Elder Advice

Thinking Inside the Box - 161

The struggle these days to restore Elder Advice’s faith in humanity is a constant and bitter one. But every now and again …

Police in Saanich, British Columbia were called this week to investigate reports of a teenager indiscriminately throwing food around at a local Tim Hortons.

Allow Elder Advice to pause for a moment and observe that the primary purpose of other people’s children is to provide reassurance that there are worse parents than you.

Now I dislike the Habanero Veggie Bowl offered up by the chain as much as the next person, but I save the hurling for the men’s room. Anyway, it became apparent that more than coffee was brewing at this Tims when some of what was not tossed salad struck a female customer. An elderly male patron promptly rose to her defense, confronted the teenager and proceeded to administer what, from the delightful video, can only be described as “a drubbing” - the multiple punches punctuating the advice the miscreant’s parents ought to have passed on long before:

“YOU DON’T .… THROW FOOD … AT AN OLD … MAN’S WIFE … IN A TIM HORTON’S!”

Now, in the same situation, Elder Advice would not have circumscribed such counsel to the sacred confines of a Tim’s. Nor implied that only spouses of the elderly are deserving of immunity from flung fare. But he is not here to quibble. Quite apart from the joy of seeing someone working with their hands these days, a man instinctively coming to the defense of his beloved when her sensibilities are assailed is a rare and remarkable event. And one to be applauded.

Some will suggest the furnishing of what Elder Advice has now christened the “knuckle Saanich” is unacceptable. The delicate devotees of the dreadful “gentle parenting” fad, for example, would have us believe the appropriate response here would be a time out for the delinquent, reluctantly rising to the level of a brief banishment from Tim’s - a “Tim-out” if you will - for a second or third offense. And that a non-parent’s role in disciplining must be limited to head shaking and muttered correction of grammar, all from a safe distance. And that the elderly man must submit to a set of stern lectures on toxic masculinity.

Elder Advice thought back to that elderly man, and his refusal to stand idly by, as he has watched the countless doors on the clown car that has become the government of the United States open and close these past weeks. And as the mountebank who is the President says and does things that, at any other time in the past century, would have disqualified him from public office and ensured his banishment from the company of decent people.

Where are the elderly men? Elder Advice asks. Where is everyone, for that matter? Why has the rest of the world not been seeing massive protests all the time and all over the United States? Marches of millions of ordinary American men, women and children. People who refuse to stand idly by. ¹

Now Elder Advice understands there can be a legitimate, serious divergence of views on complex government policy for immigration, trade, budget priorities and the like, sufficient that citizens decide they are issues for which it is not worth getting off the couch. But the orgy of corruption and conflicts of interest that mark this Presidency is different.

There is no job on the planet which has fewer qualifications than holding office in a democratic government. All that the public requires is integrity and competence. The absence of integrity and the concurrent stench of unprecedented grift and influence peddling in this Presidency can be seen and smelled by anyone. From the acceptance of a $400 million plane from a state that harbours and supports terrorists, to the sale of hundreds of millions of dollars in crypto meme coins, to the sale of memberships in a Washington club the sole purpose of which is to provide access to Trump, to the new Trump business ventures which include a luxury hotel in Dubai, a residential tower in Saudi Arabia, a golf course and villa complex in Qatar and a $1.5 billion golf club in Vietnam. You do not need to understand the meaning of the word “emolument", or have a university degree or the faintest knowledge of US constitutional principles to understand this kind of villainy. And for that reason alone, Elder Advice is plussed (or nonplussed, he is always surprised and confused by that word) why millions of Americans have not been in the streets for months. Refusing to stand idly by as the nation becomes a kakistocracy - government by the least suitable citizens of a state.

You may want to shop at Banana Republic - but you shouldn’t want to live in one.

1. This Elder Advice was penned before the “No Kings” protest of June 14 was widely reported. All Elder Advice can say is: “It’s about time”, “Why are they not 10 or 20 times larger?” and “Will there be more tomorrow and the next day?”