Justin Trudeau versus that time we all Heiled Hitler

Jeez, was anyone still planning to vote for Justin Trudeau?

It's either NDP or Green this time for me. Learned my lesson months ago, having cast my only vote, ever, last election, for the Liberals, in the name of "strategic voting."  This time around, I am relieved to live in the riding of Jagmeet Singh. I wish the NDP were trying harder, wish they had the advertising budget of the Conservatives, wish I felt they had a chance to form the government.... but I fully expect Singh to take this riding, so, uh, "my work here is done." In other ridings, I would also consider voting Green. I sure as hell won't vote for the Conservatives ("evil rich people") or the PPC ("evil rich people with their masks off," plus maybe a few deluded ideologues), so it's not like I've got choices. 

Personally, I was never ever, under any circumstance, going to vote Liberal this time.

Incidentally, re: blackface and brownface, I think I have Justin Trudeau beat. At age 16 or 17, I went with my classmates to our high school gym for a rally that included a Hallowe'en costume contest, I think possibly prior to a basketball game. Attendance, as I recall, was mandatory - class was let out so we could all go. One of the students - I actually am not sure what his name was, so he'll be spared my outing him here - dressed in a pretty damn good Hitler costume: brown uniform, swastika armbands, leather boots, the lot. Maybe we were mocking authority or trying to mortify our teachers or just playin' along with the spirit of things, or maybe we were making some sort of ironic commentary on the quasi-fascist nature of sports events or rallies - we were, after all, in a high school gymnasium, where we came for the purposes of cheering our team - but several hundred of us (including me) took to vigorously Sieg Heiling the kid in the Hitler costume, responding to his salutes with our own stiff right arms and shouts of "Sieg! Heil!" It was entirely stupid, but in no way did we mean anything to be mean-spirited or intend it to be taken seriously (and I do believe the guy in the Hitler costume won the contest, if memory serves, perhaps over the objections of some teachers...). Was our action in poor taste? Sure. Would I do it now? Probably not, no (tho' I can't really imagine a similar circumstance where it would come up). Was it disturbing to any Jewish kids in the gym with us? Possibly, but it's more likely that they participated in it, regardless - it was ALL of us, who did it, teachers aside.

And was it entertaining for us? Yep, at the time, it was really fun. We weren't thinking much beyond that. To me, now, it's an entertaining story, and not much more. Do I feel sorry that I did this? No, not particularly - it was stupid shit I did as a kid, and really not much more than that, and if it upsets you, I think I would try to convince you not to take it seriously. It doesn't actually say anything much about my values or beliefs at all.

Justin Trudeau was a bit older than that when he dawned brownface and blackface, granted, but you know what I find more distasteful than his having done that? His craven apologizing now. I can't quite put my finger on what it speaks to (general gormlessness?) but it starts to feel like, this guy is all about what photos he's in. Me in a gay pride parade! Me in blackface! Me in brownface! Me next to First Nations leaders in the House! Me in India!

And if you end up caught in the wrong photos, just apologize.

Tired of it, tired of him, tired of his government. And the fact that he must have known all through his turn as Prime Minister that these photos were out there... if I were him, I think I would have just released them myself at some point.

Please God, folks, get out and vote. Vote for the Liberals again, if you  must (though if you're shaken up by the brownface thing, may I suggest Jagmeet Singh to you, as the next obvious choice?). Just, whatever you do, do not vote for the Conservatives or the PPC!