holidays

I am on holidays from writing. After 10 or so years, I decided that I had nothing I really needed to say.

 

In the fall, perhaps....

Calling 911

 I am not sure when, in Canada, 911 became the number to call when there is an emergency. I have no memory of when I was younger of anyone ever mentioning calling any number other than "0" to get help. I can vaguely remember being in class at college in Toronto in the early 1970s and someone being surprised that I didn't know about it. It was as if something all of a sudden existed.

If one can trust Goggle, it says that it was 1968 before the US had any single system. I assume Canada developed something about the same time. I suspect that until there were only a few telephone companies and some sort of automated system, it would have been challenging to create a national system. It is hard to imagine the system working with a lot of small companies - each with their individual operators.

Regardless of when I first learnt of the system, I know that no one ever suggested that one should call 911 to ask for help in seeing if someone was okay. The instructions were clear -only call 911 if there has been an accident, if there was a fire or if someone is sick. I am sure that I knew I could use 911 to call the police if I saw a crime being committed but I cannot ever have imagined doing so. Quite simply, if you called 911, you had better have a damn good reason.

In the last 50 years, things have changed. We no longer see 911 as the call of the last resort - it what we do when we think something bad is happening and we either don't know what to do or we don't want to be involved. It is surprisingly difficult to find statistics of the frequency of use but in 2018, in the USA, there were an estimated 240 million 911 calls made (1). The most recent statistic on use in Canada that I could find was from 2008. The Globe and Mail that year reported that there were approximately 12 million 922 calls made (2). That is a lot of calls. If in fact, every one of them requires some sort a face-to-face response, that is a lot of person-hours! I could find no statistic on how many of those calls were for ambulance or fire services or to the police. It would seem to me that we need those statistics. We need to determine who is using the 911 service and why.

 I do not doubt that at least some of the people who are calling 911 are doing so because they do not know who else to call. But the dispatchers have limited options as to how to direct the caller. They are not counsellors and cannot tell the caller to talk to someone else. Everyone's job within the 911 system is to assume that it is an emergency. I suspect that this system has encouraged some people to, at the very least, slightly exaggerate the nature of the crisis so that help is sent sooner. It must very difficult for the dispatcher to do any sort of triage to determine priorities.

Given the recent dramatic examples of the police mishandling calls to assist someone who may be at risk to themselves, there may finally be enough public and political pressure to address the issue. But before we invest too much energy in looking at ways of defunding some of the police services budgets it would be useful to look at who is calling and for what services. How many of those 12 million-plus calls were related to mental health or behavioural issues? What were the outcomes?

 It is quite clear (at least to me) that for the most part, utilizing police officers to assist people who are not criminals or who have not been hurt by criminals is a poor use of the resource. But the issues as to who should help, how would they be trained, who would monitor their responses can be best addressed when we know what the job will be.

 And of course, we have to be prepared to pay for it.

 (1) www.nena.org › page › 911Statistics

 (2) https://www.theglobeandmail.com/technology/canadas-9-1-1-emergency/article560927

Word Definitions - Systemic Racism

The head of the RCMP got herself into trouble when she fumbled the question as to whether or not there was systemic racism within her organization. She should not have answered the way that she did. It is clear to most people that in all parts of our society, and in fact, in all societies racism exists and it exists at a systemic level. But the commissioner was quite right in suggesting that she was unclear as to what the phrase meant; that she had heard a number of different definitions of the phrase. Her suggestion that we needed clarity as to what we were talking about is what we should expect from the leaders of our various public institutions. To blame everything on the system - will not fix the problems that exist.

  The phrase systemic racism suggests that the actions of the individual are shaped, manipulated or controlled by the system that they work in; that the entire system around that officer is structured in such a way that treating people differently because of the colour of their skin is okay. The phrase also suggests that any racist action is beyond any one individual's control.  For example - if a police officer is more likely to confront an indigenous individual or a person of colour and is more willing to escalate that confrontation into aggressive physical restraint - it is because his training has taught him to do that and the entire command structure (including any disciplinary review process) supports such actions or is it because the officer believes (and has always believed) that some individuals are inherently guilty of some crime and less likely to be a good citizen and that there is no point trying to be "nice". The officer acts as a racist because he is a racist.

 We can fix the former. We can review training, who and how people are supervised and work on creating a culture where such attitudes are not allowed. It will not be easy and unfortunately, it will not be nearly as quick as people would like but it is very doable. However, if the main problem is that the officer's core values suggest that some people deserve less than others and that some people are more likely to offend - then all of the training in the world will not change that officer's mind. Just get rid of him/her. Pay them off and get them out of the force. The longer they stay - the more they will pollute the minds of younger officers.

 So many of the reports that I read in the press labelling actions as systemic racism strike me not as the fault of the system but the fault of the individual who committed the act or at worst the actions of a few managers. There is much that needs to be done. There are, within Canada, numerous examples of how various systems have slowly evolved over the decades to be restrictive and punitive to people who can be identified by the colour of their skin. Those individuals will experience more barriers to education, jobs, housing, social mobility and will face higher rates of incarceration or mistreatment by police. Those barriers can be identified and taken down. We can not as easily change the deeply held values, supported by their faith, their family and their chosen community, of those officers who are racist.

 When we allow people to confuse systemic racism (which puts the blame on something else) with individuals who are racists - we make far too easy for those individuals to spew their filth onto our streets. It is time we start to assign responsibility to the act upon the individual who did the crime - not on some rather nebulous system.

 

Word Definitions - Crisis

My somewhat ancient (it almost qualifies as an antique as I have had it for over 40 years) Concise Oxford Dictionary defines crisis as "Turning point, esp. of disease; a moment of danger or suspense in politics, commerce etc." There are other, more current definitions available via the internet including those from Mirriam-Webster and Cambridge Dictionaries that are more detailed and that suggest a slightly more onerous tone.The Cambridge Dictionary, for example, includes " experiencing a time of great difficulty, danger or suffering". In the past few decades, the definition of a crisis has expanded. Despite this expanded definition, if one reads any newspaper - it is clear, The word "crisis" is greatly over-used. y newspaper, it is clear - the word crisis is greatly over-used.

The word crisis implies something that is or has just happened, something that is current and I think something that is a new situation. Using the word crisis to discuss the woefully inadequate long term accommodations for seniors is not accurate. Governments, administrators, family and residents have known for years that there were problems in many of those homes. We all ignored the reports and the recommendations. How some seniors are supported as they become elderly and frail may be a national shame. It is clear, at least to some, that we need to invest more money into long term care including into oversight, but it is not a crisis. It is a chronic problem that has festered for years. Adding to the word crisis to the label makes it appear as if someone will have to do something about it, or at least they are thinking about doing something. We should have done something about it 20 years ago.

Similarly, there has been much talk in the last week about the "opioid crisis", specifically in BC. This renewed media interest was stimulated by the report that in May, more people died from a drug overdose than those who died as a result of the COVID-19. This is a frightening and shameful statistic and the news should be published and discussed. But the fact that the number of people who are dying is increasing does not reflect a crisis. The use of illegal drugs is a chronic problem, the use of opioids has been an issue that has needed to be addressed for years. We have, as is the case with so many other issues, ignored the warning signs, ignored the reports and the comments from people who understand the issues. This nation could have years ago invested significant dollars and expertise into preventing the social circumstances that lead to people becoming more likely to become addicted. We chose not to. We chose not to invest in programs that would have given more opportunities to young people who lived in difficult situations. The fact that they are dying is not a crisis - it is a reflection on our unwillingness to invest in the solutions.

Again it appears as if people are using the word "crisis" in an attempt to get people's attention. To make it seem as if someone will have to do something about it. By using the word crisis it makes it seems as if it is not our fault, that we could have done nothing about it, that it came upon us all of a sudden and we are shocked. That is all unadulterated crap. If we had bothered to get out of our safe, comfortable shells, if we had decided that we are our brother's keepers - then there would not have been the need to define the far too many deaths from the misuse of opioids or the numerous deaths within the long term care systems as a crisis.

These things are not a crisis - they are a manifestation of our inability to do what needs to be done.

Cameras or more Social Workers?

As part of the renewed interest in the police and the obvious systemic injustices within our legal systems, one of the quick fixes that have been suggested is that all police wear cameras. The assumption is that the police if all of their actions were recorded, would be better behaved, less likely to do or say things that are inappropriate or just plain wrong. If something did happen that needed to be investigated - then we would no longer need to accept the word of the officer - we would just have to watch the movie.

Cameras are an easy and quick fix. But like all easy fixes, wearing a body camera will not address any of the real issues. The cost would be prohibitive and I suspect that the results with the inevitable technological failures would not be anywhere as useful as people think.

According to the CBC "Since 2000, there has been an average of 27 police gunshot deaths a year" (1). On the surface that seems like a remarkably small number especially as compared to the approximately 1000 individuals killed every year by police in the USA. But what is important is not how many were shot and killed, but rather who they were. Not surprisingly almost all who were killed were male and almost half were white. However, the number of indigenous and black people killed was disproportionate to the relatively small number of such individuals living in our communities. What is particularly alarming is that in BC, 34 % of the individuals were unarmed, 64% were in mental distress and 75% had discernible mental health or substance abuse issues

 The issue is not whether or not police wearing cameras would reduce the misuse of force, but rather are we sending out the wrong professionals? If the latter is true - then the question becomes - who is the right person to send out. An even better question should be what could we have done to prevent the individual from being in crisis? A corollary to the above question is - how much are we prepared to spend on such things as mental health or drug abuse prevention? Unfortunately, we do not have very good answers to any of the above questions.

 It has been argued that social workers or nurses might be the more appropriate professionals to deal with at least some of these critical situations. The assumption is that nurses or social workers are less likely to be racially biased may not be true - it is an assumption that has never been tested (consider all of the social workers who willingly participated in the 60s scoop of young indigenous children or continue to support the various foster care programs for such children).  Furthermore, not only have we demonstrated very little interest in developing strategies that are effective in dealing with mental health and substance abuse issues, taxpayers have clearly demanded that both they are kept safe and that they pay as few taxes as possible.

 On the other hand, the issues have been discussed and examined for far too long. It is time to be proactive. It is time for the government and the communities need to look at effective solutions that are implemental in the short term. There is not a single solution that will address everyone's concerns. What is needed in parts of Vancouver is profoundly different from what is needed in the more northern part of the province. Different skillsets, different professionals, different teams need to be considered on an area by area basis. We need to get rid of the rhetoric that is driven by the anger in the US and look for solutions in our towns and cities.

That will require those who control the law enforcement budget to meet with those who are living in those communities, to listen to them, and to allow a significant portion of that money to be allocated to at the very least, creating a different response system.

 (1) https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/british-columbia/police-related-deaths-canada-bc-vancouver-boyd-edey-database-1.4603820