La End Odour
I walk to work because I like the exercise but lately I've been wondering if all I'm doing is raising my blood pressure. That's because I think while I walk instead of sticking things in my ears and listening to music like normal people do. Today my mind cast itself back to a particularly egregious occurance. Something that happened to me and my husband when we lived in Belleville.
Or Hellville, as we called it.
We had stopped in at the McDonald's on the way to the Mall for a quick lunch. In the back of our Toyota was the wall of carseats. One, two, three. Occupied. By two toddlers and a baby. Ours. Anyway, we went to the Drive Thru (spelt "thru", I guess, to go with the fast food theme), then parked in the lot and ate. A joyless meal, to be sure, but even at 11:00 a.m. we were beyond any attempt at aesthetics.
As soon as we were done eating, my husband started the engine and we headed out of the parking lot.
There he was. Officer Doright of the O.P.P. He even turned on his siren for a second. I froze. Coppers. My husband turned off the car.
"Excuse me, Sir. I notice you're not wearing your seatbelt. I'll have to give you a ticket." I looked at my husband. Sure enough, he wasn't wearing his seatbelt. Probably for the first time ever in the entire course of his driving life - he wasn't wearing his seatbelt. We figured later, it was because we ate in the parking lot. He'd undone his seatbelt and forgot to do it up again. Me? I would have eaten with my seatbelt on. Because I'm a woman.
It was awkward for the poor fellow. He could clearly see the three kids in the back. The car was an '84 Toyota Tercel and it was 1995. And the ticket was $120.00.
Anyway, I was thinking about that as I walked to work because, not only did we get the ticket, but we had to endure a lecture on the merits of seatbelts and wearing them at all times. My husband, to his credit, didn't take the cars keys and gouge his own ears out. To my credit, I didn't yell, "Fuck you, you mother fucking cocksucker asswipe fascist diklikker POOPOOHEAD!"
Because then the kids would have been callling each other Poopooheads for the next... ten years?
Still, even though he was sitting strategically across from the McDonald's parking lot, waiting for someone to forget to do up his seatbelt before he started the car, so he could make the monthly ticket quota without too much effort, it wasn't like he put us on a list or anything. We just got a ticket for a finite amount of money and that was that.
So, I don't understand, for the life of me, people who support the idea of more law and order, government watchdogs, private watchdogs - any of that, "You'd better mind your p's and q's Mr. Smart Alecky Upstart or we'll be all over you like dung beetles on a cowpie" stuff.
Because, here's the thing. I have a blog. You're reading it. I have a comments section. Perhaps you've read through it, too. If you've read through it late at night or early in the morning, you'll have noticed that I have the odd commenter(s) who would seem to be sifting through all of my entries looking for indications that perhaps I am not Pro-Israel enough to pass muster. Whose muster, I have no idea. When I am not Pro-Israel enough combined with not Pro-Bush enough, the commenter(s) become more insistent that I am not passing muster. But when I am not Pro-Israel enough combined with not being Pro-Harper enough, the commenter(s)' Mustermetre goes Red Alert, "BLOGGER NOT MEETING MUSTER!!!!"
Luckily, it's only the internet and there isn't really a list somewhere tallying up all the bloggers who have sent the Mustermetre to Red Alert. But a story in efrank last week makes one wonder about what IS going on in the blogosphere and if, indeed, there are campaigns afloat, systematic campaigns, to shut down - first a blogger's comments section - and then the blogger. Because having a comments section is a big draw to a blog. Feedback and interaction between bloggers and their readers is, for some, the cool part of the whole exercise. And yet, it would appear that Antonia Zerbisias of The Toronto Star, who had what I would call a fairly Liberal blog that reported fairly strongly on Israel's diplomacy (and lack thereof) in the Middle East, may have been targetted for shutdown because of her opinions.
That may or not be the case. No one is certainly taking credit/discredit for the demise of the blog. But it got me to thinking - Are there really watchdogs out there reporting findings to groups unknown? I mean, I suppose there could be and it doesn't matter because they're all a bunch of kooks.
But what if they're not necessarily kooks? What if they're people seeking to make a "ticket quota"? And you're a blogger who does the cyber politics legal equivalent of forgetting to do up your seatbelt? Like say... you condemn Israel for threatening to nuke Iran - BUT - you don't condemn Iran for threatening to wipe Israel off the map?
And let's face it - humour does NOT translate well on the internet. One person's, "How many Israelis does it take to screw in a lightbulb? - As many as it takes to crowd out the Palestinians" - is another person's Red Alert.
Anyway, we paid the ticket. I delete the comments. And go on to my next entry.
Just in case anyone's watching.
And hopefully, because more people are reading.
Better buckle up. As Betty Davis would say, "It's going to be a bumpy ride".
