I Am Sorry

This morning, I posted something to my Facebook timeline that I shouldn't have, with a comment I had no business making.

I did it in spite of already having had an exchange on Twitter about the very same topic--in which an e-friend chided me for views I had without knowing I had them.

I very intensely dislike our Prime Minister, Stephen Harper. I unreservedly believe he is the worst PM in this nation's history; that the only way he could be outdone is if a PM comes along and bans elections; that he is thoroughly dedicated to the destruction of everything I value as a Canadian, and that he has already accomplished more than his share of that destruction.

I do not wish the man harm of any kind. I do not consider him evil. I think he is severely misguided and stunningly obtuse, but he is not evil and I do not wish him harm.

During the attack on Parliament Hill last week, the PM was, as it turns out, escorted to a broom closet, having left his caucus (which included a paraplegic) to fend for themselves. No one knew where Harper was. This has spawned a fair bit of mockery on Twitter and elsewhere--the man who is so tough on crime and terror that he's the only possible leader this country should ever have, and off to the closet he went when the going got rough.

I joined in.

I'm sorry.

It is not right that I stand instantly ready to believe the worst of Stephen Harper. It's not right, for several reasons. First of all, his views are different from mine. This does not make them wrong. He believes in his worldview at least as strongly as I do in mine, and I usually pride myself on recalling that fact when I disagree with people. Nobody is a villain in his or her own mind, and people have the right to their beliefs--and to actions based on those beliefs, insofar as they don't harm others. Harm is such a beastly word to parse, though. Do I believe Harper means to harm Canada or Canadians? Not for a minute. Do I believe he has already harmed our environment, our standing in the world, and our very way of life? Yes, unfortunately, I do. But the way to show that opposition is to stand FOR the opposite, not against Harper. I know this. I know this, and I forgot it in my blind rush to condemn Harper for--

--for what, exactly? For not disarming a madman himself? Oh, no, no, Ken, you certainly don't think he should have done THAT, he should have done something else, such as...as...

Exactly what he did, that's what he should have done. To criticize him for that is actually kind of monstrous. I wasn't aware I had that much antipathy in me. I will need to work on this.

I was wrong to believe the worst of Harper because (sigh) he's not as bad as I routinely make him out to be in my head. He could certainly be a good deal worse, and those in our hysterical media who call him a tyrant should really have to go live a month under tyranny as punishment. There is little Harper has done that can't be UNdone by the next government in line, and it's worth noting that Harper learned most of his dirty tricks from one Jean Chrétien, who pioneered many of them--the omnibus bills, the rabid bullying, the automatic discounting of anything that didn't line up with the orthodoxy--those are all Chrétien traits. Again: stubborn as hell, terribly misguided (in my view)...but not evil, any more than Chrétien was.

I have friends from all over the political spectrum--extreme far left to full out yikes!--and I mean to keep those friends, all of them. It makes for a juggling act sometimes. But it's very rewarding to be permitted full access to such a wide range of thoughts and belief...and every once in a while, when I step in it, it's great to have somebody or somebodies ready to call me on my bullshit.

Now, I will say this: the security on Parliament Hill is far, far too lax. While the tragic shooting at the War Memorial probably couldn't have been prevented, the fact an armed gunman was allowed to even get close to Parliament, let alone walk right into it, is--well, does "insanity" cover it? I think it does.



The truth about anyone and anything is almost always somewhere in the middle of the spectrum of opinions that get presented. In this polarized climate, it's all too easy to forget that.

I was further chastened in the ensuing debate over ISIS and what it may or may not have had to do with last week's attack. Nothing much, was my view, any more than video games or 'satanic' music had anything to do with other crazies going off in the past and murdering people. Islam is just an excuse some people use to commit crimes--all the proof I needed for that was the roughly 1.7 billion Muslims who don't. I specifically cited Marc Lépine, who shot 28 people, killing fourteen, in Montréal in 1989, as someone who didn't need Islam to justify his deeds.

Marc Lépine, I was informed, was a Muslim. I'd had no idea. While it's true his suicide note repeatedly stated that "feminists" had "ruined his life", and his crime was invariably seen through a misogynistic lens, the fact remains he was an adherent of the most misogynistic religion on the planet.

I want to stress that I am not inherently pro-Islam. In fact, I have written many times, most notably here, about the dangers radical Islam presents to Canada and the world. I was, back in my rabid Conservative days, a great admirer of Mark Steyn et al who believe with all their hears that Islam is hell-bent on taking over the world. I read about the dar-al-Harb, the so-called "house of war", and how it's every Muslim's holy duty to kill as many infidels as he can. And then one day it dawned on me: most--nearly all--Muslims don't take that seriously. There are imams galore who have denounced extremism and the Islamic State (but you won't hear that from our media. The odds of any Muslim you meet meaning you harm are essentially nil.

Essentially. One did harm last week in Ottawa. The initial response was "we will not be intimidated"--a sentiment I can certainly get behind--but then out came a bunch of shiny new laws, to be INEVITABLY used against Canadian citizens with no links to terror whatsoever, that showed the government was plenty intimidated. It's this that disgusts me, and it's this that led me to unthinkingly condemn the hypocrisy of 'running and hiding'.

It wasn't a smart or fair thing to do, and I am sorry I did it.