I’ve been working with a variety of friends to promote awareness about how bad life will get for most of us if we end up with private healthcare like the US. I read about it, I write about it and I’m helping to advertise a grassroots province-wide pushback against the privatization of Ontario-Canada healthcare. I do some of this by posting regularly on a variety of Facebook accounts (personal, group, and local media).
Public healthcare for all citizens is one of the most important benefits of living in a first-world country. So important in fact, that most Canadians would automatically assume that timely access to healthcare – irrespective of the ability to pay – is a fundamental right. And I am one of them. Should your child have less access to medical treatment because you have less money? Should your parent or sibling or friend be passed over for timely healthcare in favour of a wealthier patient? I don’t think so. That anybody believes they should just sickens me.
The only wealthy industrialized country that does not offer public healthcare for all its citizens is the US and they have some of the worst health outcomes of any industrialized country. Public healthcare is intimately tied to the Canadian identity, along with our multicultural society, military peacekeeping efforts, and our overall “niceness”. We take care of each other and our society.
Recently someone remarked that my posts were too “political” for one FB group because I named Premier Ford and the Conservative party – as the architects behind the privatization of our healthcare in Ontario. Despite the pushback effort being “non-partisan”, everybody who is part of this province-wide effort has recognized and named Ford & the Conservatives. Why? Because it’s the truth. It’s a fact.
I’m not sure that my posts are particularly “political” as they are more about a social issue that is being pushed by a political party as a solution to a healthcare crisis that they have contributed to – despite the fact that most studies disagree with privatization as the “solution”. I don’t think it’s “political” to point out when any elected government is endangering its citizens or just on the wrong track. I also don’t think it’s political to name them. Or maybe it is. But I think it’s important. In this case to say “the government” leaves room for interpretation, fake news, etc. What level of government? Local, provincial, federal?? Not all citizens know what’s happening in this country. Many don’t understand who is responsible for what and in fact, how the government works at all.
For what it’s worth, I do think it is essential to name the politician or party behind unpopular efforts so that people do not vote for them in the future. It’s also important to name the party behind popular efforts. Because of the way the political game is being played these days, we are encouraged to get behind personalities; we like or don’t like a particular politician or the leader of a party based on a manufactured personality. Rather than vote for a personality in any political party it’s important to know what they stand for; how their decisions will impact your life. We need to think about what is important to us; what will make our lives better in a concrete way and then vote for that.
Increasingly we see governments that appear to exist for their own enrichment at the expense of “we” the people. Well, I’m fed up. We the people need to talk about it. We need to get loud about it. We need to call a spade a spade.
3 Responses
I understand what you are saying, but here’s the thing.
The goal is to get the vote out, from all parties, left, right and center. The issue is about stopping the privatazation of healthcare and have such a huge turnout that the government, the FORD government, cannot ignore it. Pointing fingers will only result in aggravating half your potential voter base. Think about it. If you ask “Do you want your healthcare to remain publicly funded?”, that’s an everybody question. If you ask “Do you want Ford to keep our healthcare publicly funded?”, while you have a bunch of posters accusing “Ford is Privatizing your Healthcare!”, you already lost the right.
*Privatization – ugh… I sound illiterate .
Hi Julia, I understand what you mean. And on the flip side: “the government” is easily identified or misidentified as whatever level (local, provincial or federal) you think is behind a particular issue. In this case, we could split the difference and say the Ontario government or Ontario Provincial government. Thanks for the thoughtful comment.