FOR WHAT DO WE STAND? / Part 403 / For Love and For Justice / Zabeth and Paul Bayne

In commenting about the CBC story about WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange, one person wrote the following:

Julian Assange stands for.......

Truth
Transparency
Democracy
Justice
Freedom
Liberty

The USA stands for.........

Lies
Cover-ups
Torture
Injustice
Aggression
Control over the people

Most of us are initially appalled to think that the last set of descriptives could be true of a free world democratic government. Nevertheless there are many people whose knowledge or personal experiences concur that these are apt identifiers for the USA. There are enough shockers happening inside our democracies to make us all nervous about the truth.

Based upon what many of you have written over the months it would seem that in your minds at least, that latter set of attributes are applicable to the Ministry of Children and Development in those localities where you live. You say that you have experienced Lies, Cover-ups, Authoritarianism, Injustice, Aggression, and Control over your lives.

That reputation is a heavy burden for well intentioned social workers.

I have the impression from social workers that their work today is like a mine field. They must vigilantly watch their steps with clients and supervisors.

Parents whose children have been apprehended inaccurately, mistakenly or unjustly are in Guantanamo Bay. Their lives have been detained. Freedoms curtailed. Resources diminished. Their children are under 'foster' arrest, customarily receiving acceptable care but experienced relationship deprivation. The children's still maleable lives are being shaped by events happening to them which they often cannot understand and which are beyond the control of the people who are most important to them.

Some of you have hinted at the ramifications possible if a Wikileaks kind of disclosure occurred with documents internal to MCFD regional offices or the offices of the suits and slacks in Victoria. But what would you want to come out of something like that? What kind of people are we? For what do we stand?

POLITICIANS AND CHILDREN/ Part 390 / For Love and For Justice / Zabeth and Paul Bayne

I am usually hopeful. Today, not so much.

The contentious spirit, the vast expenditure of monies evidenced in our British Columbia political climate as individuals vie for control of political parties and ultimately for the governing mandate of the province is a waste of resources of all kinds. This is however a diminutive display in a small arena which typifies what humanity is doing on a much larger scale around the world. Wikileaks are merely a temporary embarrassment for nations treating one another with suspicion and disrespect in the midst of a veneer of good relations. Elsewhere North Korea simply ignores the politics and aggressively blows up South Korean property. And all of this, for what?

Back to British Columbia. Progress is inhibited because there is so much wheel-spinning as individuals and parties protect themselves. Working together is a concept that eludes our kind. We can theorize but the personalities who are driven to acquire power are hot-wired to fight for factional interests. That's because they get to the power station by accommodations to special interests which thereafter must be placated. The greater interest and greater good of the whole, the province, the people, the seniors, the children, the disabled, the students, the teachers, the medical professionals, the tradespeople, are given perfunctory attention. The resources of this province should be viewed as belonging to all of us. Somehow the government has philosophically divorced itself from us but refused to accept this. From an historical anecdote, our government is the kind that gives the province's teachers grief and delay at the bargaining table and then follows it up by an outlandish in our faces raise for MLAs.

Our government is the consumer society. It devours money. It passes legislation and creates programs for the self-serving purpose of generating more usable dollars to consume on projects that do not matter and do not help the whole. Yet when the budget and the funds are challenging, the really important ministries and services that help us are slashed or eliminated. Isn't that right? Haven't you read about this before?

Yes, well, sorry about all that, but it is illustrative of my frustration with the upper echelon of the Ministry of Children which should and could work together with the Representative of Children and Youth, rather than moving instinctively into a defensive posture. An objective appraisal of MCFD by the Rep should be seen as helpful and on the other hand the Representative could be making constructive suggestions over the months rather than presenting a landmine report once every couple of years. We really know how to do things incorrectly. And the Governing Liberal Cabinet refuses to put money where it would do the most good. So, I need another dark roast coffee right now to fortify me to think about our provincial leaders who cannot be trusted with the best interests of children when they spend most of their time marketing themselves, roasting their opponents or planting IEDs for one another. It would be so refreshing to hear a politician speak about ministry to children, parents and families from a position of sincere commitment.