Pearson: The future is ours to shape

Article content

For those glass-half-full individuals, things are wearing thin.

Many of us are feeling psychologically and emotionally wounded, guarded, complaining of our aches and pains. It’s like every bad thing is happening everywhere, all at once. Joy is rare; pessimism is ubiquitous. Some of it is overblown, the product of a narcissistic age. But most of it is real and has a direct impact on our mental health. Last year, London was named Canada’s least happy city. You can tell. But it gets worse. Since we were ranked 63rd on a list of this country’s most generous cities, it means our charitable sector will feel our collective pain.

Article content

We are at the tail end of an age that experienced phenomenal economic growth and dynamism following the Second World War. We thought it would just continue, but, instead, we are now observing its sunset. Canadians wanted lots of stuff and we voted for parties promising to cut our taxes, only to find ourselves waiting endless hours in emergency rooms or discovering we can’t afford a home. That’s on us.

We also had political parties that promised us anything to gain and keep power. In London, we voted for a council that never said anything about a 35 per cent increase in taxes at election time, then proceeded to initiate cuts on a caring sector already struggling. That’s on them.

Either way, we feel like we’re losing. Many feel we have lost our joy and our can-do attitude. We’re exhausted from the kind of politics that never ends its warfare, that wants our vote but not our best. We sense the need to come together as a people but can’t locate the leaders who can bring it about.

And so, we muddle around in our individual existences, knowing we need others for fulfilment, but not sure who we can trust anymore. We can’t see a future that’s any better, so we refuse to think about it at all, until we start thinking of our kids and grandkids and the world they will inherit because we couldn’t get it together.

Article content

This is the crux of it all, that sense that there is nothing to which to look forward. Or, as Paul Valéry put it: “The trouble with our times is that the future is not what it used to be.” We blame our leaders for their lack of courage or inspiration, but we are beginning to understand that we are partly to blame since we put them in office. Our systems are broken, and we feel broken as well.

It doesn’t have to be this way. When an opposition leader comes to our town, calling people “wackos” and demanding one of our medical professionals have her credentials revoked because of her policies, one would expect strong pushback from community leaders, as they step up and defend their own. It didn’t happen. It’s true many principled Conservative Londoners refused to attend the news conference because they care for this city and don’t condone belittling it. But this doesn’t excuse the silence of our community’s political, cultural, religious, and economic leadership.

Maybe we just feel so flat we don’t have the gumption to fight back against such abuse anymore.

But we’ve been here before. We pulled together through two world wars and a Depression. We produced remarkable athletic and cultural talent, along with business innovators and medical inventions that caught the world’s attention. We built a community at the fork of the Thames that defied the odds and unified its purpose for existence.

Mahatma Gandhi noted that “a nation’s culture resides in the hearts and souls of its people.” That’s us. We’ll get better outcomes when we demand them from our leaders and from ourselves. Ultimately, our future is ours to shape, not to shun.

Glen Pearson is co-director of the London Food Bank and a former Liberal MP for London North Centre. glen@glenpearson.ca

Article content