6 - Wednesday, December 5, 1990 - North Shore News PTS WORKING! wy m ITHINKISAWHIM = 2 TWITCH! Say INSIGHTS deve ite, meng NEWS VIEWPOINT Targets of violence ANY PEOPLE on the North Shore and elsewhere will prefer to forget rather than be reminded tomorrow of the one-year anniversary of the massacre at Montreai’s Il’Ecole Polytechnique. They will prefer to explain away gunman Mare Lepine as a lunatic whose rampage was an isolated incident — the resuit of a confused man who had been dealt a bad hand in life. They will prefer to stay in their comfort zone of emotion and thought rezher than acknowledge that the Montrea! ssassacre of 14 women is another example, atbeit an extreme one, of what occurs in % country that turns a blind eye to violence against women. According to statistics, four eut of every 10 women murdered in Canada are murdered by a spouse or lover; one in 10 women in Canoda is battered by her part- ner and another one in four women will be assaulted by a man. So when people argue that Lepine’s act was an isolated violent incident, they should think again because someone they know — a colleague, a best friend, a daughter — is probably suffering from vi- olence right now. And as long as governments and the public continue to ignore violence against women, domestic or otherwise, the poten- tial for incidents like the Montreal massa- cre will remain. So tomorrow, people should remember the 14 women shot dead in Montreal and consider the societal context of violence in which the tragedy occurred. Parent concerned about earthquakes Dear Editor: I wonder if the public is aware of the imminent threat to hun- dreds of children on the North Shore? A year ago the North Van- couver School District promised to look into the structural safety of its schools in the event of an ear- thquake. At one of the oldest and most quake-susceptible schools on the North Shore — Queen Mary Community School — the parents are still waiting for that report. 1 am disheartened and frighten- Publisher Associate Editor Peter Speck Managing Editor Timothy Renshaw Noel Wright Advertising Director Linda Stewart ed by the news that a major ear- thquake has been predicted on the Lower Mainland early in December. I do not believe that the regular practice of earthquake drills will help to save lives in buildings which, when confronted with earth-moving forces, are reputed to need retrofitting in order to remain intact. 1 shudder to think of the un- necessary terror and possible an- nihilation of the children who needed the district’s earlier in- tervention, We can only hope that the TW VONCE OF ORTH AND WEST VANCOUVER ‘north. shore. SUNDAY « WEDNESDAY + FeOAY North Shore News, founded in 1969 as an independent suburban newspaper and qualilied under Schedule 111, Paragraph tll of the Excrse Tax Act, is published each Wednesday, Fiday and Sunday by North Snore Free Press Ltd. and distnbuted to every door on the North Shore Second Class Mail Registration Number 3885 Subscoptions North and West Vancouver, $25 per year Maing rates avaiable on request Submissions are welcome bul we carnot accept responsibility lor unsolicited maternal including manuscripts and pictures a which should be accompamed by a stamped, addressed envelope 1139 Lonsdale Avenue, North Vancouver, B.C. V7M 2H4 59,170 (average, Wednesday Friday & Sunday} <7 SDA DIVISION Display Advertising Classified Advertising Newsroom Distribution Subscriptions North Shore owned and managed prediction is incorrect or remove our children from those unsafe schools. As a parent, a taxpayer and a humanist ! feel that School District #44 is in a precarious tegal situation with respect to its re- sponsibility for the personal safety of hundreds of schooi children. I write this letter in the hopes that publication of it will jar the conscience of the school district since constant reminders from concerned paren: groups hav? not. Mary Klausen North Vancouver 980-0511 986-6222 985-2131 986-1337 986-1337 985-3227 een eemnere of ames MEMBER Entire contents © 1990 North Shore Free Press Lid. All rights reserved. ary Gulf crisis no time to listen to ostriches! “DON’T START shooting in the Gulf — why should North American boys die to keep Japan and Germany in cheap gasoline?’’ The wails of the ostriches have grown louder since the UN en- dorsed the option of military ac- tion if Saddam Hussein hasn’t pulled out of Kuwait by Jan. 15. lt would mean another Viet- nam, they warn, risking heavy ca- sualties to prop up two feudal Arab regimes whose social and political systems are an affront tu any red-blooded democracy. Leave it to sanctions, they urge, to either bring Saddam to his senses or pressure his hungering citizens into toppling him. Alas, it’s not quite as simple as it seems to ostriches. First, the importance of Saudi Arabia and Kuwait oil for much of the free world is, in itself, no light matter. Of the seven Gulf oil states, these two account for 45 per cent of the area’s daily pro- duction and 54 per cent of its reserves. The long term risk posed to both from Iraq's seizure of Kuwait is already causing that pain in our pocketbook every time we fill up. Unless we’re thrilled by the possibility of eventual $2-a- litre gas — savagely inflating the cost of everything else — it’s as much in OUR interest as George Bush’s to have Saddam retreat back home for good. Secondly, sanctions alone have never worked before with the world’s bad kids. Despite the toughest enforcement yet, the present ones still show no sign, after four months, of persuading Saddam to repent. How long, if ever, it will take — given Arab fanaticism — to force a starving population to deal with him is anyone’s guess. TV scenes of Baghdad mobs screaming ‘‘death to Americans”’ may be set up by Iraq's surpris- ingly efficient propaganda arm, but they can’t be wholly ignored. Moreover, time 1s NOT on the side of the UN and its chief agent, the U.S. The cost alone of main- taining indefinitely an army of nearly half a million in Saudi Arabia boggles the mind. As months pass, troop morale problems and political pressure from U.S. voters to ‘‘bring the boys home’’ will likely grow. Add to that the searing summer heat of the desert, which could make the success of any UN military action from May to September decidely doubtful. Meanwhile, Iraq’s drive to de- velop chemical, biological and nu- clear weapons casts a long, still darker shadow over the world’s Middle East powder keg. aio ME GEORGE Bush ... U.N. options means tough judgment call. Noel HITKER AND YON War on ANY scale is hell, but there are degrees even of hell. If sanctions and diplomacy haven't worked by Jan. 15, the UN option to enforce international law with guns and tanks will involve the U.S.-led UN allies in agonizingly tough decisions and judgment calls. But for the UN to succeed where its forerunner failed, these can no longer be shirked. The League of Nations flinched from curbing Hitler and Mussolini. The tragic price the world paid over six long years was millions of lives. Had the League ignored the ostriches and ACTED — in time to uphold the law -—~ the price ‘could have been far lower. ece TAILPIECES: Salute the West Van Kiwanis Ciub whose fund- raising talents brought 1990 dona- tions totalling $8,250 to Lions Gate Hospital Foundation, Mis- sion to Seamen, West Van Santa Fund, the Sally Ann, West Van Daycare and Crimestoppers. Meanwhile the Club itself salutes Dick Irwin Chev Olds who gave it a head start for 1991 by buying 40 of its $14 ‘*K"’ Christmas cakes ... Another good-guys bouquet to Norvan Power & Sail Squadron whose 90 members and guests at its recent Xmas party piled a table high with gifts for the Food Bank ... And don’t let the kids miss Neighbourhood House's ever popular ‘‘Breakfast with Santa”’ Saturday, Dec. 8 — sittings 8:30 and 11 a.m. with entertainment and a small gift for each child. eee WRIGHT OR WRONG: Fastest cure for a problem about remembering your wife’s birthday is to forget it once. SADDAM Hussein world’s bad kids slow to react.