I was listening to CBC the other morning, and they were playing sound bites from the opening of the fall session of the B.C government.There has been a scandal in health-care recently, where incidents of neglect in an old folks home in Victoria have come to light ~ one woman even died when she was left alone for so long that no one noticed she had slid down in her wheelchair, and she was strangled by the seatbelt. Horrible stuff. The opposition party, the NDP, was attacking the party in power, the Liberal party, for the massive cutbacks they have made to budgets for long-term care facilities such as the one involved in the scandal, and blaming the cuts for the problems. The Liberals, of course, were stating that that simply wasn't true, its not their fault, they have actually increased funding to many of these facilities. (Let me just point out that one of the favorite tricks of this government is to make huge cutbacks in budgets for various government run programs, and then later toss back 1/4 of the amount they cut so they can say "Look, we increased funding". Not sure who they think they are fooling with this technique, but I am on to them!) So here is what I hate about politicians ~ no one will step up to the plate and say "oops, we made a mistake, our bad, let's set this right. Now, as far as blaming the budget cuts for the problems, I agree that they are probably a factor. However, the union representing the long-term care workers is taking it too far in saying that the suts are completely to blame. Yes, these facilities are understaffed, and yes, many can only afford to pay minimum wage so they are not getting properly qualified people applying for the jobs. But i don't care if you are only making $9 an hour, you don't let people go without baths for 2 weeks (one of the alleged incidents) and you don't leave people unattended for so long that they strangle in their wheelchairs. Again, passing the buck. And as far as I have heard, no employee of this facility is under investigation. So what we have here is a huge problem that absolutely NO ONE is apparently responsible for. Helpful.
I'll tell you another reason this bothers me. I think it is a symptom of a larger problem in our society. It's the culture of "It's not my fault." I see this as a substitute teacher working with young people. Many kids these days are simply not willing to take responsibility for their behaviour. In fact, if you call them on their misbehaviour, they get super pissed off at you for daring to give them heck when they so clearly deserve it. I know this is naturally a characteristic of youth, but it is extreme, people. Some kids think they can do whatever they want, and if they get caught, it is the person who catches them that's at fault. A big part of the problem I think is parenting. There seems to have been a real move towards trying to be your kid's buddy and letting them get away with anything. Plus it is a lot more work to make your kids take responsibility for their actions ~ you have to come up with a valid consequence and then deal with them being mad at you etc, etc. Way easier to just say "Oh, you broke Mrs. Finch's window with your baseball? Thats ok, we'll just pretend it wasn't you."
So please, people, make your kids be responsible. It's more work, but it's worth it. And you probably don't want them ending up being a politician!