Gordon Lightfoot was a great Canadian
Gordon Lightfoot was truly a great Canadian talent who did a very short stint in the United States, studying music, only to move back to Canada because he never identified as anything other than Canadian.
He had a large talent that shone brightly without catering to the larger United States market even though his music and songwriting was heard around the world and sung by the world‘s biggest headliners.
My wife and I grew up with his music as did so many Canadians of our generation. His songs identified our youth and early adulthood.
In recent years you would hear one of his songs and say “remember when.”
His music reflected Canadian history and Canadian life.
He continued to write and sing his music until very recently.
He was known as a generous person who helped those who fell upon hard times and never expected help from somebody so well known. He had a heart for others and didn’t hoard his wealth.
I always knew that when Lightfoot passed that it would mean a marked date for me and also for our generation. One of own now gone forever and it feels that way.
No new songs from a musical storyteller and ballad singer reflecting our country and our life. We will mourn Lightfoot even though most of us never actually met him but still felt we have known him well through his music and his life.
A very sad day for Canadians and those who loved his music.
Leslie Leyh
Saanichton
End of world talk a cause of mental health crisis
Re: “Fossil fuel industry and the tobacco playbook,” letter April 26.
The letter stretched the truth in equating the tobacco industry “deceiving the public” about cigarette smoking in the 1950s with oil-industry executives “deceiving the public” about burning fossil fuels and their primary contribution to the “climate crisis.”
I’ve met many oil executives in my career. I found them on the whole to be intelligent, honest, hard-working, and pragmatic about Canadian energy needs.
Canada is a cold country; its citizens require reliable and relatively cheap energy to heat their homes, get them to work and to fly on airplanes.
In contrast, green-energy-transition initiatives in Ontario, Germany and Siri Lanka, to name a few, have had near-disastrous results: energy prices skyrocketed and created significant social unrest. A healthy Canadian oil and gas industry can help us avoid this catastrophe at home.
The writer implies that Canadian governments are overly helpful to the oil industry.
Given the cancellation of such major projects as Northern Gateway, the ever-increasing “carbon tax,” not to mention the anti-oil mantra of Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and his advisers, the Canadian energy industry is being punished for delivering the reliable and essential energy our citizens need.
Since the end of the last “mini-ice age” in the mid 1850s, global temperatures have risen about one degree Celsius. Is this really an existential crisis?
The letter-writer concludes that government approval of future hydrocarbon projects is akin to promoting cigarette smoking to children — another major stretch.
Perhaps the writer could turn her attention to a more observable and pressing “crisis”: a mental-health crisis, especially amongst young people, in part because they are taught from elementary school onwards that the world will likely end in their lifetimes due to the “climate crisis.”
Ken Rowan
Victoria
Rest assured, dogs are being allowed to run free
Re: “Commercial dog walkers do not cause problems,” letter, May 2.
The author is playing the game, “I’ve never seen it so it must not happen.” OK, I’ll play along.
I’ve never seen someone fall off a ladder.
I’ve never seen an accident caused by a drunk driver.
I’ve never seen a sexual assault.
See how silly this game is? Of course all of these things can and do happen, and just because I don’t personally witness them doesn’t mean they don’t.
What I have seen is commercial dog walkers, and other dog owners, allow their dogs to run off trails, jump on people and chase wildlife. But even if I had never seen this, I would believe others if they said they had.
Phoebe Marcovitz
Saanich
Look at the people, not at the problems
I work with people in the street community. On one of my walks for work the other day, passing some encampment areas, I had a moment when I properly realized this:
People using substances are deciding each moment they take that substance that it is easier, better, more tenable, than other alternative behaviour.
We often try to simplify solutions to clean up the problems downtown. But these individuals making their painful decisions in our full view are just that, individuals.
They come to any solution with their own individual spirits. They use the contents of the bucket of history, trauma, responsibility and capability, just as we all do, to make their decisions and they suffer the consequences with less privacy than many of us enjoy.
Personal growth is hard no matter who you are, please try to see people, not problems.
Erin Lumley
Saanich
No evidence, no proof to back the statement
Re: “If there was murder, give us the evidence,” letter, May 2.
That needed to be said.
I’m sure Charla Huber got many letters, including one from me, protesting the use of the term “murder” without evidence or proof.
Jean Anderson Reid
Saanich
Nothing being done for mental health care
The lack of mental health care is not a new problem but one that has festered for 40 years or so.
The NDP are in their second term, during which they have done nothing but ignore the problem of drug addiction and the associated challenge of homeless addicts.
The current ‘plan’ of catch and release of drug addicts does not help them nor the public. The fix is going to be expensive.
Why does Premier David Eby not explain this to the public? Treat us like adults.
In the European Union there are social and financial support for families from pre-natal through to adult. Problems are tackled whilst there is family support.
Meantime the seven NDP MLAs from Surrey will get $30 million to sort out that city’s policing mess. Funds that could be spent on social housing.
M.J. Berry
Nanaimo
When we ban words, it’s just plain wrong
Re: “Unfortunately, this word isn’t allowed,” letter, April 19.
The writer would like some words to be “disallowed” or, in other words, banned. We already have a very long list of words that we’re not supposed to say, and it’s getting longer every day.
One has only to look up Stanford University’s recent “Elimination of Harmful Language Initiative” to appreciate just how far this has gone.
Some of us understand that censorship is bad and ultimately undermines democracy, as alluded to by another letter on the same page.
Stanford has back-pedalled on its list of banned words, but even then retreated to a vague excuse about how it was inadvertently “counter to inclusivity,” instead of simply admitting that such things are just plain wrong.
M.H. Ward
Victoria
SEND US YOUR LETTERS
• Email letters to: [email protected]
• Mail: Letters to the editor, Times Colonist, 2w01-655 Tyee Rd., Victoria, B.C. V9A 6X5
• Submissions should be no more than 250 words; subject to editing for length and clarity. Provide your contact information; it will not be published. Avoid sending your letter as an email attachment.
