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I Should�ve Taken That Left Turn at Albuquerque |
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Hello and welcome. If you're new here, be a dear and Read my Disclaimer. My diary not good enough for you? Fine, be that way. Try these instead: plf
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2000-09-26 - 7:49 pm� I don't know if it has really been apparent in here or not, but lately even though I've been feeling pretty happy generally, there are some things in my world that have been making me sad. My brother joked yesterday that I've changed since I started this temp job at the charity organization. He says it's made me care. I don't know that I like the idea that I didn't care before. I've done volunteer work in the past, I'd like to think that I did care, and still do care. I think what he means is that lately I'm getting restless. Caring alone isn't enough. I want to do something. I want to make changes, or at least make an attempt to. The main thing that has been making me sad lately is something that I have mentioned here before. It's the poorly run bus service. Everytime the city makes the decision to cut back on the bus service in this town, they are reinforcing the message that the people who ride the bus don't matter to them. Take the latest cutback, for example. They decided to cut back the late evening service. Why did they decide to do this? Because someone tipped them off that "the bus that drives by such and such an area every night is almost always empty. Some person, who has nothing better to do than to sit by their window and watch buses go by calls in this comment and suddenly the city is investigating cutbacks and ways to make the service more cost efficient. They didn't listen to the people who need to take the bus to get home from late evening shifts at work. The didn't take into account the fact that these people might not be able to keep their jobs if they can't get home from work every night. And don't tell me that the people who ride the bus haven't tried to tell their side of the story. There have been numerous committees set up to make changes, but you know what? The city council doesn't want to listen. They don't ride the buses, they don't care about the people who do. Do you know what the mayor of this city said in response to a question about why public transportation is not a priority in this city? She answered that "The only people who ride the bus are people on welfare and single mothers." Say it with me now, all together, "What the Fuck?" First of all, let's get this clear. There are a number of different groups of people who rely on the Barrie bus service. Along with the aforementioned welfare recipients and single mothers, there are seniors, many, many diabled people, College students, high school students, the working poor, and middle class families using the Barrie Transit System. But the mayor doesn't care about those people. She doesn't even want to admit who actually rides the bus. If she did, her voters might be concerned. No, it's more fashionable to say that the problems are single mothers and welfare bums. No one in this right wing little burg gives a damn about them. And while I'm on the subject, I really hate the implictions about single mothers being dregs of society. It has such negative connotations. Single mothers... like it's their fault completely. The woman got herself into the situation by being promiscuous or irresponsible. Well it takes two! No one talks about the absent, often deadbeat, or possibly abusive fathers that these single mothers may be connected to. Nope, the single mothers are the problem. (Another term related to that one that consistantly pisses me off is "broken family." My mother was fixing my family when she left my father, thank you very much.) This is a municipal election year. I want to get the word out to public transit users that they need to vote out the current council in favour of one who will give a damn about them. I have no idea what would be an effective way to do this. Do you think I would get in trouble if I was caught putting posters up at bus stops around town? Here's the problem though. I know it wouldn't actually do any good. The current mayor has been mayor for 20 ought years, and probably will be mayor until they drag her cold dead body out of office. The people running against her this term have no chance in hell. There is some guy that no one has ever heard of, and then there is another guy, who used to be one of my school principals, who is a total jerkwad. He may be the lesser of two evils in this case, but he doesn't have a chance in hell of getting in. He's taught/principal-ed too many people who are now of voting age. Sigh. I'm telling you, the only thing keeping me in a happy mood today is the fact that the new seasons of Buffy the Vampire Slayer and Angel start up tonight. Is it any wonder I get so wrapped up in TV when reality is so screwed up?
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The big 3 0 - 2006-06-03 Hello again - 2006-05-03 Random stuff in place of an actual update - 2006-03-15 Pictures. Just Because. - 2006-02-23 Christmas 05 - 2005-12-26 Currently listening to: |
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