Ramblings of a Peace Junkie

More headlines in the papers about Haiti this week right beside the forgotten government “Jobless Budget Priority” segments. I cannot believe someone has actually even written these articles down and published them for the public eye to witness! What kind of slow paced ninny goat actually believes these things they talk about? “The next federal budget should focus on helping unemployed Canadians and businesses struggling through the recession, say Canada’s opposition leaders.” All would be wholesome and grand if only these statements weren’t then followed by “Liberal leader Micheal Ignatieff was quick to say he wasn’t setting out any ‘conditions’ but said he will be looking for a credible program for dealing with the deficit and help for jobless Canadians.” In summation, how is this getting us anywhere at all? Having been a jobless Canadian after moving to the city of Ottawa for about 7 months these matters have taken precedence of really frustrating me. The public are briefed on problematic aspects of their waking life and then told that they are being ‘looked into’ (for lack of more misleading words). Are we supposed to sit around with our cigarettes and magazines with hope and neglect that things are actually going to turn out alright?
Personally I thought the article was a major farce masked by more important issues happening on a global scale as most of our political issues have been over the past month (if not for most of time). Being the curious human I am, I decided to skim through to the ‘letters to the editor’ section hoping that maybe, just maybe there was a soul out there reading these articles and had possibly something to say about the matter. My aspirations were stubbed out with demandingly important articles like “Hockey Violence Must Stop” and “Taliban Thugs”. I then had to come to terms with the victims of our ignorance. We jump on a whim to help out another country and don’t even understand our own. Don’t get me wrong here. I think the Canadian involvement in helping Haiti is exceptional as you can very well read in my previous article I had written for the Toronto Star website (‘Youth for Haiti’, January 20th 2010 down below if interested). We are finally standing up for ourselves and taking some initiative of getting something done and the government has noticed. It’s great! While this is happening however we have chosen to neglect everything we have been trying to fight for all along, our rights and freedoms as individuals in our own country as the government shrugs it off for other issues. Has anyone even heard Stephen Harper speak? What does he do? I don’t even know who he is or what he has become but by the looks of things he may be some form of mime behind a curtain waving his hands and making people laugh.
While President Obama takes in the spotlight Stephen Harper hides behind his shadows making sure nobody gets a glance of his insignificant face...Are vampires allowed to come out in daylight? I am not one to stick my nose into matters of politics mainly because to me it comes across as a simple game of soldiers taking control of everything we cannot own but when it is affecting us directly why not lend a voice, or maybe an opinion here and there? It is what keeps us mobile and together. Stop forgetting. Great job in Haiti! Let’s keep our country the beautiful place we know it can be. As I glared out my bedroom window at the Gatineau hills in Quebec, wrote this segment with a pack of Canadian cigarettes, matches, the paper, and The Great Shark Hunt by Hunter S. Thompson I prepared myself for the evening and thought to myself... What is in store for tomorrow?

Youth for Haiti

There has been something strange about waking up on these January winter mornings. Every cup of coffee I drink comes from a vending machine and every newspaper I read has a front page spread of the “Devastating Earthquake in Haiti” and because of such issues has lately had me pondering about what makes us who we are and what we are doing as Canadians to invest a bit of ourselves into finding out more about this global issue. On average and from many first-hand experiences dealing with people around my own age, I had come to build up a semi-biased opinion on some of the matters these individuals choose to sink their minds into and normally my opinions are hard to change. Today I stand corrected...
As I focused my attention deeper and deeper into the Canadian involvement of the Haiti earthquake I had finally come to terms with having my opinion changed. Over the last couple of weeks I have been receiving nothing but invitations to Haiti Fundraisers and groups like “Hundreds for Haiti” (One of which I have been presently following) over Facebook and other networking websites. “Hundreds for Haiti” is a group created by 2 young girls named Shelby Morell and Katie Matheson whom of which both currently reside in the Brampton Ontario area. I was intrigued with the dedication they had shown with starting the group and decided to get in contact with one of the girls.
“I started this group as an attempt to spread awareness of the severity of the situation in Haiti to fellow classmates, family, and friends” Wrote Shelby Morell. The returning grad student of St Thomas Aquinas High School and aspiring photographer in the local Brampton area was taken back the moment she had witnessed the Quake all over the news. After witnessing the devastation and further educating herself about the matters surrounding the Haiti incident she had realized that there was more she could do to help Haiti then she had realized. “I know that if you want something to be seen - and seen fast - Facebook is the way to do it, and by creating my group "Hundreds for Haiti", this addictive social networking site has proved itself yet again.” Shelby had students meet her during and after school and has reached people as far as the Philippines to help with aid through the group.
As of January 19th 2010 “Hundreds for Haiti” has reached 1071 members and have raised almost $4000.00 to donate to the Yele Haiti foundation founded by Grammy award winner Wyclef Jean. “I have been insisting to everyone that anything they can do - whether it be spreading the word through text, inviting people to the Facebook group, or donating whatever they can - it will in fact make a difference.”
Sitting on my couch and sifting through pictures of the damaged Haitian National Palace is something that has come unexpectedly and by somewhat of a surprise but it has been (and like I had stated before) a known fact that my mind is a hard thing to change. It is with the youth of today and people like Shelby Morell and Katie Matheson that really gives us a true peer into ourselves. It is for people who have enough courage to stand up and lend out a hand to our fellow human brothers and sisters without any hesitation that will give us hope for our future generations. There has been something strange about waking up on these January winter mornings and through so much chaos can there really be such a sense of hope from our youth?



- Jaden Adams


For any further donations or inquiry about the “Hundreds for Haiti” group Shelby can be reached at 1 – 647 – 227 – 0091 or text “Yele” to 501501 to donate $5.00 to the “Yele Haiti” fund.

12:00

The stars were all gleaming as the moon hung low
The night time was vibrant and the sky was aglow
A lonesome wanderer and a finely dressed crow
At midnight had began a conversation.
"There is something too simple in believing yourself."
Started the Crow with a sigh.
"Or at least that is what they have been trying to teach us."
"There are no more fantasies worth diving into
and all of the colors have faded passed shade.
Wouldn't you love to wake up in the morning to a whole new wacky world,
Where all of our worries were gone?
Where we all got along and sang for the moon and the tides and everything else that caught the attention of all our discovering eyes...
It is kind of like imagination!"
The Wanderer proclaimed.
"And this fairy tale world we have all dreamt up really holds no true meaning!"
Celebrated the Crow.
The Wanderer believed in thought and magic and friends
But least of all this world that he lived in
He was true to himself
He spoke with integrity of change because he saw the potential floating all around us.
"It is just the eye sight that needs to change...
Not the weather, nor the rain. We all need to look deeper for our colors... Because they are all there you know. If you choose to look far enough."
The moon had almost fully disappeared and the sun had begun to rise.
He shuffled his hat, scratched his nose and looked upwards toward the sky.
"Or maybe you don't..."
And that was precisely what he had meant to say
So the Crow packed up his things and he traveled away
and the Wanderer tossed off his hat in celebration of that day,
At the prominent stroke of noon.

The Fear

Have you ever just sat down, focused your eyes deep into space, and thought about those three awe inspiring letters... Why? Then you more than obviously have stumbled upon the branching effect before. Where the “why?” turns into a “what for?” and the “what for?” becomes a “What in the hell am I doing with my life? My hair is too short, my body too thin, I laughed when I saw a child crying over a banana today and by god the last time I fed the dog was Christmas 1964!” As intensely allusive these thoughts may be, how many times do these reflections ever amount to anything good? Are you ever entirely positive about yourself? I as much as anyone have fallen victim to this weird slave generation our countries have going on here and I get it, it works for some people. Bright lights are big, and yes they are oh so shiny and distracting but does degradation really come with such an impressive reward? I am very concerned about humanities future. It’s the constant paranoia that has really been getting to me. Has nobody noticed this extreme lapse of paranoid, irrational fear everyone has been going through lately? I mean realistically it has been happening for the entire span of human existence already but it is still to this day insane to observe! I was huddled up on the couch for a nice night of conversation with a few friends when the news had to creep its way onto my television screen. What a ghastly charade those people put on. Always know that there should be a certain criteria of rules set into play while watching the news...
Although the news may be informative and at times generally precise you must keep in mind that they love to project fear. It is their passion. You are kidding yourself if you choose to believe that the 3 second pity segments after commercials about “young Sally Jenkins from the neighbourhood’s beauty pageant winning dog shit grinner was just nominated for another shot at the title again this year” actually attributes to making the news “not all that bad.” Give me a break! Regardless of how much I believe the news should be bent into that direction, it will never be that way. I mean if it were, maybe I would actually enjoy the seemingly endless periods of time that it is played on television for in the evenings. The main goal to keeping your sanity during the news is however, to be aware of the blunt intention of these media ogres with their stalking attempts to try and break the middle class spirit. You must always keep this in mind. They want you to feel unsafe outside of your homes to trap your attention otherwise we would have news station ratings dropping off the airwaves like suicide divers but we can’t have that happening now, Can we? There would be too much money lost in the process for already overly wealthy investors and they are at the moment what makes this world go round. Wealthy investors and we all know wealthy people are greedy. That is how they got to their point of power. Like spoiled children they trample faces, names, companies, friends, adversaries and lovers. They want all of their own cookies and all of yours too. So they stick to the scare tactics because they know it works, it keeps the average human being in place and it is what keeps them in business and that is truly all it has become these days, just like everything else on this planet... business. So we sit down quietly, turn on our television sets at 11:00 p.m., grab a bag of popcorn and watch the world explode, always kept in line... What would you do to keep your job?
This week’s big story: The full body X-Ray scanner that is being placed in airports all over North America. This story, for me anyways has been just another eye opener to these suburban lives people all hide behind. Full body X-Ray scanners in airports! Have people given up entirely on even the slightest amount of possible freedoms we could be given? How can anyone be accepting of such things? Before these neutron machines are placed into our airports I want to get a few facts set straight here! Are there really that many “terrorists” traipsing through our airports, getting away with sporadic crimes left, right, and center? (Just saying) I know I certainly have never caught a glimpse of one and I’m sure that if I did his/her profile might seem a bit off. I for some reason doubt that “old Mrs. Watson from city hall” has decided to strap an AK-47 up her skirt. There is no way a human can go through rigorous training boot camps... sorry, TERROR-ist camps without having some form of sketchy facade attached. These people do not grow up in suburban Canadian and American towns. I am sorry for stepping on your fantasies. We are being stripped of yet another freedom simple and plain. This time however, we are taking it without a fight and without information. We just accept the fact, step into tiny plastic tubes while “security” guards get a good look at our wee-wee’s, and shrug it off like its standard procedure, just another day and another place to go. Got to get back to that old nine to five job and make sure to stock up on antiseptics and band aids, you know to keep that brain inside your head from bleeding.
The fear grows like a new-age plague. We keep up this constant fear of each other for reasons we don’t even fully understand or care to understand. Maybe it is embedded somewhere in our genetic make-up? Maybe we still have some deep receded fright of being eaten by something bigger and stronger then ourselves, I mean we did survive through evolution(surprisingly I might add) but where have we ended up? I don’t feel like our advancements are truly making a difference anymore. Some would beg to differ but just think to yourself, deep down just like you do when you ponder that magic word I had discussed before. Have we really been making a difference? One to better ourselves and the lives of every fellow human we walk, eat, sleep, and breathe beside? If you finally stumble upon an answer and shed all current ideals of this society of sceptics and pushovers, I think we may finally come to the point of forgetting to ask ourselves the question that has been tearing away at my mind the entire time I have spent here and that question again is: Why? When I took philosophy back in high school I had a great teacher by the name of Mr. O Neil. I remember him remarking to the class about his quirky philosophical question he had used to end a previous years exam with. The question was in itself: Why? He spoke about a student and his “100%” response to the question, a student of which I had never had the pleasure to meet. His choice of words had always stuck in my mind from that point on. The student answered with a simplistic yet suggestively responsive: Why not? I think he had this planet more figured out then he could even know...