as the incidents of gun violence and death become a seemingly daily occurrence in Toronto and other large urban Canadian centres, there is no shortage of people who will push the mantra of "don’t worry, be happy".
Leading the pack is Toronto mayor David Miller. While addressing a breakfast meeting of the Toronto Board of Trade on October 24; the day that saw five separate shootings in his city and will undoubtedly be referred to as "Bloody Monday", Miller made the point of telling his audience that sexual assaults and armed robberies are down. It’s as if the fact that the commission of certain offences has decreased or violent crime in general is down make the increasing use of guns and gun deaths somehow acceptable. In other words, the citizens of major centres should just accept the increased gunplay on city streets and other public places.
Then there are those that hold the view that anyone who tries to make a big deal about guns and shootings is doing so out of fear and is given a stern lecture about having such an irrational fear. Ryerson Professor and head of the Coalition for Gun Control, Wendy Cukier, recently commented that fear will just embolden the bad guys and it will just end up with the bad guys winning. This thinking is much the same as that of Toronto Transit Commission Chair Howard Moscoe, who refused to take further measures to protect the city’s transit system from attack after the July 7 attacks in London on the basis that doing something would mean that the terrorists have won. Cukier goes on to cite that the murder rate in Canada is quite low; in other words, you’re perfectly safe so stop all this whining about guns and violent shootings.
Writing in the National Post, adam Radwanski wrote a relatively lengthy piece about how the real danger is not the violent crime that is occuring in Canada’s major cities but the perception of it. The columnist described Torontonians as having "long had a slightly hysterical inclination to view themselves as under siege". In other words, you have very little chance of becoming a victim so what’s the big deal?
There are some people who live in Canada’s major cites who, like people everywhere else, are afraid of spiders, flying and walking outdoors lest a meteor fall on them and kill them instantly. and there is no doubt there many people are afraid of being caught in a crossfire while walking down the street, shopping at the mall or riding a city bus. They only feel safe within the confines of their own four walls.
But what apologists for the status quo like Cukier and Radwanski fail to understand is that the much of the reaction to violent crime is not fear but anger. Most people know that despite the increase in gun crime, they have little chance of becoming a shooting victim. They are simply fed up with the streets becoming bloodier and bloodier while the politicians and politically correct police chiefs discuss how many new community centres should be built. Many of us are sick and tired of constantly being told that violent crime is down when drivers and children are being shot on city buses. We’re fed up with politicians whose major aim is to use the gun violence to score political points by blaming the United States for all of our ills. We are losing our streets to the bad guys and when we complain about it, we are lectured in a patronizing manner that we’re just too scared of something that we shouldn’t be scared of.
Most people are not scared to death of all the shootings. They just want their streets back and the bad guys dealt with.