Disney Gets Tough on Crime
I went to a high school musical last night, which was surprisingly good (people are clearly spending plenty of their hard earned working family incomes on singing and dancing lessons for their kids) but which came with a very stern introductory warning by the musical theatre teacher (yes, Virginia, some schools DO have musical theatre classes - just... not likely in your neighbourhood - the public system is more public in some neighbourhoods than in others). The warning concerned copyright laws advising the audience that video-taping any part of the performance is strictly forbidden by law - particularly Disney law - and since this was a Disney production, please please please: OBEY THE LAW!
Now, I can't imagine why anyone would want to record a high school musical in any case, but golly gee, Disney - hardass much?
Meanwhile the particular play performed last night centered around Horton, the Dr. Seuss character who hears a Who with an over-the-top absolutely fanstastically fabulous Cat in the Hat setting him and The Whos down in Whoville up for a fun-filled two hours. (As an aside, there were little kids in the audience, so wrapped up in the performance, that they came perilously/delightfully close to actually being IN the play - it really was that good.) And it was at the very first "a person's a person no matter how small" that I realized this is the play that has resurrected the controversy about "Horton Hears A Who" versus the Pro-Life Movement which has adopted him as some kind of mascot - expressly against the wishes of Dr. Seuss and the Family Trust.
It added an interesting dimension to the play because, knowing a few of the actors in it, the Pro-Life Movement would be dismayed at how far and how hard it has fallen behind in its campaign to convince society that the rights of the unborn should take precedence over the rights of women as fully recognized persons in law - which brought to mind the awful Bill C-454 and its sleazy New Conservative attempt to re-criminalize abortion through what it pretends is just another redundant and partisan stuff o' nonsense tough on crime initiative that - unsurprisingly - does absolutely nothing to prevent crime.
Because that's really is, isn't it. So much crime could be prevented but our governments clearly do not have the will to spend the money necessary to make public safety our reality instead of all of this after-the-fact crime and punishment, with a lot of tough talk which is really just the worst kind of politically-motivated ass-covering for managerial neglect and failure to perform one's duty to the public to ensure, at the very least, that public space is safe. For instance, after the play, I walked to a friends house for a ride back downtown (the school is in the suburbs) and I was genuinely nervous for my safety - at 9:00 p.m. The walk was dark, deserted, and lacking sidewalks. The idea of teenaged girls having to make the same trek, almost made my blood boil, so obvious was the fact that none of our tax dollars go towards making public space safe for girls and women.
Some tough guy government we've got here, eh ladies? After the criminals are caught, anyway. Up until that point, it's afraid to even spend our tax dollars appropriately for fear of losing that little bit of grassroots support that holds our entire society ransom to stupid petty short-sighted wing-nutty interests.
It is unjust, is what it is. There is absolutely no attempt at actual safety being made by our governments - for girls and women, anyway - out in the suburbs. There just isn't. It's beyond disgraceful - it's absurd. I was afraid for my personal safety walking to my friends house from a high school at 9:00 at night in a nice suburb of Ottawa, the nation's wealthy and privileged capital. I can't imagine what it's like in YOUR city.
Better public transit that runs all night, sidewalks with plenty of street lighting even in the remotest of suburbs that developers should be made responsible for when they build all their godforsaken tract housing, safe work/education/recreation places with walk-safe programs for all women, cops out and about on the beat AT NIGHT when hard working taxpayers in low paying jobs are trying to get home to their valued families - no matter how and where they live - these are the things that would help prevent crime, but since they cost money in our valued days of tax cuts - we're stuck with politicians of the mindset that crime + punishment = New Conservative success story.
Anyway, the Whos down in Whoville when they really needed to get the attention of society (Horton, the Elephant, was about to be punished for guarding their dust speck of a world) shouted, "THINK!"
Maybe we should make like The Whos down in Whoville and try shouting "THINK!" over and over during the next election campaign.
