2020 is behind us and hope for renewal in 2021 beckons. Aside from the development of the COVID vaccine, you could hear a global sigh of relief when Joe Biden was finally sworn in as the president of the United States of America and the devil incarnate was ousted from the White House and banished to Florida, at least for now.

Will sanity prevail?

We shouldn’t be naïve enough to believe that all is calm, all is bright. What ails the U.S. is not gone, but on hold. Political change, like the vaccine, has been introduced but not distributed. The insurrectionists that want to flush their democracy down the toilet are alive and thriving, but temporarily constrained only due to the fact the military is larger and better armed than they are.

We are not Americans, but what happens there impacts us. I was dumbfounded to see how many Americans have been duped by unfettered online propaganda. I’m not talking about the hardcore white supremist, anti-Semitic, militia groups and cults, but ordinary Americans who bought into the conspiracy theories, many of whom will pay a price for their actions.

By example, have you seen the clip of “Elizabeth from Tennessee,” (who is Elizabeth Koch from Maryland) pathetically crying, claiming that she had been pepper sprayed? She didn’t seem to understand why because, after all, she was just there to storm the Capitol Building and for the revolution. How dare the police do that to her! I’m not sure stupidity is a defence in law.

Arizonian Jason Angeli Chansley, the fellow wearing what appeared to be a Viking style horn and skin hat, painted face, full on body tats, carrying a flag with a spear tip and claiming to be a QAnon shaman, will have a good legal defence — insanity.

This man is 33 years old and lives with his mommy, but not to take care of her. Mommy, on the other hand, rushed to the jail where he was being held to bring him a special organic vegan meal, because he would absolutely die without it and the vegetarian fare offered by the prison system would not be to his liking. Enough said.

For the life of me, I can’t understand how hackers worldwide can get into government systems, banking institutions and every other form of digitized file, yet no one can seem to find out where QAnon originates and who is behind it.

Its huge cult following and those belonging to it cannot be reasoned with and if the cult exists, the problem exists. Remember, cult leader Jim Jones convinced about a thousand of his followers to drink the “Kool-Aid” when his gig was up.

However, the idolization of a narcissistic and dangerous political figure is not new. History has a long list of pied pipers that led otherwise good people down dark paths. The question is what society is doing that makes these dark figures appealing.

I suspect the sense of disenfranchisement is likely the main reason. When groups or areas of the country start feeling that they are falling behind while others move forward, apparently it takes just whisper in their ears that it’s because of black people, immigrants, Hispanics, and Jews, to name but a few, who are to blame.

Poverty and income disparity play a role as the rich get richer and the poor get poorer and a failing education system that leaves citizens defenceless to these charlatans. Add to that politicians who do not work for the best interests of the country, but rather in their own best interest.

If you are shaking your head in dismay at the folly of these people, don’t shake too intensely. Some of this disenfranchisement is growing in Canada.

Increasing numbers of Western Canadians are proposing Western separation because of the sense that the prairie provinces are being overlooked by our Eastern brethren, that our federal government has left us out and we have no ability to control our future. And, like the U.S., racism is alive and well in Canada and not everyone is welcoming new immigrants to our country. We are baby steps behind our Southern neighbour.

On the upside, the online media giants are recognizing that free speech does not always mean the right to promote disinformation, violence, and hatred towards others.

Suspending the accounts of those who abuse their privileges is a good first step. A good second step would be for legislators to hold online media corporations accountable for the publication of libel and slander in the same fashion as other mainstream media.

As an interesting aside, I recently listened to a program that interviewed a guru from Yale University that proposed that the decline of local newspapers and broadcasts has contributed to the acceptance and belief of dubious online reporting, the theory being that previously people were more likely to believe what reliable news they got from local papers and stations than from national and online outlets. Food for thought.

I sincerely hope for the sake of our American neighbours that their new president can heal their souls, and I sincerely hope we can learn something from their mistakes. And for the sake of our souls, before our federal government gets bogged down with election shenanigans or dealing with a disastrous governor general, get that vaccine moving so we can start interacting with one another and feeling like human beings again. We are coming up to a year of COVID and fatigue is setting in!

-Elaine Hnatyshyn