As some of you know, hubs has a long running movie site called Corona’s Coming Attractions. Due to that, he does get advance viewing passes for some of the movies that are hitting town. Being that many are action films, Adam has been tagging along with him. Last week, during game 5 of the NHL playoffs it was Super 8. Yesterday, it was Green Lantern.
Patrick is a big comic fan. Always has been. He also loves Green Lantern. He really wanted to see the movie.
He really wanted to see the movie despite it being the night of the LAST GAME OF THE HOCKEY FINALS. He really wanted to see it even when I warned him about tweets stating the rather ugly crowds on the Skytrain heading downtown.
So with much misgiving, I dropped them off at Joyce and went to watch the rest of the game on TV.
According to him, the crowd indeed was not like it had been last week. There was a darker and more hostile vibe on the ride down…..these were not the people heading down for “fun” at the fun zones.
My heart leaped into my throat when I saw the first tweet about the car being set on fire. Then I turned on the news channels, and go more and more concerned.
The movie theatre was on Burrard, but I started to worry about them even trying to head for the downtown skytrain stations….mainly because innocents or not….I did not want Adam to be on a train crowded with very rowdy and frightening people.
I started calling him before 9. By the time I got hold of him, he had already stared toward Granville until he had seen the crowds and the smoke. He quickly retraced their steps and took refuge in the little IGA there. Adam was scared. Patrick was trying to stay calm and relaxed for his sake. He was also not seeing what I was seeing on television. Burrard was mostly filled with people trying to leave the area.
I was sickened by what I saw. The looting troubled me the most. For me this is a symbol of just how thin the veneer of civility is really getting. When people can steal with a clear conscience – just for the giggles – and have the balls to try to sell the stuff they stole on Craigslist…..this is society? This is people who are supposed to be part of our city, our country? These are people who would also not see any irony in themselves calling the police when they needed help.
But in the society they are creating with their thoughtless and damaging behavior….there will be no police or any bystanders to help them. They create a world where we shut the doors and hope the screaming masses pass us by.
I was truly afraid for my boys.
I am truly saddened for our future.
Watching a sea of smart phones and cameras recording the destruction was weird. Yes we have seen this recently in places like Egypt and Libya but seeing how the viewing ‘history’ through a third eye affects people right in the moment is a tad unsettling. It is different to record something to make sure people KNOW something or see the truth, etc…but I don’t think that was the case for many of the people downtown on Wednesday night.
I think for some the ‘real’ isn’t real unless they can share it on Facebook. It isn’t real until it is seen through their phone lens. I think our cyber world has distanced people from their own real, even when it is going on around them. I don’t think the impact of their actions or the actions of those around them was truly felt because they were too busy recording it for ‘posterity.’
Yes, looting and hooliganism has happened long before the age of social media…..but I think social media has certainly changed how people process their part in unlawful actions. I also wonder if the destruction would have been so bad without everyone sharing it.
I love social media and I love how the positive of the medium helped rally people to help clean up and show their concern with things like the new wall of apology that is the boarded up windows of the Hudson’s Bay.
We saw the good and the bad of social media right in our own backyard.
Social media kept me up to date on what to tell my husband about where to go and not to go, again due to the miracles of technology called cell phones.
And I knew he would keep Adam safe. But I was more concerned at the fact that he HAD to keep him safe and how upsetting the angry atmosphere downtown would be to him.
The feeling that I have to protect my family from violence chills me. The feeling that I have to protect my family over a hockey game infuriates me.
What a first world worry compared to the horrors and fears so many other families face today.
Great post and I agree with you. Social media I think plays a huge part, as does the media as well. Helicopters were flying overhead filming everything they saw, to report the bad and ugly. But they fly overhead when clean up was going on, when citizens banned together, no not as much. It seems we as people are drawn to victims, violence, accidents and bad things happening.
I’m truly sorry your son had to witness this. I was at the 94 riots when they broke out and it wasn’t fun back then, though nobody was seriously injured. People were stabbed this time, cars burning, a city devastated.
thanks for sharing your view point. As always I enjoyed it and luv you much xoxo!
That is nothing short of terrifying. I would be pretty freaked out, I have to say. I’m glad everyone was safe in the end.
Absolutely insane!!! Can you imagine that all of this happened over a hockey game?! I am SO glad that the boys are safe and sound.
Well you pretty much covered it. Glad your fam made it home in one piece. Sadly, just because we’re Canadian, does not make us immune to bad behaviour. *sigh*