points.)
I compared the bill as introduced to the bill as it currently exists in the Senate and my earlier analysis stands. The only changes made to the proposed law so far are to reduce the Minister’s discretion a tiny bit, by turning two “may”s into “must”s (ss. 6(1) and 7) and by imposing a tabling requirement with time limit (new s. 11(3)). Those are fine amendments – there’s no reason, for example, that the Minister should be permitted to bury expert reports or refuse to pay out after entering into an agreement with a province – but they do nothing to speed up the process of Canadians getting support with medical expenses.
The only path to that is for politicians to start privileging the needs of their constituents over their own egos.