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This week was burger week in Halifax, an annual fundraising event that is widely reported and followed by citizens.
I only got out once, to the Celtic Corner where the proceeds of Burger Week went to support Margaret’s House.
Margaret’s House is named in memory of Margaret Savage, who was a great supporter of the F.O.O.D. program as was her husband John Savage.
Mayor Mike Savage and his brothers and sisters continue to support Margaret’s House.

Another person who had a burger this week was Premier Stephen McNeil. I am sure few of the other participants who posted #HalifaxBurgerWeek posts on Twitter were subjected to the following petty, mean and self-promoting comments. The Premier also posted an item promoting the Cancer Societies daffodil campaign and received the same sort of comments.

I have participated in the political life of Nova Scotia for a long time and I have written many posts that criticize the policy proposals of political parties. I do not, however, make a practice of attacking people personally. I did post a tweet to Gary Burrill noting his constant stream of negativism, but it was not on a post promoting a charity.

These types of things get much worse than those I have highlighted here. They include comments on character, appearance, sexual orientation and intelligence. They include harsh and abusive language, threats and become a constant stream of disheartening noise.

Why?

Are any of these good citizens prepared to put their time and energy into anything more than tweeting? Will they put their name forward to serve the province, city, neighborhood? Will they subject themselves and their families to the abuse they dish out?

This week the Herald ran an opinion piece from Bruce Lantz on this topic, an interesting read.

I ask again why? If you don’t want to get involved your facebook posts and twitter rants are a waste of time. I have the greatest respect for political opponents who work and advocate for their position, and maybe some of the twitter posters do as well.

So maybe we can agree that anyone who is promoting a good cause can just get a pass on that? Can we agree on that? Probably not, and we will reap what we sow.

#nspoli #HalifaxBurgerWeek

I was away sailing in two model sailboat regattas at the end of May this year when I received a voice message on my phone.The message contained a male voice and originated  from a phone number in Nova Scotia. The man was shouting and swearing and the message ended with a death threat.

My first reaction was puzzlement, I did not recall anything in my recent past that would generate a death threat. I googled the telephone number which generated a name and then I googled the name. I found his FaceBook page and picture, I did not know him. I thought it must be a misdialed number, but who knows?

I called Silvia at home to let her know what had happened and together we decided to call the police in Halifax. I called the non-emergency number and filed a report. The police took the information and treated it very seriously. They dispatched two officers to my home, talked to Silvia and then called me. I played the message for them over the phone and gave them the information I found online.

When I followed up with them a week later I learned it was a wrong number, I was not the subject of the threat. The man was angry with someone and made a stupid call. He was “spoken to” by the police but as I understand it no charges were laid. I have no quarrel with that result, people make mistakes.

I know that these kinds of calls and threats are a regular part of the landscape for the staff in the offices of our elected officials. I wonder if people become accustomed to it, or are they puzzled and concerned as I was.

I am left to wonder what kind of people think this is OK. Are they the same people that bully the cashier in a store, or go bananas when their special coffee order with 1-1/2 of this and 2/3 of that is not perfect?

Who are you people? What is wrong with you?

I woke up at 3:30 am today and inexplicably had this thought about zombies.

Why do zombies want to eat brains?

To create fans! Clearly, you have to be brainless to care about a TV show featuring zombies. It had to be said, hate me if you must but you know I am right.