Remembrance Day 2021

I am having trouble writing my usual Remembrance Day post. In 2021, Canada finally lost its first war since the Chilcotin War in 1864 (the Chilcotin still belongs to the Tsilhqot’in, and that road was not driven through it). So far, our government has shamelessly betrayed the people in Afghanistan who helped it. Canadians are still fighting in the undeclared wars in Syria and Iraq. The Canadian Forces have not dealt with a 30 year crisis of senior members abusing their power to collect sexual favours from junior servicemembers. And our institutions in most provinces have not been honest or effective at dealing with the pandemic. Our federal government has spent more on hand sanitizer than on ventilation to combat an airborne infection, and until fall 2021 libraries were still quarantining incoming books.

I am good at remembrance. I am not so good at making institutions follow basic ethical or professional standards. And just like you can act correctly without knowing why you do it that way, remembering why you should act correctly does not lead to that action.