And The Wall Came Tumbling Down

I ran into an old acquaintance last week, someone I hadn't seen since he and his family had moved to Israel a few years ago. I asked about his wife and kids, told him to send my love, and he asked, "Aren't you on Facebook?"

No, I told him. Facebook makes me nervous.  Too many privacy issues.

He snorted.  "Get over it.  Move into the 21st century."

A week later I caved. And don't think I didn't get teased about it.

It wasn't just the encounter with Yoni, though it was certainly the final push over the cliff.  It wasn't a sudden decision, though I did just get up one morning and do it. I had been thinking about it for a few months. Friends had been asking me join for years (in fact, I had four friend requests waiting the minute I showed my face). My main reservation, as I said, was the privacy issues. Facebook is notorious for letting people see information that you would rather keep private, as well as sharing info with advertisers and other third parties. I set my privacy settings to the highest, yet a friend using a fake page was able to see my profile, my interests, everything but my wall, because there are two sets of settings and I only saw one. That bothers me; had I not figured out how to fix it, my e-mail address would have been accessible to strangers and spammers. Canada has insisted that Facebook comply with Canadian privacy standards, but I don't think they really have. And if you truly want to be frightened off Facebook, just read this article at TechRepublic.com.

Yet in spite of my better judgement, there I am.  As one old friend re-connecting wrote on my wall, "Peer pressure does it again!!!"  And it was immediately clear to me what makes Facebook the addictive waste of time it is.

First, you are hit with an enormous number of friend suggestions, at least in the beginning. As I said, there were four people waiting for me to join. The minute I accepted their requests, suggestions poured in.  Current friends, old friends, family... although so far I haven't "friended" anyone I couldn't have found by calling  someone I'm already in touch with. I did search a few people whom I can't find through existing relationships, but either they are not on Facebook, or they have names like John Smith, with hundreds of matches.  You need at least a city of residence to narrow it down.  Still, after the first day, I went to bed with 30 friends (and woke up with 31). That's probably pathetic by FB standards, but it was still kind of cool.

Second, there is an insane amount of information to sift through. The "news feed" shows you everything that's been posted by anyone, even non-friends, to every friend's page-- and whatever your friends have posted everywhere as well. If you have hundreds of friends, that's a lot of shit in one day. And you can unwittingly add to this by putting too much information on your profile. I figured if I'm doing this, I'm doing it right, and listed my favourite books, TV shows, movies, and the only sports team I care about, the Toronto Blue Jays. Suddenly, my news feed is covered in promos for True Blood, In Treatment, and announcements from the Blue Jay’s management, not to mention all the dogs needing foster homes from an animal rescue site. (There's a way to turn that off, I just have to do it.)  All this extraneous unwanted stuff almost made me miss the fact that my friend got a new wig.

Finally, there is the social element (duh).  Facebook is clearly trying to take over all communication on the Web. I have a number of friends who communicate almost exclusively through Facebook. An e-mail sent to one of them might not get answered for days. There's on-line chat to replace MSN, messaging to replace e-mail, and of course, constant status updates on everyone's walls. Plus the games. I'm not going near the games. I waste enough time in my day as it is.

This post took much longer to write than it should have because every minute or two, something happened on Facebook.  I couldn't write; I was too busy discussing a friend's upcoming trip to the bakery with her and three other people (one of whom I don't even know), while messaging someone else at the same time. And don't forget the updates.  "Bozo the Clown has accepted your friend request."  "You are now friends with Bozo the Clown and two other people."  Personal comments on the wall.  Articles in the news feed to pique your interest.  A reminder of a friend's birthday (thank you FB, it's now in my real calendar, so I can remind myself next year).

The public nature of the platform is scary. Obviously I don't care if people know I like the Blue Jays. By all means let's moan about the weather, or share a funny video from YouTube. However, there are certain things I won't be sharing.  You won't see status updates every five minutes. You won't see pictures of my kids. I won't tell you about all the jobs I apply for and don't get.  I won't swear on someone's wall, where everyone can see it (I'll save that for private messaging, e-mail, and real life).  And it won't supplant the long, chatty e-mails to my penpal in London (hmmm, should check to see if she's on Facebook....)

I've never been shy, as my long-time friends will attest (cue "remember when she...?" stories).  I still enjoy public speaking, I still love socializing and being evil and all those fun things. If I was still 20, I bet I'd have a million pictures up, and live my life in the public eye without a second thought.  But I try for a little discretion in my old age (trying doesn't mean succeeding, mind you).  We should all know by now that some things can come back to bite us; just ask Kimberly Swann and Ray Lam. It seems obvious not to tell the world that your job is "boring," or put pictures of yourself being stupid on the Internet, but Facebook gives the illusion that you're just talking to friends.  You think no one's going to tell, but really, you've told on yourself.  Careers have been ruined, or failed to get off the ground; employers now routinely check Facebook pages before calling for an interview. And while I can decide how much I want to show, if my sister elects to put up a naked baby picture of me and tag it with my name, there's not much I can do.

The Spouse has told me, "Just have fun with it!" and I intend to. I'll just assume that everything I put up will be seen by all 500 million users, and act accordingly.  Now, if you'll excuse me, I see I have a message waiting.

Winter Weather

Here's an opinion for you. Winter sucks.

I've lived in northern climes all my life. In fact, I grew up somewhere considerably colder than where I live now.  In my younger years, I could stand outside in -20 without a coat and chat with friends. I started wearing sandals in April, even if there was still snow on the ground.

Now I'm old. Technically I'm middle-aged, but I feel old. When hanging around the dog park, I'm shivering and bundled in a coat, while other people wear sweaters. "Isn't it a beautiful day?" they ask, while I look at them like the grumpy old woman I've become.

It's not just the cold, it's the snow.  Snow removal here sucks, much like winter itself. The city, in its infinite bureaucratic wisdom, clears the one-way street just north of ours before they clean our two-way street.  Complete snow clearance after a major storm can take up to six days.

We just had a major storm, at least two feet of snow, lots of traffic snarl-ups, and the sidewalks are impassable. I get snow in my boots, I can't walk the dog, I feel boxed in, and I get even grumpier. I want to go where's there no snow and the temperature is at least 70.

"Florida," says the Spouse.  We're 20 years from retirement age (and 40 years from retirement), but he's dreaming of Boca. I don't mind Boca, but I hate southern Florida in general. The I-95 from Boca to Miami is the ugliest stretch of highway in America, nothing by jai alai parlours and graffitied warehouses.  A vacation-- great, no problem.  Buying a condo and becoming snowbirds, not so much.  Besides, we're still too young.

So I'm stuck in the cold and the snow. I don't ski. I don't skate. My kids play in the back yard with the dog, but that's the sum total of winter activities. The dog loves the snow. Today he dug up a dead frozen squirrel. Our middle child was traumatised. So was I. Spring can't come soon enough.

Tell the Truth, Pay the Price

Christie Blatchford at
the book signing

Last night I went to a book-signing for Christie Blatchford's Helpless, a book about how the residents of Caledonia, a pretty rural area near Hamilton, Ontario, have lived in a state of near-siege since 2006, perpetuated by aboriginal protesters unhappy about real estate developments they feel encroach on their lands.

Helpless puts forth the thesis that the government of Ontario and the Ontario Provincial Police failed the citizens of Caledonia by pursuing a two-pronged approach to the situation: appeasement of the protesters, and the refusal to protect and uphold the rights of non-aboriginal citizens. The OPP, with the blessing of Queen's Park, seat of the Ontario legislature, stuck to a policy of non-interference even as the natives grew more brazen and aggressive, and the protests spread from the disputed land to town itself.  Citizens and landowners of Caledonia (and others just passing through) were subject to harrassment, intimidation, and acts of vandalism and outright violence, while the OPP stood by and let it happen.  The book details the abandonment of the rule of law, or, more accurately, how the law was unjustly applied to some residents of Caledonia, but not others. Aboriginals protested with impunity and non-natives were arrested for flying the Canadian flag, or anything else the OPP deemed "provocative" or "confrontational."  Blatchford believes that the blame does not lie with the rank-and-file members of the OPP, many of whom were distressed by their inability to act; the hands-off directives came from Commissioners Gwen Boniface and Julian Fantino, who, ironically, is now the member of Parliament for Vaughn, the riding which includes Caledonia.

Blatchford has a no-nonsense, tell-the-facts-exactly-as-they-are style; her loyalty is to the truth, not some bigger political agenda. But by showing the actions of the native protesters to be both violent and illegal,  Blatchford breaks the rules of political correctness; naturally, this ruffles feathers. On November 12, members of the Anti-Racist Association at the University of Waterloo managed to shut down her speech, and organizer Dan Kellar claimed that Blatchford had, in the past, "glorified" neo-Nazi Ernst Zundel, then compared her to Julius Streicher.

I've long been a fan of Blatchford, and I was not very happy to hear her slandered. I wanted to know what Blatchford herself had to say.  So I popped off the following e-mail:

Dear Ms. Blatchford:

I am sitting with a cup of coffee at my kitchen table reading about how a few yahoos with opinions contrary to yours managed to curb free speech at the University of Waterloo. One of these individuals accuses you of anti-Semitism, stating that “older members of the ARA [Anti-Racist Association] remember her ‘glorifying’ neo-Nazi Ernst Zundel” (National Post, page A6, second column).

I will confess that I am not currently a subscriber to the Globe and Mail, but I was many years ago, and I always enjoyed your writing. You didn’t strike me as a racist or Nazi sympathizer, but perhaps I missed something. I was quite annoyed to read about your mistreatment, and would like to know how you will respond to this accusation. I suspect, if anything, you supported Zundel’s right to free speech, which is a legitimate view, rather supporting his actual views, which are repellent. And perhaps this man is just out and out lying. Really, what I would like to know, as a long-time fan of your writing, is, what the hell is he talking about?

I received the following reply, in Blatchford's succinct, to-the-point tone:

He's a liar, period. I'm a Zionist, if anything, and all I ever would have defended about Zundel was his right to speak, and I don't remember even doing that.

Thanks for the note.

C

I thought as much.



Anyone who thinks Blatchford is a racist hasn't read the book.  She openly acknowledges that many injustices, from the glacial pace of aboriginal land claims to the residential school scandal, have plagued Canada's aboriginal community for decades, if not centuries, and that these issues "are one way or another in the background of everything that occurred in Caledonia." In other words, the members of the Six Nations (and other native groups in Canada) have justified grievances. These grievances, however, do not give them free license to terrorize their neighbours; people have a right to live in peace and security, and they rely on the government to provide this protection under the rule of law.  The book is not anti-aboriginal; it is a condemnation of the Orwellian situation in Caledonia, where in principle all are equal in the eyes of the law, but in practice some are more equal than others.