... living in the G20 grey zone

Why do I write?

I most often write when I've seen or experienced something that I want to write about. I also write when something moves me so much that I just can't keep how it makes me feel in my head anymore. I also write when I'm trying to figure something out, and when I start I don't know where it's going to end.

Most people know what happened in Toronto during the first day of the G20 summit. I'll point out right now that by living in the West End, I was nowhere near the action. Dawn was working during the day in the East End, but was able to get out of there before the conflict escalated and got home safely.

I originally had a larger, much more different piece written in my mind, about how there was enough blame to go around. How could the protest organizers not have been able to identify that those people wearing balaclavas were going to be trouble and removed them from their protest (an action that is easier said than done, but which could still be done, and was probably not done either out of a sense of "inclusion" or lazyness)? How could the police not realize that the city was on edge after watching a fence go up and the downtown depopulated, trees removed, and identity cards issued? What can you say about people whose first reaction was "Stop breaking the windows of MY Starbucks!" (emphasis mine), a statement that in its own way nicely encapsulated the reason why some people are compelled to smash up said windows in the first place?

The more I thought of it, the more it came down to the colour gray.

The events that transpired are polarizing. I don't like polarizing moments. The problem with allowing yourself to get polarized is that you lose your sense of empathy. At that moment, it's all black and white. "I hate those protesters and what they did to my city" might be a natural reaction, but it's a dangerous place to land and stay for long. It leads to moments like those that Steve Paikin reported from the streets, where peaceful protests and questioning authority are all treated with the same response as a violent protest, because you're angry at those to did things to "your" city. (Parenthetically, I shall note that I hate that rhetorical construct. It's "a city", it's made up of different people. You have ownership over your part of it, but it's not a hegemony.)

Anyone who knows me personally knows I have a complex relationship with authority. I have no stains on my record, but actions taken by those looking after the common good have taken someone very dear from me in the past as well as making me feel unwelcome in my own town. But I also know that this action does not reflect on the whole organization. BUT, again, this also means that I can empathize with people who can get very, very, very angry as they feel authority's grip tightening around them, even at times when said grip is justified for the common good.

There are two "but"s in that paragraph, and they see me run through three sides of the same argument. And if I told you the whole story, there would be about four more "but"s and probably seven other parts to the argument I would come down on.

I wish I could see the world as black and white, I really do. I wish that I could see what happened today and shake my fist at one person, or one group, shake the dust off my feet at them and cast them to outer damnation. I can't. Because while I don't agree with their action, I have an inkling of where there anger comes from, and I have my own dark places as well.

I was raised Catholic by very Catholic parents (Italian and Irish), but it wasn't a conservative religious upbringing. If there are those who see the Bible as a gateway to prosperity and riches, we came from the side that saw it as a document about divesting yourself of those Earthly things and embracing your neighbors, who we were told were everyone - I guess you could say we were an Acts-centric home. I was taught about a creator who had mercy for us.

When my brother finally succumbed to his injuries, I was told it was because he "didn't want him to suffer, so he took [my brother] to heaven".

That moment still kills and haunts me. At one moment it fills me with mercy, another it fills me with rage, then compassion, then cynicism. They're all different. And in their own way at their own time, they're all right.

People did some bad things today, things that are clearly wrong and unnatural in a society. I know that. But I also know that something drove them there. I also know it's not something as simple as "they hate capitalism/freedom/class-centric coffee". I know that they feel that what drove them to that may be as valid a grievance as any other expressed that day, and I also know that I 'm sympathetic to that grievance on a lot of levels. I know also that as much as I'd love to sit in judgment of those people I can't, because I know in my dark places that but for a few different life choices, both made by myself and those that raised me, I could have been there with them also.

My empathy, my dwelling in the grey areas, my lack of moral compass, whatever you want to call it, can be traced back to the fact that in my youth I was told, I was taught, I believed that there was only ever one person who walked who was untainted by sin, whose intentions were always pure, and who you could never question the effect of his actions of the contents of his heart because they were those of a pure love.

And even he got angry and turned over the tables of those who were using authority to take away money in the name of something his father made.

If you're looking for a conclusion, you're not gonna find it. Life's too complex. Just because you're done with book doesn't mean the book is done with you.