The Scene and Herd

Working for BlogTo has been tons of fun. I get to go out to eat cake at least once a week. Plus, I get to take Alyssa with me. We have a good time. There’s just this one problem with the whole BlogTo experience – the comment section. People can be so mean. It’s demoralizing. Rather, it used to be demoralizing. I’ve become desensitized to stupid comments and this is of concern, because it makes it difficult for me to discern which comments are legitimate. Some of them are completely worth my while to read. In short, a few shifty comments are making it difficult for real comments to be heard.

Word on the street is Jason Kenney has the same problem with Canada’s refugee system. Apparently there are so few restrictions on who can claim refugee status, that a number of Mexicans have been taking advantage of it and making illegitimate claims. Then they get to hang out in Canada while their case is sorted out. The system is so overwhelmed by the fake refugees that the real refugees can’t get their case heard in a timely manner.

So Kenney has decided to slap Visa restrictions on Mexico and the Czech Republic. I disagree with this move, to say the least. It’s already hard enough for those guys to get out of Mexico alive. But the system is broken and Kenney is trying to fix it. Aside from making the system more of a priority (i.e. hire more people), I can’t offer any solid ideas.

Thankfully, most news reports have wide-open comment sections, where regular people can offer their own solutions to the refugee problem. “Let’s expand the visa requirement to anyone seeking refugee or immigrant status and refuse entry to anyone with improper documents,” suggests one lofty individual, who obviously doesn’t even really understand what a refugee is. Someone else proposes we put them “on the next plane home if they don’t pass even basic muster.”

I appreciate this last guy’s optimism. I have no idea who he is is, but I’m going to give him the benefit of the doubt and call his idea well thought out. In fact, I think we should apply his solution to all comment sections. Before someone may leave a comment, they have thirty seconds to explain why they deserve to leave a comment. If they have too much to say or get nervous or can’t articulate or have just had a really bad day and can’t think straight then tough luck. They don’t get to make a comment. They get to bring their cursor to the upper left hand corner of their browser window and click “back” to the page they came from.

All last year, save a few exceptions, I had to google Mexico news to find out what was going on over there. But the past few days suggest this previously, oddly contained war is slowly being enveloped by mainstream media. I’ve heard drug war details on the CBC, in the Toronto Star, all over the internet and even from my relatives. This bizarre phenomenon,  Mexico’s precarious position as NAFTA partner, tourist destination and war zone.

A plane went down in Mexico City two days ago with Interior Minister and former head drug prosecutor on board. Civilians cry Narco plot, but the official stance is still accident. Eight more bodies were found in Northern border town with one decapitated, hanging from a bridge to terrify locals. The national drug war death toll rivals Afghanistan and Tijuana exceeds Baghdad. The drug cartels’ increasingly brazen violent acts show their attempt to assert power and control while quelling any opposition.

But we all know this just leads to bloody war. Police and local government officials are targeted, threatened or murdered but ultimately replaced by those either more staunch and stubborn to wipe out the cartels, or corrupt individuals tied to the criminals. No one in between would take on such a god forsaken position. So the drugs are either going to meet with greater violence and opposition or a brief time in complete control before a desperate civilian uprising. 

Whatever happens, I feel like Mexico is headed into this terrible situation and when total civil war breaks out, no one over here will have seen it coming because we are too distracted by billboards and TV commercials suggesting we take a break there sometime this winter.