migod@csri.toronto.edu (Mike Godfrey) (12/21/89)
In article <89Dec20.141047est.2233@neat.cs.toronto.edu> mgreen@cs.toronto.edu (?) writes: > The Sunday Shopping controversey is just the tip of the iceberg. There > real issue that the governments of Canada and Ontario have are bent on > imposed their views on how you should lead your life. I can add a little bit here, so let me. What is happening here is that the Peterson government is waiting in the woods for public opinion to change. Remember the "beer-in-the-corner-stores" muddle? What happened was that the Ontario government talked about introducing a law that they thought would be readily embraced by the public-at-large. What they didn't count on was the Brewer's Retail union successfully playing to the naturally conservative sympathies of the Ontario public. The government ended up with egg on its face for trying to "force" its opinion on an unreceptive public. So for the Sunday shopping issue, the government is playing it cool. They've tried to wash their hands of it by throwing the responsibility over to the individual municipalities, but the municipalities don't want it either. (As a side note, can anyone else remember an instance of a political body *refusing* power.) What everyone is afraid of is a combined labour/"family" movement that might manange to consolidate public opinion behind them. So the government is waiting in the bushes, waiting until people start going to Loblaws (illegally) on Sundays and liking it. *Then* you'll see Sunday shopping in Ontario. And it *will* happen. > According to the government, you are ... supposed to be Christian I can add a little insight here too. Remember the Ontario Leadership Convention that elected Peterson? Well, OK, probably not. However, I was a delegate to that convention (during my brief "politically active" phase in late high school). At the time, one of the issues that concerned me most was the nature of the opening exercises in the public schools. I won't bore you with why, but basically I was of the opinion that it was inappropriate for the public schools to insist on Christian-only religious exercises. I contacted the offices of each of the major candidates to get some response about how they felt. Eventually, I got to talk to Peterson personally. He was very non-committal (as you might expect, not knowing if I was some religious nut or a reporter fishing for tomorrow's headline in the Toronto Sun). He gave me platitudes about how he thought the Bible was a good book etc etc and said that he had no plans to change the law as it stood. Well of course you know that the Ontario government has since changed the law, and Peterson was quoted as saying that in our cultural mosaic, it is unfair and inappropriate to present only one point of view ... etc etc. The moral is, I think, that politicians will often wait until the political climate is right before doing anything that might change the status quo. I think this is what we're seeing right now with Sunday shopping. -- Mike Godfrey "Baby it's an AM world, baby it's an AM world, Dept of Comp Sci, UofT Get yourself a flag and run it up a pole, migod@csri.toronto.edu And keep that flag unfurled." -- L. Wainwright III
henry@utzoo.uucp (Henry Spencer) (12/21/89)
In article <1989Dec20.194709.3125@jarvis.csri.toronto.edu> migod@csri.toronto.edu (Mike Godfrey) writes: >... (As a side note, can anyone else remember an instance of >a political body *refusing* power.) Sure: the Conservative government trying to avoid making a decision on what to do about abortion. No middle-of-the-road go-wherever-the-polls-go politician wants to have anything to do with a decision that has vocal pressure groups on both sides. They think they'll get re-elected if only they can avoid offending anybody, and all too often they're right. -- 1972: Saturn V #15 flight-ready| Henry Spencer at U of Toronto Zoology 1989: birds nesting in engines | uunet!attcan!utzoo!henry henry@zoo.toronto.edu
migod@csri.toronto.edu (Mike Godfrey) (12/22/89)
In article <1989Dec21.050538.6471@utzoo.uucp> henry@utzoo.uucp (Henry Spencer) writes: >In article <1989Dec20.194709.3125@jarvis.csri.toronto.edu> migod@csri.toronto.edu (Mike Godfrey) writes: >> ... (As a side note, can anyone else remember an instance of >> a political body *refusing* power.) > > Sure: the Conservative government trying to avoid making a decision on > what to do about abortion. The feds are not *refusing* the power to make the decision, they are simply not exercising it. -- Mike Godfrey "Baby it's an AM world, baby it's an AM world, Dept of Comp Sci, UofT Get yourself a flag and run it up a pole, migod@csri.toronto.edu And keep that flag unfurled." -- L. Wainwright III