A Closer Look: Jody Paterson

I wrote a letter to the editor to the Victoria Times Colonist that they ran Sept 27 as an opinion piece , which I then posted on Facebook, where it got major traction primarily among people who aren't my "followers."  I'm saying all of that because it has led me to conclude that those of us who think like this about the social crisis burning on all of our communities' streets need to be way more out there in public spheres with our thoughts. There is more support than we might think, and governments that only ever hear from the highly active lock-em-up types need to know that.  Let's take a leaf from the populist playbook and get loud at every opportunity. (Ideally by pointing out the reality rather than just shouting angrily at the "other side" that they're idiots, though I admit I came pretty close to doing that in this particular rant, didn't I?) I fear that some of us in this fight have concluded that it's hopeless to openly push back...

I remember a time when I thought that online comment sections under news stories would encourage the sharing of fascinating insights and common wisdom, and that social media would be such a force for good in bringing us together in community around the world. Who WAS that stupid woman? She’s long gone now, though I do miss her optimism. She didn’t yet know that human beings are really quite awful and unstable when grouped by the millions into dangerous tribes brimming with hate and given free licence to say the most awful things about each other. I’ve done a lot of reading over the years to try to understand human beings. It has given me more understanding at a scholarly level, I suppose, but I’m still pretty baffled overall. We are wild animals dressed up in the thinnest veneers of civility. We achieve greatness, then we tear it all down. The blame for our increasingly outrageous ways gets apportioned depending on your tribe, of course. It’s the alt-right. It’s the woke. It’s the tran...

  I was standing on the beach at Esquimalt Lagoon a couple of days ago, gazing out across the sea at the Olympic Peninsula and having that usual thought of how lucky I was to live amid such beauty. But it isn’t actually luck, is it? It’s planning. If the beach I was standing on happened to have been located in a different part of the world, it would very likely all be private property now, bought up by people who love the vista too but want it only for themselves. Or it might be covered in garbage and plastics. Or reeking of raw sewage. There might be a factory on the shore, or uncontrolled industry spread across the landscape. Someone might have built a big casino there, or a 24-hour disco. There almost certainly wouldn’t be a protected bird sanctuary across from the beach, with nice paths in all directions and easy, safe roadside parking. That none of that happened had nothing to do with luck. Virtually everything about my very pleasant experience at the beach that day ...