The short answer is, not in the foreseeable future.
Last Friday a gun crime shocked the residents of the city of Toronto who, since the beginning of the summer have been getting a near daily dose of news of shootings along with their morning cup of coffee. Eighteen-year-old amon Beckles was attending the funeral of his friend, 17-year-old Jamal Hemmings. Beckles had been with his friend 10 days before when Hemmings was gunned down on the streets of what was once referred to as "Toronto the Good". at one point in the service, Beckles went outside to have a cigarette and he was re-entering the Seventh Day adventist Church, he himself was gunned down and killed within earshot of the mourners.
The place and circumstances surrounding this shooting reverberated across the country. Headlines screamed, "Enough is enough".
This shocking murder that really should not be that shocking in today’s Toronto produced the usual rounds of promised summits and anti-gun rallies. While these rallies undoubtedly make the organizers and participants feel like they are doing something, neither the rallies nor the summits will do anything to prevent the deaths of those young, mainly black males who, if they live to see Christmas will be celebrating their last.
The harsh reality is that there is simply no political will on the part of any level of government to take steps to combat the violent crime on our streets.
The federal Liberals have begun to talk tough about violent crime which makes the cynical among us think that perhaps there is an election in the offing. Justice Minister Irwin Cotler did an about face and now is proposing increased mandatory sentences for gun crimes. Cotler previously opposed mandatory sentencing on the issue on the grounds that mandatory minimums do not deter violent crime. Cotler is right; anyone who risks either being shot to death or a life sentence with no chance of parole for 25 years by engaging in a shootout is not going to be deterred by the thought of a four or more year minimum sentence. Tougher sentences are needed not for deterrence but to simply remove some of this human garbage from society for longer periods of time. It’s all just talk; if the Liberals are re-elected they will return to their soft on crime policies and like many of their promised election goodies, tougher laws will never come to pass.
as far as the provincial government goes, Premier Dalton McGuinty has been promising more police since the 2003 election campaign. any similarity between what Dalton says and what he actually does is strictly coincidental. He has an aversion to the truth so anything he says about combating the increasing use of guns can and should be ignored. Besides, adding a traffic cop in Wawa is not going to solve the problem of Toronto’s gun violence. If only these shootings and murders were committed bypit bulls, we might see some action at the provincial level.
By far the most disappointing of all the levels of government is the City of Toronto. after this shooting, Toronto mayor David Miller went on and on about the haves and the have-nots and about more jobs for young people, yada, yada, yada. Miller is not a stupid man but it makes you wonder how many young people have to die before he actually gets the message that his way of dealing with violent crime on our streets simply doesn’t work. Of all our leaders, Miller is the most elitist and he has no concern or compassion for individuals who are direct or indirect victims of the violence. To him, the shooters and the victims are merely members of a disadvantaged social group and will remain so until he can change the entire social structure of society. The shooters are victims who can’t help themselves because of what was done to them by our capitalist and racist society.
In the wake of a shooting in a church at least some members of the clergy are becoming more vocal. While Pastor al Bowen’s suggestion that Paul Martin send the army in is way over the top, at least he’s on the right track. and while church leaders have refrained from referring to the bad guys as "evil" they are at least using that word. They realize that the problem of violent gun crime cannot be solved by giving the perpetrators a $30 an hour job with CUPE.
Toronto’s crime will never change until the federal Liberals and David Miller and his left wing council are all booted out of office. If people aren’t willing to do that they should just get used to the gun violence and quit complaining about it — or move.
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