The Gateway, University of Alberta, Canada
Jan 20 2005

Over-sensitivity is making it pretty goddamn tough to live in Canada

Josh Kjenner

I hate shoveling my sidewalk. Whether my roomies agree with me on
that issue or are just a bunch of lazy pieces of shit, I’m not
sure – either way, our walk seldom gets shoveled.

When I say seldom, I mean about once a year, when the tickets or
ticket threats start coming. Other than that, no way. In fact, right
now our walk is at the point where one would have to take an
approximately six-inch step from either neighbour’s concrete-exposed
perfection to have the privilege of standing on The Josh’s sidewalk.

I’ll be the first to agree that, like me, this is both ugly and
slothful. But the good people at City Hall and Canada Post have come
to the conclusion that this is also dangerous, and now I can get a
ticket for it.

This threat of a ticket is not based on logic or research or anything
like that; it’s predicated upon a crippling fear, likely of being
sued. The packed snow that makes up our front walk is about as slick
as my lonely, late-night-party-line-commercial-watching ass, but
that’s irrelevant – at some point in history, some asshole has
successfully sued a homeowner on the basis that said suer doesn’t
know how to goddamn walk, and now the rest of us are fucked.

This is why I had to sign a waiver to go roller skating the other
night, and why the insurance I’ve taken out on my ass has doubled in
cost, and why frigging Cram Dunk is probably thinking about forming a
risk management department. It’s ridiculous.

Also, it seems that if one has lived his or her life and successfully
avoided getting sued, he or she has likely pissed someone off in the
process. Pretty much every action that would have been viewed as
mildly controversial ten years ago will now cause some random,
marginalized group to react in `outrage.’

Take, for instance, the issues that arose when Conan O’Brien had a
few shows in Canada and Triumph the Insult Dog called the Québécois
`dull and obnoxious.’ Legions of people across Québec and Canada
alike reacted as if O’Brien had sodomized Lucien Bouchard on Saint
Jean Baptiste Day and wiped himself off with the Fleur-de-Lys. And
for what? An insult that wouldn’t elicit a response at a Mormon
Jesus-fish convention. Political correctness has become so overblown
in Canada that we are starting to lose sight of reasonability.

Although it seems by the randomness of this article that I likely
substituted a Vicaden/Wild Turkey colada for my porridge this
morning, I’m actually driving towards something here: Canada, because
of these trends, is becoming increasingly difficult to exist in. More
and more, we barely live; we basically just eat, breathe, shit, sleep
and occasionally masturbate while trying to avoid getting sued or
hurting someone’s feelings.

This drives me crazy. I want to go back to the `80s, when it was
still okay to paddle high-school freshman without getting the fuzz on
your tail, or make a joke about an Italian, or wear cut-off jean
shorts without making babies cry. I’m so sick of signing waivers and
paying insurance and tiptoeing around people who don’t share my exact
sex/ethnic/physical ability/sexual orientation/hair colour/blood type
composition that I could seriously just pack up and move to Armenia.

In fact, I just might do that. Frankly, the world deserves to see my
thighs covered only with six inches of frayed denim and a thin coat
of sweat.