acknowledgements

Make room for books from Memphians with a message.

"An nything you like about this book is due to me, and any errors are the fault of those listed above."

Those words, following a list of acknowledgements, are in the author's foreword from a new book — and a scholarly one, in fact — that political junkies and, really, all serious writers with an interest in the future of their society can profit from. The sense of humor in the sentence quoted above is a tip-off that the author, who knows his subject, well understands that famous maxim of Aristotle's: "All art must both amuse and instruct."

The book is Rethinking U.S. Election Law: Unskewing the System (Edward Elgar Publishing, Ltd). The author is one Steven Mulroy, professor at the University of Memphis and, of late, a member of the Shelby County Commission. Even more recently, Mulroy was the sparkplug and primary eminence of the local movement to reject a City Council-sponsored referendum that would have prohibited the use of Instant Runoff Voting.

Back in 2008, Mulroy was the Johnny Appleseed of the IRV process when the original referendum authorizing it was passed by Memphis voters. IRV, in brief, is a means of voting whereby voters, instead of just picking a single candidate, can rank several in order of preference, so that if no candidate succeeds in polling a majority, the voters' secondary choices are weighted and factored into the results so that a majority winner can prevail.

The result: No plurality winner (as in the last presidential election). No expensive and ill-attended runoff or the anti-IRV referendum emanating from the Council. IRV is scheduled for use in the 2019 city election but still must maneuver its way past a couple of legal actions — one of them from the state Election Coordinator — attempting to block it.

"One common response to any argument for a national popular presidential vote [another cause preferred by the author] is, 'we live in a republic, not a democracy.' Indeed, that response comes up in just about any discussion of any significant electoral reform. It is, of course, a shibboleth rather than an argument. The U.S. is both a democracy (governed by the people) and, more specifically, a republic (governed by the people through elected representatives). ... [B]oth terms are consistent with the Founders' original understanding, and any purported distinction between the two" is irrelevant.

That about says it.

Equally rewarding to the lay reader and the political adept is Jocie (The Hillhelen Group LLC, $20 at Novel), a personal memoir by one of the most thoroughly committed citizens of Shelby County. In the course of this jaunty, passionate, and humble narrative, one encounters a being determined to fully experience the actual world she lives in and equally determined to improve it to the most ideal specifications she can imagine.

The author, Jocelyn Wurzburg, has used her life to graduate from the status of "good little girl" in 1950s Memphis to that of mover and shaker in almost every good big cause there has been in the rapidly changing social ferment of her adulthood.

The singularity and determination to be of her times and not just in them caused Wurzburg to ignore every barricade she encountered — religious, social, political, what-have-you.

She has been active, from the time of the 1968 sanitation strike crisis, in the cause of racial togetherness and civil rights, to the point that the Tennessee Human Rights Commission has not only taken note of her efforts, the THRC has named its highest honor the Jocelyn Wurzburg Civil Rights Legacy Award.

A lawyer, she became a pioneer in the art of domestic mediation once she realized that divorces for most people had become a zero-sum game. She has also been a force in women's rights movements locally, statewide, and national.

For all her involvements and distinction, though, she remains as down-to-earth and gracious as the old cliche of Southern hospitality would suggest. She is famously colloquial in speech and, when circumstances call for it, deportment. If you don't know her, you should. If you spend your time in the company of people trying to help Memphis find its best self, you will.

Mascoe: Here's why land acknowledgements are both meaningless and patronizing

Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and Perry Bellegarde, national chief of the Assembly of First Nations, celebrate National Indigenous Peoples Day in Ottawa in 2017. Why is our capital on someone else's land? Sean Kilpatrick / THE CANADIAN PRESS

As I write this, I would like to acknowledge that I am doing so while sitting at my desk on the unceded, unsurrendered traditional territory of the Algonquin people. Why am I telling you this? I’m not sure. But I’m also not sure why I am hearing a similar message every morning on the announcements at the school where I work. Furthermore, I don’t know why the same statement is being read prior to my staff meetings and teacher’s federation meetings.

I do know however, that this has now become our national pledge of allegiance (simply insert Indigenous name) and if we say these magical words enough, everything will be all right.  These very words will have the power to erase white guilt and restore Indigenous pride.

How does repeating a phrase ad nauseam contribute to reconciliation? When I attend teacher federation meetings, teachers continue to talk or get up and go for coffee or tea while the territorial acknowledgement is being read. After two weeks, I received not one question from my students about our new daily pledge. Yet, when I asked, no student could tell me the meaning of the word, “unceded.”  How can insincere, empty rhetoric lead to reconciliation?

According to Algonquin-Anishinaabe-kwe author Lynn Gehl, it can’t. In her opinion, the protocol of acknowledging her traditional territory is both meaningless and patronizing. So if the territorial acknowledgement is not for the benefit of the Algonquin people, then who is it supposed to benefit? It would seem that this is really all about appeasing non-Indigenous guilt.

Let me use an analogy that everyone should be able to understand. Your home gets broken into and a man walks off with your television. You discover years later that every time he turned on your television set he acknowledged that it wasn’t his TV, but thanked you for its use. Would you be OK with that? I think I would be pissed.

Territorial acknowledgements have existed for hundreds of years as part of many Indigenous cultures. I wonder how many schools have brought in an elder to speak about this topic.  Probably very few. I have never been taught anything about territorial acknowledgements; they just started happening. Someone needs to explain to me how token gestures and insincerity bring about reconciliation.

In 2008, the Truth and Reconciliation Commission was established with the purpose of documenting the history and impact of abuse directed at First Nations Peoples. Note that the word “truth” comes before the word “reconciliation.” I am in no way a crusader or advocate for the First Nations. I don’t believe that I personally owe anyone an apology, nor have I ever taken anyone’s land. I do know, however, that saying sorry and not meaning it can only make matters worse.

Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and his government refused to support Israel’s claim that Jerusalem is the rightful capital of the Jewish nation because the city sits on disputed land.  Wait. Doesn’t the Prime Minister’s Office sit on disputed land? Actually there is no dispute, according to Trudeau: In a 2016 speech to the Assembly of First Nations Chiefs, he stated the land belonged to the Algonquin people. So why, then, is Ottawa our capital? How can our capital sit on someone else’s land?

Herein lies the problem our First Nations people face: political hypocrisy, unfulfilled promises, and meaningless rhetoric. Action rather than disingenuous words is the only way to achieve true reconciliation. So please – enough with the territorial acknowledgements. Stop talking before I become so desensitized that I no longer care about the plight of my fellow citizens.

Patrick Mascoe is an Ottawa area teacher who holds a Master’s Degree from the University of Ottawa in Society, Culture, and Literacies. 

Richardson: Trump is a great classroom teaching tool – sadlyParis: Historic portage along the Ottawa River deserves recognition, not neglect

‘Acknowledgements’ do not heal our diabetic patients

Francis Zammit Dimech Tuesday, 29 May 2018, 09:40 Last update: about 10 months ago

I was touched by a remark which came from a mother of a Type 1 diabetic, who told me that the skin on her son’s finger is so hard that she struggles to get the blood out, and that her son cries because of the pain.

I was recently co-hosting a conference on Diabetes with the Maltese Diabetes Association under the auspices of  the President of Malta, Her Excellency Marie-Louise Coleiro Preca, during which several parents have remarked that the struggle to extract blood as a result of having to be pricked many times a day can be easily waived if Type 1 diabetics are equipped with glucose monitors that would give better care and results.  This is because insulin pumps allow greater opportunity to take control of diabetes but, because they are a more expensive option than injections, tighter eligibility criteria exist.

I came across similar cases of the sort which sensitised me significantly on the direct impact on the lives of patients and their families which such glucose monitors can have. 

It is positive to note that diabetic patients benefit from free glucose sticks and meters, but for me it was not enough.

A couple of months ago I decided to put pen to paper asking our Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Health Chris Fearne to make available Continuous Glucose Monitors (CGMs) to Type 1 Diabetics.

Last month, I received an acknowledgement of receipt. 

Eight months ago, Government and Opposition were reportedly in agreement over the creation of a parliamentary committee on diabetes.  The proposal was submitted by my Parliamentary Group colleague Claudette Buttigieg, to create a permanent parliamentary sub-committee on diabetes.

Strangely enough, the Parliamentary Health Committee has so far not taken any decision on the matter.

Another acknowledgement of receipt with no action.

In this context I applaud the initiative of the then Leader of the Opposition Simon Busuttil during the previous legislature, who was the driver in the setting up of an unofficial committee which was headed by former Labour whip and now a Partit Demokratiku MP Godfrey Farrugia.  While the committee met on a regular basis, together with medical, academic, private industry stakeholders and patients themselves; reports were drawn up but were left ignored by the Government.

This is disappointing to me.

Also because I am aware how our President Marie-Louise Coleiro Preca is sensitive to the incidence of diabetes, so much so  that she referred to diabetes as ‘a national problem’ and called for the launch of a national screening for the illness, saying that the growing numbers of sufferers required immediate action.  She even called for ‘immediate action’ because according to Professor Boulton - the main guest of the conference which I co-hosted at San Anton Palace and who is an expert on the topic – said that Malta has one of the highest prevalence of diabetes in Europe  and that explains why there is the need to screen high-risk individuals without delay – singling out people with significant obesity, those with a family history of diabetes and women with a history of gestational diabetes.

The International Diabetes Federation, which is an authority on the subject, estimates that in Malta there are more than 30,000 adults known to be diabetics and another 8,000 adults who are undiagnosed diabetics. 

From a European perspective the problem is just slightly less pressing than in Malta.

As an MEP I am contributing within the Diabetes Working Group to address this incidence also through related measures, for instance, be it through food labelling. The European Union has elaborate laws; when it comes to funding for research, the EU dedicates significant resources too; and on obesity we are addressing nutrition from tender age in classrooms.

What frustrates me however is that we assume that diabetic patients can wait.

Let me be clear.  I commend several positive initiatives in Malta to decrease the impact of this disease on patients but making an excuse on monetary terms is not on. 

From a cost perspective our Deputy Prime Minister Fearne knows that investing in the fight against diabetes actually pays in cost savings because managing diabetes means less money spent overall on the high health care costs of fighting complications of unmanaged diabetes.

Translated in real terms, that  means that affordable Continuous Glucose Monitors to those in genuine need, that is Type 1 diabetics, are a must.

Families with children who are diabetics expect more than just ‘acknowledgements’ from a Government which says ‘it listens’ and runs a budgetary surplus!

Making these devices available to them will undoubtedly give better care and life changing results in pursuit of the aims sought to be achieved by our own National Strategy for Diabetes. 

Francis Zammit Dimech is a Nationalist MEP

Because actions speak louder than… acknowledgements.