6 - Friday, June 17, 1994 - North Shore News COME TD BEAUTIFUL BRISH COMBI \ LNING AT ITS FINEST: THE OKANAGAN “Seria UDA LING FIELDS OF THE FRAGER VALLEY. CEFDL VISTAS: VANCOUVER ISLAND THE CHARINING AND QUAINT VICTORIA STAEETS PCa Pe rien Two-faced INCE TUESDAY, how many times have we heard someone whine words to the effect of “This is Vancouver. This isn’t Montreal or L.A.”? Tuesday’s National Hockey League hockey riot in downtown Vancouver was inevitable given the conditions that prefaced the ugly melee. There was relentless hype as the Canucks took us all on a wonderful ride as the under- dogs performed minor miracles on ice to advance to within a stick’s length of grasping the legendary Stanley Cup. It became more than a game. There was a lot of emotional energy invested: _ It soured all too readily in the streets when a frustrated 70,000-strong mob led by a pack of booze-fuelled, testosterone-poisoned hooli- gans let leose and rampaged. It was a situation of extremes on both sides. The police, unfamiliar with the judicious use of tear gas, went to town with it. They had to take control of the situation, as one put it, or else “all would be lost.” Tuesday simply showed us supposedly relaxed West Coasters that we are as nasty as everyone else given the right conditions. The Canucks’ fan appreciation event Thursday at B.C. Place was promoted as a chance to show the “true” face of Vancouver. But if we’re all honest about it, the riot showed a face of Vancouver that was no less true. Yes, we should all be ashamed and horri- fied, but as long as our society continues to glorify violence, we shouldn’t be surprised by the seemingly inexplicable behavior of many among us. OF THE DAY Vancouver riot a shameful exhibition Dear Editor: I cannot ignore my strong emo- tions after watching the news about the crowd/police confrontations downtown al! because of the Canucks’ loss in New York. This is my city, and one that I usually feel proud of, but tonight I do not. The support of the Canucks is now tainted by the behavior of oth- ers who profess to be fans. i am disgusted at how lawless some of our citizens can be, and I think that needs recognition not only by the police in Vancouver, but by city Pubilsher.. hall, and certainly by the Canucks’ team, staff and administration. I commend the action of the Vancouver Police Department in a situation of grave danger to its members. I think the mayor of Vancouver should make a statement that this behavior by Vancouverites will not be tolerated. 1 feel strongly that the Canucks’ players need to speak out to denounce the appalling behavior of their so-called fans. After all, these hockey players are role models for Classified Advartising Newsroom 986-6222 North Shore News, founded in 1969 as an independent suburban newspaper snd qualified ol undar Tax Act, is Sunday b distribute lule 11, Paragraph 1 Excise Published each Wednesday. Friday and North Shore Free Press Ltd. and to avery door on the North Shore. Canada Post Canadian Publications Mail Sales 1 139 Lonsdale Avenue 985-2131 Administration many and their opinion counts for a great deal. Many people downtown were probably there simply to celebrate the Canucks’ achieving so much this season, and I suspect many were frightened and perhaps even hurt by the events unfolding as they did. This city obviously has a lesson to learn. I hope I never again have this feeling of shame about my city, of which I usually have such pride. Wendy Alden. 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Grubel needs eech writers MY DEAR Herbert Grubel, you don’t need printed forms stating “I apologize for... ,” the blanks to be filled in with whatever terms of regret are demanded by opposing members of Parliament, the media, and so forth, What you need is a speech writer, Because the essence of what Grube] said in the Commens last week — inflaming self-righteous MPs and giving them, Indian lead- ers, editorial writers and others a fine opportunity to issue declara- tions of censure (of him) and Freedom From Bigotry Awards (to themselves) -—- was not a lot differ- ent from what the above-named critics say themselves. Just, ah, differently. More, um, .euphemistically. During debate on self-govern- ment for Yukon Indians, Bill C-34, our Reform MP for Capilano- Howe Sound said, in part: “I rise to discuss the problems of C-34 and its attempt to help the Indian communities in the Yukon to achieve the kind of economiz and social aspirations which I think 66 ... he thinks giving any group public money for producing no goods or services is bad, a dis- incentive to work and an interference with free markets. 99 is their legitimate right and which I would like to support. “Unfortunately I believe this bill will not achieve this objective (but instead) will do a good deal of “AI of us dream about having a tich uncle who pays us a guaran- teed, generous income so we can retire somewhere on a south sea island. (But) the rich uncle, even if he gave money to us, would not help us be any happier than we are. “It is the human condition that we need an obligation, that we need a job, that we need to work. We have been misguided when in the past we have given in to the deriands of the native community to wive them more physical goods, to allow them to five on their south sea islands equivalent. “Cet me tell you the story of what is known on these reserva- tions as the lazy house. In the olden days, the man in the house had to cut wood (and) to hunt and fish. The housewife, the mother, was fully occupied. “The lazy house now means the mother has so much time on her hands she does not know what to do with it. The father, his very existence, the meaning in life has gone away, just like the meaning of life has gone away from people who go to the south sea islands.” Roundly criticized, Grubel protested that he wasn’t saying that native people were inferior. And “I Lautens GARDEN OF BIASES did not invent the words lazy house. It was discovered by the natives themselves.” ” The reaction was predictable. Party leader Preston Manning said some of Grubel’s statement. were unacceptable. Reporters phoned every Indian in the nation they could think of. They slammed Grubel. One reporter wrote that Grubel “characterized native people as spoiled, lazy children.” . A Vancouver Province editorial called this a “shockingly racist assault” and — more racist than the “racist”? — ended: “Shame on you, Herr Grubel, shame!” Of course anyone familiar with Grubel’s economic theories — shaped in part by his years at the University of Chicago under Milton Friedman, who merely won a Nobel Prize — knows that he thinks giving any group public money for producing no goods or services is bad, a disincentive to work and an interference with free markets. They could be white, green or purple people, and he’d say the same. And I'd declare that his “rich uncle” metaphor, though I wouldn’t use it, is sound psycholo- e (overlapping) land claims of the Musqueam, Squamish and Burrard bands include the entire city of Vancouver and far beyond. Other bands claim almost the whole province, When young people are assured that “some day, all of this will be yours” — or that they'll get lucra- tive compensation, leases or royal- ties — why bother to get educa- tion, skills or jobs? It’s like waiting for a “rich uncle” to die. But Grubel can only blame him- self. Had he said “the house of unemployment” instead of “the lazy house” — unemployment _ being a morally neutral term, if anything shading toward blaming Society for the condition — his critics would have nodded gravely. And if, rather than saying that the “rich uncle” was sending implicitly spoiled Indians to “a south seas island equivalent,” he’d intoned that government policy was encouraging Indian girls to head southward to balmy Vancouver and a life of prostitu- tion and “substance abuse,” he’d have been applauded. Routinely applauded, but applauded. By other MPs. Indians. Reporters. Maybe even that Province editorial writer.