Here we are. Less than two weeks 'till the start of a new year. And if you thought 2024 was insane, just you wait!
I started writing this day after Monday’s calamity and chaos in Ottawa following the resignation of Finance Minister Chrystia Freeland, and naturally the knives came out for the members of the federal government still standing. On Tuesday, Pierre Poilievre called for an “immediate” election, which I understand is a reflex at this point, but it’s bound to be disappointing to his children that he’d rather spend the holidays applying for his next job than, I don’t know, spending time with them.
Perhaps Poilievre feels like he doesn’t have to really run for the job. Polling says he’s got it in the bag, so why not just let local candidates run and make the clearly decided case that the Conservatives should form government, and he should be prime minister?
The bedlam in Ottawa is a reflection of what we’re all feeling around the country. In the years to come I feel like we will look back and say that while Justin Trudeau was the antidote for the Stephen Harper years, he was entirely ill-suited for the challenges of the post-COVID-19 world. But when I look at this political landscape now, I’m really not sure anyone is suited to lead, even the ones who have done well with the hand of cards they were dealt. (See Joe Biden and Kamala Harris.)
So because of that, it’s impossible to look back at the events of 2024 and not see an overarching theme of abandonment, and that breeds cruelty. We’re cruel to each other, we’re cruel to our government officials, and we feel that they’re cruel to us back.
And if we don’t see our politicians as cruel, we certainly see them as selfish. Think about Doug Ford’s nearly six-month long refusal to discount the possibility of an early election, and that’s despite the fact that he’s got another two solid years of mandate and a fixed election date in June 2026. Poilievre’s pressure is understandable due to the inherent instability of a minority government, but why does Ford to want to run two years early? He’s in the majority now!
But Ford’s brazenness is outstripped only by the ineptitude of Ontario’s opposition parties to present a unifying alternative vision. I fear at the end of all politics now is a reality no one has solutions to problems anymore, they only have criticisms. The system has been gamified, everyone’s a team player, and the only goal is winning.
The worldwide rejection of democracy is not a reject of government for the people by the people, it’s a rejection of a system that’s not working the way it should and if the government’s working for anything, it’s certainly not for the people. This did not happen overnight. It happened 30 years ago when we decided the things that protected us were outdated and didn’t matter anymore: social housing, labour unions, taxation of the wealthy, regulations and local media.
In essence, we need to rebuild our systems, but it’s been historically easier to destroy a system than create one. That’s why the Ford government has pivoted this year to the easier solutions offered by cruelty. Every story about tackling homelessness, housing, addictions and mental health has been to get rid of it. Not solve it, just not see it anymore.
Homeless encampments? No! Clear them out, and make sure legal clinics and anti-poverty activists can’t take governments to court to protect civil liberties.
Build deeply affordable non-profit housing? Nope, “cut red tape” and municipal fees for for-profit developers and if municipalities can scrape together some change for a couple of new units, whatever!
Give people more treatment options and access to services to suit their needs? Sorry, the best we can do is close your CTS, make sure you can’t access safer supply, and if you don’t like it, we’ll force you into treatment, and, oh yeah, make sure that legal clinics and anti-poverty activists can’t take governments to court to protect civil liberties.
Even locally, these issues have been confronted with cruelty, or failing that indifference, to the growing plight of people whom this economy has left behind.
The extremely rough procedural maneuvers that resulted in the passage of the Public Space Use Bylaw is proof of that, as is the fact that council and staff ignored – or conveniently forgot – the demands of the Accessibility Advisory Committee to engage with them as local disability reps before its passage.
The County of Wellington’s dithering about tiny homes and their place on the housing continuum is another, demanding the City of Guelph bend to all of their procedural traditions while ignoring calls from the City to meet us halfway on our unique needs and outside the box thinking in this crisis.
And we can’t ignore the schism inside the council chambers as Mayor Cam Guthrie has repeatedly decided to go along with cruelty from the Ontario government in order to get along and forcing his council colleagues to take votes counter to his individual direction because they get co-signed to it when he uses the official Guelph logo on an official letter to the premier.
And going along is going to be harder with the next federal government. The man who will surely be prime minister this time next year has already said in front of a scorching rabble that local governments are “greedy," “money-hungry” and “driving up costs," which means any financial assistance from Ottawa is a dwindling resource, and what happens then?
The answer should not be surprising: More cruelty. It’s the only currency that well and truly trickles down in any economy. Everyone’s so busy playing politics that nobody’s playing government, and all the while that crack in the safety net that swallows people whole is only getting bigger. The more people fall through it, the angrier everyone gets, from the ones who feel forgotten to the ones still hanging on who feel like *they* have been forgotten.
And that should be the takeaway this week: The real problems driving anger have been overlooked in the name of exploiting that anger for political benefit. It’s also been the story of this year, and now I fear, it will be the story of next year too. How cruel we end up being is a matter now in all our hands.
