Us against them

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Some year ago when this last great west was being settled national groups of immigrants settled in communities and at times became quite insular.

They wanted teachers of their own nationality. They wanted their people to control the rural municipal council, the school board, the recreation facilities and other amenities. Often they voted as a block in provincial and national elections.

Some wanted to set up what amounted to their own country within Canada.

Eventually, as they intermarried with people of other ethnic origins and discovered people of other languages and religious faiths had the same problems and ambitions they had, this fortress mentality faded.

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The current fuss in Quebec indicates how easy it is to win support by telling the electorate someone out there is discriminating against them.

Many a farm organization and many a political party was built on the same formula.

Just as many of them failed because they had no real recipe for correcting the ills they groused about.

Today’s ferment over the lack of a satisfactory economic rudder, the confrontation between interest groups, the perceived explosion of crime, the feeling that we’re being put upon by somebody out there, have led to groups suggesting shotgun solutions so that “our way of life” can be maintained.

The trouble with “our way of life” is that it never existed in the rosy hues it was painted.

Here’s a prediction for the people of Quebec, the right- and left-wing economic theorists, the anti-crime lobby, the anti-gun lobby, the whole kaboodle of pushers and shovers:

You’re going to have to recognize democracy is built on compromise and if, heaven forbid, you get everything you ask for, you’ll soon discover you don’t want it.