Raptors and the Cost of Seats

I like watching basketball on television. It is a fast-paced game that requires a level of skill and fitness from all of the athletes on the floor, attributes that are not always apparent in other sports. I wish I had seen more games live. In fact, I have only seen two professional matches - one involved the Harlem Globetrotters years and years ago and another just last fall when I saw a game played by teams from a second or perhaps even third tier basketball league. The odds of me making it to a big league game in a major city are somewhat remote. The odds of me making it to a Raptors' playoff game are infinitesimally smaller.

It has been reported that, if one wants a really good seat to watch the Raptors compete in their first ever championships series - it will cost up to $30,000 for your seat. I like basketball and I would really like to see the kind of show that a professional basketball team put on but I think I would rather buy a new electric car than go to a playoff game. At least in an electric car, I would get more than one seat for my money.

I understand that professional sport is business just like any other business. I get that the sole function of such a business is to make money for the owners. I also understand that both the corporation and the scalpers who will sell the tickets for even more have a limited number of games in which to make that money and therefore they need to gouge as many people as possible.

Part of me wants to scream out that it is just not fair, that in a society like ours we should all have access to the same type of opportunities; that surely there are people who deserve to go but won't be able to because of the cost. I have no doubt there is a little boy or girl whose life would be forever changed for the better if only they could go to a Raptor's game. But the reality is that going to a playoff game is not a human right. It is a social privilege accorded to a relatively small number of individuals, individuals who have both the capacity and desire to pay that amount of money for a few hours of entertainment. For that amount of money, they also get the vicarious pleasure (hopefully) of winning a game and I suppose, some sort of bragging rights around the office water cooler the next day.

For the rest of us, we will just have to suck it up and pretend that it really doesn't matter to us.

But in some ways, it should matter to everyone. In this hyper-inflated world that we live in, where some people are rewarded with millions of dollars for jumping or running or skating better than the rest of us; where we value possessions and "star" quality over hard work, commitment and basic human decency; in a world where bad behaviour is forgiven if the person has sufficient political or financial power, we need to recognize that maybe, just maybe our priorities are a bit misaligned.

Someone has to win the NBA championship - I hope it is the Raptors. I, like thousands of other Canadians who will not go to the game, and do not have access to the right cable channel to watch them on television will still quietly cheer them on. But I do not think I am alone in wishing that I go afford to go to a game. A little electric car might have at least two seats and its value would last much longer - but it would never be as exciting.

Whose Garbage Is It?

Canada's reputation as a reasonable and fair trading partner and an over-all good guy has been tarnished just a little bit more by the fact that we deposited 103 containers of garbage in the Philippines and for months have refused to go and get it.

All of the parties concerned agree that the containers came from Canada and that, instead of the recyclable material that the containers were supposed to contain, they contained household garbage, the stuff -including dirty diapers - that we would send to our local landfill sites. The kind of garbage that the Philippines never agreed to take. As such, there would appear to be little doubt that someone in Canada is responsible to ensure that the garbage comes back to Canada or goes elsewhere so that it can be disposed of properly. My question is why is it my problem?

I don't understand why the Government of Canada should be responsible for paying for the return of these 103 containers, or responsible for their disposal once they get here. I don't understand why my tax dollars will get used to solve this problem. It may be my garbage - but I have already paid someone to take it away. The fact that some private, for-profit company bent (or in fact broke) the rules as to what should go where - should not be my problem. Some company got paid to pick up the garbage. Part of that cost was for them to dispose of it in an approved manner. The fact that it was cheaper to ship it just over 10,000 kilometres than it was to pay local dumping fees says something about how we process our waste but disposing of it was why we paid them to pick it up. This unknown company appears to have loaded up 103 containers, got them loaded onto a boat and then washed their hand of the problem. They had to have known what they were doing was wrong They had to have known that as soon as someone in the Philippines opened those containers to start processing the recyclable materials that they would close up the containers and report it. Clearly, they did not care.

What is surprising about this whole affair is that I cannot find a single published account of who this company was. This was not something that was done by one person. There were truck drivers, stevedores, accountants, and countless others who knowingly or unknowingly were involved in the operation - but no one is talking. The company had to have had a licence to do business, to export material, they had to have paid all of the federal taxes that all companies pay. They must have had an agreement with some company in the Philippines. And yet no one is holding the owners of that company to account. Why?

In a world where we document almost everything, in a world where people share all kinds of information on social media, in a world where various political parties take great delight in looking for dirt on the ruling party - why is no one talking about who this company is and how to reclaim the cost of retrieval from the owners of this company?

The company may have disappeared or gone bankrupt. However, if the courts can confiscate the private possessions obtained through the profits of crime - these owners did commit a crime and therefore they should lose everything until their bill is paid off. If we hold companies responsible for what they do in other countries - should we not hold this company responsible as well?