Ask the Hard Questions

I am a hockey fan.  I am a hardcore fan of the Toronto Maple Leafs and have been almost my whole life.  During the playoffs I played devil's advocate and poked jabs at all my friends here in Vancouver who cheer for the home team.   As the playoffs wore on in Vancouver a part of me was getting caught up in the energy of the city and how great the vibe was in the city.  People seemed happy.  People seemed to be glowing with excitement. 

And then....

It's over.

But.

The face of this playoff run will not be hockey.

It will be pictures of people (not hockey fans, not canucks fans, just people) in Canucks jerseys turning over cars and breaking windows.  Rioting.

These people are not fans of the sport.  They do not play hockey for fun.  They cannot name the starting line-up of the Canucks or the Bruins.  They do not know the jersey numbers of all of their favourite players from past and present.  They cannot tell the difference between offsides and icing.  

My friends and fellow hockey lovers were not involved in this riot. 

Terrible.

Hockey is a great game and this great series will be forever marred by foolish drunkards looking for a reason to spark chaos.

I read this post from a blogger on cbc.ca and I thought I would repost it because it's exactly how I feel about Vancouverites:

The cause of this particular riot goes much deeper than the simple loss of a hockey game. As the most expensive place in North America in which to live, there is by implication, a large group of dispossessed people in Vancouver. Those who have little or nothing in a city of great wealth and prosperity are inclined for the most part, to simmer in quiet hostility. However, given the chance, these people will lash out against a society they feel has ignored and forgotten them. The gathering of many thousands of people in the downtown area gave these people the platform they needed to bring attention to their feelings of alienation and discontent. Unfortunately, some fans, in a state of anger at the Canucks loss, were drawn into the fracas and ended up acting out as badly as those who had instigated the riot.

I think the results of this latest riot will serve to eradicate any feelings of complacency our city officials may have had regarding the safety of the city. How could the Mayor and his staff, or for that matter, the police, not know that allowing thousands of people to mass together into a relatively small area of the city would be a recipe for disaster?

The vast majority of Canucks fans are law-abiding people who would never think of participating in such an abhorrent display of law-breaking. The same can be said of nearly every hard-working person in this city and for that matter, in the province of British Columbia.

Vancouver's image has been forever tarnished by a relatively small group of miscreants. It is up to the Mayor and his council to ensure that this type of situation will never happen again.
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Thanks for reading!
love,
Marty
@martyzylstra