Every day I hear people who are fed up with society, stupid people, and so on. From city councels that always raise taxes (because they refuse to cut or limit services to hold the line), to pedestrians and drivers that apparently don't care about their lives (people on foot step in front of my moving car all the time, or drivers who never signal are on the rise) there are more and more reasons to want to just drop everything and find the simpler life.

My simpler life has always been to move to a shack in the woods. These days I'd need high speed to be happy in that shack, and little else. Wood for heat, running water from a stream for water and some power, more power from wind/solar, some cottage industry to pay taxes and basic food.. its not that far from reality.

Then a good friend started talking about buying a boat and sailing off into the sunset. Man, I was thinking small potatoes! This is the life! Just drop a net or a fishing line over the edge for supper.. don't make port until you have a load of seafood to pay your berthing costs. Not to mention that I now have family in Barbaods which makes a pretty nice destination..

How many people are borderline serious about plans like this? It seems like the number is growing. This is a bad sign - it means people are more and more fed up with the social system we have (government, schools, common courtesy, etc). The peaceful people just want to be left alone, but the un-peaceful people are the dangerous ones. Right now they are the ones that are screaming "We NEED millions of dollars spent on picking up litter!" and other equally useless causes.

At heart I'm peaceful, so I'll just be adding details to my plan (plans I guess now- I have to add crew that sailboat to my list..) while other rant and rave at the system.

Anyone have the answers?

Let's assume the subject actually exists. How could we tell them from the bad ones? (keep in mind I'm talking Canadian politics, but much of this should apply across the border too)

If you start to list the qualities you want in a good politician, you have to step back and think how long that person would survive in the current system.

An honest and upfront politician who cared about voters, would get steamrolled and blindsided by his politician peers. Its sad to say but true. Even worse is that the party system would help this 'mugging'.

That said, how far does our 'ideal' politician have to go down the 'dark side' to survive, but still be true to the good qualities? Of course that is ignoring the slippery slope that would involve.

Apparently women in politics are considerably less inclined to take bribes, and take part in other underhanded dealings. Should that be a consideration?

Everyone knows about the coming of age things that kids have to do or go through or whatever. But more and more, there are additional events/rites/etc for middle aged people.

Some of these have been around for ages, things like getting married and having kids. These are big changes in life and are definitely a trial of your endurance and patience and how grown up you are.

But there are other challenges that maybe should have been part of the teenage events that weren't. These are things like taking a sick day to play a game on release day, dating two people at once, or how to deal with elderly sick family members (parents, grandparents, etc.)

Everyone assumes we learn our ethics from somewhere, but in truth we only get a vague sort of direction from school (apart from the very direct message that plagarism and bullying are bad) and if you had the bad luck to be a latch key kid you didn't get a lot of guidance from home.

Ethics should be a topic in school from kindergarten right through the end. It should be either worked into each course, and/or it should be a course on its own. Its sad but true that many people need to have this beaten into them before they realize its not just a fairy tale, its the way things really work.

Then maybe the general population would start holding elected and public officials accountable for their actions. If everyone knows right from wrong, then why should any group in society get away with doing wrong? That goes for politicians, doctors, police, religious groups, ... anyone!

An added side effect could be that more people would find they like the work that lawyers do, and the reasons they do it. Apparently Canada has a shortage of lawyers so this could help that problem too. Too bad the solution is long term...

Anyway, a clear sense of ethics is what people need to traverse these coming of age rites of passage - be they teenagers, twenty-somethings, or older.

Why are we acting like sheep? In general we let companies and other people do what they want with our family members, our money, our rights, and our property. Even when it amounts to legalized theft.

My mother had been in and out of the hospital many times last year before she died of heart complications (among other things). If my dad had not fought for her every day, doctors would have had her on untested medication (must have liver tested daily), on dialysis (once you're on it you can never get off it and in this case it wasn't needed), or had the plugged pulled simply because they needed the bed. Without a strong willed person with common sense, my mother would have died (been killed?) a year before she did pass away, possibly more than that. That would have been before she got to see her only granddaughter.

Our Canadian banks keep raising our service fees, and we just sit there and take it. The few people who care, move to PC Financial or ING Direct. But not enough to put a dent in bank profits. Last year Canadian banks made $19 Billion off the backs of little people. If you ask me, move your money out of banks liked CIBC and TD (major mainstream banks), but invest in their shares! With profits like that why not join in?

The government seems to think it owns my land. I'm starting to wonder myself these days. It seems the government can declare my land a wildlife sanctuary (no endangered species needed) and while I can still own the land I can't do a thing with it (not farm it, build on it, or sell it). Even worse, if I am a farmer and that happens to a neighbor, my land value goes down so much that the bank will foreclose on my mortgage because the land isn't worth enough to be collateral anymore! Does the government have the right to put hard working honest farmers out of business for no reason? Its one thing if the market doesn't want to buy my crops, but this is entirely different!

And lastly rights. I agree native Canadian Indians have had things very bad for a long time. I agree that the Canadian government is doing the right thing in providing the band councils with money to help them live in their traditional ways. However, I do not think they (or anyone for that matter) have the right to take guns and weapons and set up a roadblock in the middle of a town and harass the average person. This is the Caledonia situation that came up this past spring/summer. In doing that they are essentially terrorists, but we can't call them that or treat them like terrorists. When a judge issued a warrant to arrest a protester for attempted murder, the police wouldn't carry it out, and the army was never called in. There is no law and average people suffer, all because nobody wants to 'offend'. The government should make a very goodwill first move, and say unless they take down the barricade and act peacefully that is all thats going to happen. But no, that would be to heavy handed and unfair. At this point any sympathy I have for the native land claim issue here is far overshadowed by the approach. [ed: since this was written another band has blocked a major train route between Toronto and Montreal for similar reasons. and 16 months after Caledonia started its not resolved yet.]

Everyone has rights. Rights to safety, rights to basic food and shelter, and rights to expect that something you buy or earn today can't be stolen from you tomorrow without penalties. All of my above examples infringe on one or more of these areas, and if you ask me they do it for no good reason other than greed and/or laziness. I expect I will get flamed for this, and possibly get some unkind labels thrown my way. Please try to put thought into any comments on this journal post - don't be lazy!

This is a test journal entry.

I think the world is going downhill. Somedays its going there slowly, others fast, and yet others it even makes it uphill a bit. But overall things are going downhill. I'm not an old fuddy-duddy, but I've been thinking like this since I was 25!

Ethics is big one. Responsiblity is another. Common sense is a close third. If we concentrated on those 3 things, many other problems would disappear or become really really small problems.

Political correctness was a bad thing that has gone way to far. A muslim insults a Christian. A Christian insults a Buddist. A Buddist doesn't say anything to a Jew. Get over it people - it happens all the time and its not world war 3. If it bothers, you politely tell the person so and why it does.

Other views are permitted, just not here. :-)