food for thought on racism, anti-semitism, and anti-Muslim sentiment

I'm in a more pensive mood lately. Maybe it's in the air... maybe it's astrology, maybe it's converging Hindu, Muslim, and Jewish holidays. I don't know, but I'm a thinking a lot lately...

And this post is right up my alley today. I couldn't agree more with how scary the rise of anti-Islam/Muslim sentiment is becoming in the world. And while I never made the link myself to anti-Semitism and the Holocaust, and the scary places that leads to, I believe she's right in drawing the link and that's a very very terrifying thought.

gay rights in India

According to the BBC , India has taken a historical leap forward in terms of the gay rights movement. Although the battle is still long from being won, the abolition anti-gay law in the constitution is a major victory for gay rights activists in the country.

I'm sure that social resistance will continue and that even though homosexuality will still be viewed as a crime, the fact that it can no longer be punished by law is a great start. Change doesn't always come quickly, but it comes nonetheless.

Reena Virk and Kelly Ellard: social reintegration and forgiveness

I've had a lot of down time lately because of sick days and pulled wisdom teeth, which has lead to a lot of media consumption on my part (for example: I've watched all of Angel, season 3 in 3 days). In this time I've also caught up a bit on the news. The recent continuation of the Reena Virk case in particular caught my attention.



This particular case was big news way back when I was living in Victoria, BC. I remember being asked to sign a petition about trying Kelly Ellard and Warren Glowatski as adults. At the time, given the horrific nature of the crime, I wasn't against the idea. I was 21 and closer to the ages of the individuals who participated in the act. In my mind at the time, there was no grey area: these individuals were, at the ages 15-17, old enough to know better and their actions were nothing short of criminal.



Ironically, I think time may have mellowed my opinion on the issue. While I still believe that they should have known better, I am also more aware of how stupid teenagers really are and how various pressures, personal crises, etc, can influence our actions at that age. This does not mean that I condone the act in any way, shape, or form, just that over 10 years later I'm not entirely sure if the girl who is still in jail still deserves the punishment she's received. Is she murderer or an accomplice, I don't know, but in either case, her life has been ruined. No, that doesn't make up for the loss of Reena Virk's life. However, when do we draw the line between punishment and social re-integration. The act was malicious and heinous, but who was Kelly Ellard at the time that it was committed and who is she now?



And more importantly: what could she be now if we actually gave her a chance?

Community, Apathy, and the Global Village.

Today on my daily commute to and from work I read two articles (Education and Darfur) in this month's Utne Reader that prompted a fair amount of introspection about the nature of compassion in our current society. In the article about Darfur the author was asking why we are so indifferent to the crisis in Darfur given that we are inundated with horrific images that demand our action.

The question is obviously rhetorical. We are indifferent because we are overwhelmed. There are too many crisis', too many people in need, that the individual no longer knows where to start, what to invest time, action, energy, or money into. I don't think that people care less, rather they are overrun by too many problems that they are paralyzed into inaction and apathy.

So while the teacher discussed in the education article is right in saying that what we need in the world is more compassion, I also think that maybe that individuals need to pick a cause or two and focus on them. This doesn't mean that I think that we should only learn about those causes we've invested in, but rather that we should realize that one person can make a difference if they focus their energies on making it happen.

The education article went on to discuss how specific communities invested in making a change (in the 60s) and made things happen, whereas now that hasn't happened. Bear in mind that the article is focusing on a specific incident and that I am extrapolating rather loosely. However, the point is that my metro ruminations left me with the feeling that perhaps our parents moved mountains more because they only saw one or 2 mountains that needed moving. Obviously there were many issues at hand during the 60s, but the amount of information and media bombardment wasn't anywhere near what it is today. I wonder if the media isn't doing us a grave disservice by blasting us with so much, so quickly, and then moving on. Maybe this is the downfall of the global village. The great irony is that for all that the media and global village allow access to one another, they cause us to lose touch with each other.

Yes the world needs more compassion, but where should we be directing our compassion? The well is only so deep.