Rants and GFOMM

I Rant on Your Grave

Hey Guelph! Thanks for voting!

Or at least that’s I would say if more than one-third of you actually gave a damn and voted.

But seriously, thanks to the 33.9 per cent of Guelph that did give a damn and got out and voted. You are the real heroes, and that’s maybe the saddest thing I’ve ever typed. Not that you voted is sad, but the fact that so few of you couldn’t get yourselves to a polling station and fill in four little boxes with a pen is an epic tragedy worthy of Sophocles. Where was the anger? The outrage? The pettiness? Nothing. Sense of civic pride and responsibility? Crickets. Okay.

But seriously, what’s the deal? Are people in Guelph any less frustrated with the economy, taxes and services as compared to, let’s say, Toronto? In the T-Dot, 53.2 per cent came out to vote for *sigh* Rob Ford. Perhaps voter dissatisfaction was higher in Toronto, while the number of people in Guelph who were either content with city leadership, or discontent with the choices offered, was stratospherically high. Considering that there are people in the world that brave bullets – or worse – to vote, what’s our excuse?

Ed The Sock did a bit during the 2006 Municipal Election saying that 36 per cent of people voted in the 2003 election, so majority rules: no more municipal elections. We’re not there yet are we? Surely, the 66 per cent that didn’t vote in Guelph last week  will agree that this reaction is extreme, yet still one wonders why we can’t hoist more people off the couch and into a voting booth.

Of course, people can’t get over their ignorance either. A woman named Jeri Scheffer wrote a letter to the Guelph Mercury on Election Day decrying the fact that her child’s school was being used as a polling place, like every other school has been since at least when my mom was a kid. But if this woman’s misalignment with, you know, how society works was messed up, there was the other side of the coin that was slipped in to her letter so surreptitiously that you you’d almost miss it.

Yep, Ms. Scheffer doesn’t vote, and she said so right in black and white before taking the school board, the school, the trustees and everyone to task for not keeping her informed about the fact that the school’s gym – far from where the kids sit in class – serves as a polling station and probably has since time and memoriam. A better metaphor for this election I can’t think of: A person mad at the system that they can’t even be bothered to participate in. Oh well.

Fill Your Brain

This weekend is the annual Guelph Festival for Moving Media, or what used to be called the Guelph International Film Festival, if your memory goes back that far. The one thing that GFOMM does best, if it can only do one thing, is inspire you and invest you in some unique documentaries, shining a light on people and issues in small towns and big cities across the globe. This year’s program looks to be no exception with environmentally-minded flicks, compelling docs about the arts, and some short animated films for adults only (not like that).

Let me include a few recommendations. First, and this is no particular order, is The So-Called Movie. Savvy Canadian music lovers will be able to name check So Called, a musician and artist based out of Montreal who gave one of the most rockin’ performances from this year’s Hillside Inside. The NFB doc about this madcap man of music is a definitely a fun watch if nothing else. Another neat movie, albeit with a more advocate bend is A Different Path, which follows activists from across North America as they try to overcome the tyranny of the single-occupant automobile. Along similar lines, check out the Friday night performance of Polydactyl Hearts who will be performing their new show Hello Adventure, as well as their now classic show Le Cyc.

For information and the full program and schedule, go to http://www.festivalofmovingmedia.ca

The Fight’s Not Over for Water Watchers

The Wellington Water Watchers celebrated not just a year of existence, but a year of triumph last Tuesday night as members gathered at Norfolk United Church for the group’s first AGM. The WWW started making waves last summer (pun intended) by coming out strong against the Aberfoyle Nestle Bottled Water plant’s application for a five-year renewal of their contract.

Earlier this year, the Ministry of the Environment announced that they would only be renewing Nestle’s contract for only two-years and part of the new contract is the requirement for better monitoring of the Mill Creek, from which Nestle pulls it water. As well, the Ontario government is considering making the Galt-Paris moraine protected land. “We’ve had some real successes and we have some really ambitious plans too,” WWW Board member James Gordon told the crowd.

Amongst WWW’s ambitious plans is to expand its “Klean Kanteen” program. The stainless steel canteen is free to everyone when they buy a membership in the WWW, which includes over 750 Guelph and area residents. But now, the group is looking at putting their canteens into the hands of every kid in the county as part of an overall campaign to promote tap water over bottled.

Two other components of the plan are “Emergency Use Only” and “L’Eau Municipal.” The former is a guerrilla promotion gimmick wherein WWW is encouraging members to really enforce the idea of bottled water being reserved for emergency purposes; bottled water being of primary importance in situations where the tap water’s been compromised. The second part, “L’Eau Municipal,” will be a campaign working with local restaurants to push the serving of tap water over bottled in their establishment.

Basically, the group is going to throw their focus on reversing the trend, pervasive in this generation, that carrying around and drinking water out of a plastic bottle is cool. Beyond that, the notion that bottled water is cleaner and safer than what comes out of the tap is a popular myth that WWW wants to dispel. One member held up a plastic water bottle and said that he considers the contents “plastic water” and reinforced the toxic effects these bottles have on our environment.

The evening was rounded out with a speech by activist, author and Blue Planet co-founder Maude Barlow, who had high praise for the group she calls part of a growing movement of “water warriors” and that WWW is an example she cites in her speeches worldwide. She reinforced the need to protect water from encroaching elements who want to see its commoditization, particularly NAFTA. Barlow’s speech was followed by a screening of the new documentary FLOW: For the Love Of Water.

Greens got a plan

Following-up to my interview with Elizabeth May in last week’s Echo, here are some details of the Green meeting at Guelph Youth Music Centre on May 26. The main point of the event was a kind of rally to garner local support and get May into the next televised leaders debate in the eventual Federal election.

Drawing on history, May hopes that if Guelph Green candidate Mike Nagy were to make it to the House of Commons via a by-election, than a sitting Green MP would force the hand of all those keeping May out of the debate. The same strategy worked for Preston Manning when, as Reform leader, he was invited to the 1993 debates after Deborah Grey was seated in a by-election in Alberta.

May also spent the day canvassing in Guelph neighbourhoods along with Nagy and former Green leader Jim Harris. Harris remains a consultant for the Green Party and participated in the event by enthusiastically getting members to commit to 40 hours of campaigning for Nagy when the writ is dropped.

Still no sign of that happening though.