'Calls To Action'

The restless and the righteous are at it again. It's a kind of party-time for individuals and for groups who revel in confronting authority. Who enjoy rejecting mainstream conventions and a social contract that they believe excludes the disadvantaged from the process of personal fulfilment through opportunities given only to those who value societal norms.

Well, in a sense they're right. Those who fall through the cracks of opportunities to advance their self-interests through ineptitude, or social adverseness, or lack of education or sheer disinterest, are not advantaged by a system that insists people be responsible for themselves. It is why responsible societies look after the needs of those incapable of doing so for themselves.

In any event, perhaps for some the attitude that they are invested in the well-being of the disadvantaged of the world and vengeful toward those who have responded to the opportunities within society and business to advantage themselves through succeeding at becoming an enterprising and self-disciplined member of society, really masks their own general disinterest in the social contract.

Some people just find fulfilment in being in disagreement with the status quo. There will also be those in society who find grievances to bolster their belief in a prevailing global injustice.

So confrontation is on the cusp of presenting itself. The opportunities are there for self-styled anarchists and protesters and activists to join in the fray that is certain to present, during the G8 and G20 summits. "We will take back our city from these exploitative profiteers, and in the streets we will be uncontrollable! This is a militant march where many forms of resistance and tactics are welcomed and respected", according to Internet postings in promotion of "anti-capitalism".

The belligerent threats of physical violence culminating in a paroxysm of rejection of global wealth and unequal distribution of same may be mostly rhetoric, but there will always be those whose penchant for chaos and violence will create an atmosphere of danger. The larger groups among the protesters will demonstrate loudly, but peacefully.

The grim determination of a minority to mount violent dissent will make the news and justify the expense related to a large law-enforcement presence.

All the protest groups are coming out of the closet of high dudgeon they like to grumblingly live within. They have a cause and they detest what they decry are global financial interests that feed off the misery of the poor and forgotten. When reality is that societies that live by profit represent populations that are capable of looking after themselves.

And those same societies, in recognition of the indigent demographics among them generally make a reasonable effort to see that the poor are not forgotten.

Canada is hosting the wealthy countries of the world, as one of those wealthy and developed countries. Which, among them, represent a whopping majority of the world's finances. And which, as a group, generally strong-arm one another to broaden and heighten their support of less-wealthy countries of the world. We will generally always be at fault in that those with wealth will never be seen to offer enough of what they attain to help those in need.

But the world does have a conscience. And that conscience is larger and more empathetic among wealthy, Western-originated democratic countries of the world than it is elsewhere. And because of that conscience and the ingrained need to exercise a decent degree of compassion toward the people of under-developed countries, there will always be an outreach to assist.

Together with the grim knowledge that assistance given to undeveloped countries too often find their way to the pockets of the 'entitled' of those countries, and too rarely reach the needily deserving underclass that need help.