Fear Grips Nation. That was the ominous sounding headline splashed across the front of The Province, with a picture of a brooding sky and a Canadian flag. In a word or two--one of the most sensationalist and ludicrous newspaper covers that I have seen in years. Apparently, 75% of Canadians are truly scared for the future of the country--so says a poll published in the paper. Let’s get real. We need to grow up and put an end to this lunacy. Yes, we find ourselves in a time of unprecedented political instability, but the sun will rise tomorrow, chickens will still lay eggs, and salmon will amazingly find their way back to the river of their birth. And Canada will forge along as it has for 141 years.
Most of us have never experienced real fear.
Fear is when you were the sole income earner, and you just lost your job, or you’re not sure where you’ll find some money to buy your kids presents at Christmas, or you don’t where you’ll sleep tonight, because you have no home to go to. Fear is when a soldier points a gun at your husband’s head and shoots him, and then rapes your daughter. Fear is when you have to walk miles through the searing heat looking for clean drinking water, or when war drives you to pack up all your belongings (which you can carry in your hands), and forces you to trek for hundreds of miles to another country, only to find yourself with thousands of others crammed into a refugee camp, uncertain if you will ever return to your home. Fear is when the Ebola virus, or some other insidious disease, sweeps through your impoverished village.
Fear is when you know you are drowning and you take one gasp of air before slipping beneath the surface. Fear is when you are trapped in a burning building, or lost and injured on a freezing hillside, or you lose your brakes while driving down a steep mountain road. Fear is when a foreign army rolls across the border and occupies your town. Fear is when you and your family are huddled in the cellar of your house waiting for the monstrous destruction of a tornado or hurricane to pass, or when you survive a massive earthquake, only to find that 100,000 of your neighbours perished and cholera is now rampant. Fear is when your son, who has found a home in the South Side Compton Crip gang, gives you a hug on his way out the door, and you wonder if it will be the last time you see him alive.
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2 comments:
I fear you've oversold your point. Fear can be much more sublime than the extreme examples you've given. It is perfectly reasonable to feel fear about the small things in life as much as it is for the big things. While the headline may have been sensational, the sentiment of the public may not be. One of the biggest fears people have is change, and there is a sense that there could be big, unexpected changes in the country. Some may be irrational, others logical. The response of the already fragile markets to the political instability certainly gives the pensioner on a fixed income reason to fear. People who have put up with 30 years of constitutional wrangling and being pitted against their fellow citizens from other regions may fear having to go through the gut-wrenching/tedious (take your pick) experience all over again.
That all said, if the sun isn't up tomorrow it's because it's raining once again.
Sean,
No doubt we can fear the small things in life. But it's how we deal with those small things that is a reflection of our character. Do we get ourselves all worked up in a frenzy or do we deal with our challenges using rational thought.
My point was about putting everything into context. This country is not well served by attention grabbing headlines, and polls which suggest 75% of Canadians are truly scared for the future of the country. If three-quarters of Canadians are indeed scared of the future of this country, then let me off the bus.
As Roosevelt said, "This great Nation will endure as it has endured, will revive and will prosper. So, first of all, let me assert my firm belief that the only thing we have to fear is fear itself—nameless, unreasoning, unjustified terror which paralyzes needed efforts to convert retreat into advance..."
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