6 — Sunday, October 19, 1997 — North Shore News north shore news VIEWPOINT TARiO. FARMERS PREPARE FOR THE: CHANGEOVER FROM, NUCLEAR, POWER TO.COAL-BURNING POWER : Coach questions § T is the most abhorrent act an adult can inflict on a child. Two similar, though unrelated, court trials involving North Shore soccer coaches this past week serve to under- score the vulnerability our children ? face when they go off to play a game. “Both. men on trial for sexually ‘assaulting teenage girls were found -guilty, but this comes as little coniso- ~Jation: to. the victims, their families " and' the families of the guilty preda- tors. «. | At their best, coaches can serve as integral a role as a parent when it ‘, comes to guiding young lives into the "complex world of adulthood. : Ly successful teenagers-turned- adults: often cite’ a end. som coach as a ground ball. At their worst, coaches can shatter young lives and inflict mental scars on their innocent charges that will never heal. Not only do these scars disable children’s trust in adults, they are _ often the roots of future behavior that completes the victim’s disconnec- tion from society. How can we prevent these adults from preying on our children? Screening potential coaches is the way sports organizations have tradi- tionally gone about weeding out bad . prospects. But in both aforemen- tioned cases, neither man had a crim- inal record. _As is the case with all complex problems, we as a society must stand together and remain vigilant in the "care and well-bein g of the next gener- HELLO HARDWARE? DO YOU SELL SMOKE MASKS FOR THREE~ LEGGED, TWO-HEADED ation ° News Free Speech Defence ig. s time Friday, donations from over 1 960 News id‘free speech supporters to the fund stood at fees expen ded thus far by the News have already: exceeded $200,000. The final bill will be much her.: All-funds' received will heip defray the legal costs ‘faced ‘by the: News in its battle with the Human :: Rights Tribunal over a complaint laid against the “newspaper and its columnist Doug Collins by the - Canadian Jewish Congress. The hearing into the .. Matter, which began on May 12, concluded on June 27 with final arguments at the Century Plaza Hotel, 1015 Burrard St. The decision from Nitya vl Hyer, the tribunal of one hearing the complaint, is “expected some time later. this year. Extra copies of : :the News’ Free Speech Supplement, which was -» Originally published in the Aug. 20 News, are ~- gow available at the News offices. ‘More excerpts from the hundreds of respondents to the cause: 000 °A new: paper should report the news as objectively as possible und then provide comment from its edi- -» tor or opinion’ columnists. I frequently disagree ‘ with columnists whose opinions I read, or find the words they use to express those ideas ill-chosen, jar- ; ring or in some way offensive. I dunt bother to “rend those writers again, but as for silencing them — how : can I expect the right to express my ideas while at the same / time taking away someone else’s right to do so? ... The truth in any matter can only be determined when all opinions are heard — even those in loud and disagrecable terms.” — Denis and Susan Rodgers cf North Vancouver Donations to the fund can be sent to: 1139 Lonsdale Ave., North Vancouver, V7M 2H4. Cheques should be made out to the North Shore News Free Speech Defence Fund. — trenshaw@direct.ca north shore ‘North Snore News, founded in 1969 as an andependent suburban newspaper and qualified under Schedule 111, Paragrapn 411 of the ‘Excise Tax Act, is published each Wednesday, Friday and Sunday by North Shore Free Press Ltd, and distributed to every door on the North ‘Shore, Canada Post Canadian Publications Mat ad ‘ AS if we’re not brainwashed enough about the so-called blessings of cyberspace, along comes a remarkable tome by a leading investment guru and a former top newspaper edi- tor. Mark you, The Sovereign Individual by James Dale Davidson and Lord William Rees- Mogg (Simon & Schuster 1997, 415 pages, $34) is not exactly a book with which to while away the odd minutes during a carefree vacation. To be blunt, it’s often pretty heavy oing. But if you can settle down to it ‘or the long haul, a fascinating crystal- ball story emerges. The central theme of the book is the many ways in which cyberspace and the Information Age — now fast replacing the Industrial Age — will radically change all the social, economic and moral structures built up by Western civilization over the past 500 years. This, because cyberspace brings instant, unregulated worldwide communication between individuals, groups and corpo- rations. That, say the authors, means the early death of the nation-state as we have known it since the age of the Renaissance. It’s inevitable because the nation-state can only exist by taxing its citizens. But in the Information Age, where citizens and businesses can carry out transactions and move their money anywhere on the globe at the touch of a button, they can no longer be con- trolled by national tax collectors. Checking on millions of individual incomes and assets via the Internet clearly becomes an impossible task for any national government. Davidson and Rees- Mogg liken this devel- opment to the collapse of the previously dom- inant power of the Catholi. Church around 1400, thanks largely to tite inven- tion of printing which finally allowed radical, often heretical, new ideas to be disseminated for the first time to the masses. The result, the authors predict, will eventually be "much smaller social units — possibly more like the city-states of mediaeval Europe, reflecting the new- found power and independence of “sov- ercign individuals.” Downsizing, devo- lution and reorganization will be the order of the day. Nor will the changeover period be painless, Until the brave new Info Age world finally settles down, they warn, expect crime and political corruption to increase (as in Yeltsin’s Russia), hackers destroying vital computer records to become the new terrorists and gated communities with private security guards to proliferate, But since all stable societies must have a moral basis, the Info Age will eventually develop its own morality. Ir . you will be the morality of. “he marketplace — since that is what cyoerspace is fun- damentally all about—based on produc- tivity, on the retention of tax-free earn- ings by those who produce and on trust, without which no marketplace can. ultimately survive. There's lots more in the book, including a couple of appendices on.. how to survive and thrive during the | bumpy transition period ahead. It takes" a little will power to get going on The «: Sovereign Individual, but once you do, I suspect t that, like me, you'll be ‘glad: ung in there. Especially since the authors are clear- . ly no pie-eyed dreamers. Davidson is ‘ounder-chairman of the US National .. Taxpayers Union and a noted Wall. _. Street analyst, Rees-Mogg — formerly editor of The Times of London and vice-.. chairman of the BBC — is a director of Rothschild Investments. - Between.them they publish Strategic. Investment, a highly popular private investment letter. . In earlier co-authored books they”. have accurately predicted Black etaay on Wall Street, the Savings & Loans bankruptcy, the collapse of the Sovict Union, hyperinflation and disorder in Yeltsin’s new Russia and the civil war in © former Yugoslavia. These are credentials not to be light- ly ignored. Given Davidson’s and Rees- Mogg’s forecasting score to date, we are left with much food for thought — not. all of it palatable. Q WRIGHT OR WRONG: A career dif- fers from a job by at least 20 hours more per week. LETTERS TO THE EDITOR Letters must include your name, full address & telephone number. VIA e-mail: trenshaw @ direct.ca Comptrotier Unda St Human Resources Managet Safes & Maing ecto Publisher Sales Product Agreement No 2987238. 985-2131 (177) 960-0511 (319) «= 985-2131 (101) 985-2131 (133) Mading rates avatatte on cequest. Genera Office Manager 985-2131 (114) SE52131 (185) Andrew McCredio - 986-2131 (147) i Photography Manager Fr 906-3337 (12) 905-2131 (160) m 61.582 (average circulation, Wednesday, Fnday & Suncay} Entire contents © 1997 North Shore Free Press Ltd. All rights reserved. The North Shere Hews Is published by North Shore Free Press Ltd., Publisher Peter Speck, from (1938 Lonsdale A Avenue Worth Vancouver, B. C., V7M 2H4. 2 4 ie oan eee eee Gistribution Manager Creative Services wel Classified Manager Promotions & Acting Display Manager ‘985-2431 (127) 988-6222 (282) 905-2131 (218) Internet. kttp://iwww.esnews.com