June, 2004 - Nr. 6
Letter from the Editor
Dear Reader
While nature is having a slow and cool start this spring the area of politics has heated up over night. We are about to elect a new Prime Minister for Canada and a new leader to the new Conservatives in Ontario.
Not everyone has gotten used to the new name of the all newly defined party. Just now I received a call from a pollster to as me if I wanted to vote for Mr. Tory as the leader of the Progressive Conservatives. Provincially they are still the PC party, and federally only the Conservatives? What’s up with that? Confusing, wouldn’t you say?
Ernie Eves is stepping down and needs to be replaced. We can choose between a few candidates and Mr. John Tory, last heard of in the mayoral race in Toronto- and he almost made it and I wish he would have - and Frank Klees. Was he not the German Tourism Minister in the last administration? He is of German decent, came here as a boy and at the Christmas Fair 2 years ago we indoctrinated him into the kind of luck that is supposed to happen if someone gives you for New Years a marzipan piglet. He got two from me!
Every election we revisit all the same old clichés: Who to vote for, the why and why not and why at all?! Should one go with an enemy one knows or should one leap into unknown waters. Or, as might be the best thing to do right now, should we go for a minority government, where everyone has to convince everyone else that the chosen course is the best one.
Not a bad idea, if you ask me. This way we can develop a strong multi system party again. We would and should give votes to the Green Party, we need an environmental watchdog, an alternative, not to govern yet, but to have a strong presence. We need the NDP, but not to govern by itself, we know that does not work too well. We do need the rather well developed point of view of the Conservatives to protect traditional rights, even if it ticks off some folks, and we need some of the good old Liberal know how, especially since they promise to be honest this time. Everyone deserves a chance to prove that, but not without penalties after the betrayal of trust.
So why not split all the votes in the family evenly all over the place and see what comes out. Perhaps we would actually have a government of the people and for the people. Wouldn’t that be true democracy, rather than a one party feudalistic dictatorship?
So much for the federal situation; what about the provincial
one. I think we need to hear a lot more from all the candidates. It has been
a bit too quiet on that front. But you do know that a lot of stuff is going
on over the Internet: emails of newsletters to anyone having had contact
with any political entity in the past and then some.
Politics and human rights
Yet
sometimes we need to do something unusual and actually get off our duffs and
go somewhere. I for instance visited City Hall, Toronto, after a lovely
dinner in the Four Season’s Hotel on Avenue Road, where Tourism Berlin was
wooing our favours, to hear about – what the poster said:
The Drugging of our Children. The Citizens
Commission for Human Rights and a few other interested individuals like
doctors and nutritionists who had done a lot of research into the causes of
adult and children immune system disorders, disclosed some startling
statistics and facts.
Did you know that currently there are more than 3 million prescriptions for antidepressants being written for just as many children per year? In Canada! That is 10 % of our population! Young people whose lives are routinely ruined. The figures are even worse in the USA, where in 2002 more than 10 Million children under 18 are on antidepressants. This constitutes a 50 % increase over the year 1998. There is a website by Dr. Ann Blake-Tracy telling it all: www.drugawareness.org . You can also go to www.cchr.org , which is a good source of information in regards to the abuse of human rights, especially in the psychiatric field.
Our school system has to come under real close scrutiny, because this is where our kids get drugged, if nowhere else. Ritalin is the answer these days to just about any condition that deviates from the "ideal" well-behaved child. The teachers are totally in the dark as to what to do. It is up to the parents to speak out for their children and not believe everything that comes out of a system that is looking for an easy way out.
And in the end it is a political issue, one that keeps falling by the wayside, as was also pointed out at this meeting in City Hall.
So when you as a parent are asked to participate in the school system, watch out that you are not voting for more drugs and psychiatry in the schools, but for more teaching and real caring of actual children and young people that constitute our collective future.
If you want to inform yourself more and extensively on the subject of the drugging of our children, or if you are already having difficulties with your children in school and the use of drugs, then contact the Citizens Commission on Human Rights, 27 Carlton Street, Suite 304, Toronto, ON M5B IL2, or call at 416-971-8555. You can also go to www.fightforkids.com
All this is going on while our community is celebrating all sorts of events and anniversaries, which are stooped in traditions of old, and which are based on our religious and cultural roots. As our front page montage points out: the old and the new have to co-exist next to each other. Sometimes it is a success, often times it does not, but it always deserves our help! St. George, the little church on College Street, founded by Dr. Goegginger, that has existed for 50 years as a German congregation and is surrounded by a bit of neighborhood and very close to downtown and its powerful businesses as depicted in the photos backdrop of BCE Place, build in a style reminiscent of a cathedral. But it is a temple of money and built for the glory of man, beautiful as it is.
Considering which of our causes we want to support needs regular reflection, and those that help where it is needed should also be supported. It is because of such acts that life is still livable and bearable. The arts definitely fall into such a category, religious activities do and all pursuits that favor and foster the better survival of all life forms.
Big job? Sure! Easy? No! But no one ever promised that it would be easy. And if everyone does a little bit, then that will be a whole lot!
Have a nice summer!
Sybille Forster-Rentmeister
Comments to: editor@echoworld.com
