Democracy Gone Astray

Democracy, being a human construct, needs to be thought of as directionality rather than an object. As such, to understand it requires not so much a description of existing structures and/or other related phenomena but a declaration of intentionality.
This blog aims at creating labeled lists of published infringements of such intentionality, of points in time where democracy strays from its intended directionality. In addition to outright infringements, this blog also collects important contemporary information and/or discussions that impact our socio-political landscape.

All the posts here were published in the electronic media – main-stream as well as fringe, and maintain links to the original texts.

[NOTE: Due to changes I haven't caught on time in the blogging software, all of the 'Original Article' links were nullified between September 11, 2012 and December 11, 2012. My apologies.]

Thursday, November 24, 2011

The Occupiers have even lost Naheed Nenshi

Even Naheed Nenshi, possibly the nicest mayor big-city Canada ever had, is fed up with the Occupiers. If you've lost Calgary Mayor Nenshi, you've lost the country.

So here is the choice the Occupiers face: go, with their tents and their portable toilets, and keep their dignity and message reasonably intact; or resist, and act as a law unto themselves, and be forever remembered dragging their own names through the mud of their unwanted encampments.

There is a third choice, peaceful civil disobedience: refuse to leave, insist on being carried away by police, and face the judicial consequences. Alas, if Mr. Nenshi is fed up, civil disobedience at this late stage is probably going to be met with a yawn, at best, by the public. “The protesters need to understand that they've lost the thread, they've completely lost the plot,” Mr. Nenshi says. “Making this about the tents instead of about the issues they're talking about, they've completely lost any ability to influence people.”

The remarkable tolerance of the civic authorities may have created a mistaken impression among the Occupiers that they have a right to occupy. Maybe that explains why the movement has tried everyone's patience, including Mr. Nenshi's. Its members seem to believe that civil disobedience is a form of protest protected from consequences. In Vancouver, after being served with a court order, the protesters packed up their tents and, like children proud of their cunning, moved them to another public area. Occupy seems just another group claiming an entitlement, free of responsibilities toward others.

The Occupy movement began as an understandable response to the excesses that contributed to the world financial crisis. It turned into an excess of its own. And now the courts have taken a strong stand against that excess. The time for negotiations is gone. Even Mr. Nenshi says so.

What will anyone remember of all this in a few years, or even in a few weeks? It depends on whether the Occupiers make a last, self-defeating stand, or go, as Montreal Mayor GĂ©rald Tremblay says, with their heads held high.

Origin
Source: Globe&Mail 

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