Citizenship - "Our Public Choice To Be Together"

In 1517, a young priest named Martin Luther nailed 95 theses to the door of the great church in Wittenberg, Germany and started a Reformation, or more likely a revolution. I have visited that door a number of times and always marvel that from such an obscure place so much change can occur. All he required was a bright mind, his share of courage, and a pen and ink. But possessing the fortitude to put his ideas in a public space resulted in the overthrow of the old order, with a new more enlightened world moving in to take its place. Luther acted in this way because in his day the privilege of political, religious and social decision-making rested in the hands of the elite, forcing him to take matters into his own hands and placing his 95 thoughts in a public place that created the effect he desired.It seems to me that we have been afforded an opportunity greater than Luther’s to put our best ideas in the public space. Whereas the German reformer’s efforts wrested control from one group of elites only to place it in the hands of another, we have the chance to take it public, to forge a common consensus through the use of the Internet. Three obstacles stand in our way, however: 1) too many differing voices that make it impossible to find a coherent message; 2) powerful elites still control much of the Internet possibilities; and 3) citizen apathy concerning the importance of a collective voice. Of the three, perhaps the last is most problematic – something Robert Hutchins observed when he stated, “The death of democracy is not likely to be an assassination from ambush. It will be a slow extinction from apathy, indifference and undernourishment.”Let’s be direct here. Citizens say they want one thing in polls but continuously refuse to pay for those ideals. Political parties can and do seek to manipulate the public space in pursuit of power, even, using voter suppression as a means for acquiring the ultimate prize. Media more often than not opts to cover politics as some kind of competitive sport as opposed to the legitimate formulation of public policy deserving of objective scrutiny. And corporate leaders consistently angle for more opportunity by promoting lower taxes and less regulation. Such formidable hurdles are strewn in the path of citizens seeking to enhance democracy and the intrinsic right of participation for citizens in general. We require every tool at our disposal to move towards fundamental change, but if we are lethargic from within the citizenry itself we are hampered before we even begin the journey. The Internet could be one of those tools that could energize our efforts, but it would require those dedicated to the resurgence of democracy – the activated citizens of Canada - to come together to form one powerful voice.If the new age of citizen empowerment is ever to reach critical mass, communications, content, collaboration and community will have to be the new arbiters of the political age. But let’s be clear: there’s a fundamental difference between democratic choice and consumer choice. Consumers can make individual choices about their private wants, whereas citizens must make collective choices about the public needs of Canada. That’s why public institutions matter, and why government itself matters – to make the difficult choices that affect us all, even as we dash off on our individual pursuits. As consumers we are free to choose among a great variety of automobiles, but someone has to fight for public transportation if our communities are to be functional. Buy whichever kind of book we wish, but the champions of public libraries are still essential. I can choose the kind of painkiller I want, but if someone isn’t out there fighting for our public health institutions, we are in trouble.One of the most dangerous flirtations in existence today is the trend toward the idea that privatizing everything is much more efficient when rampant freedom of choice is all that is required. Occasionally this is true, but mostly it is bunk. Our real freedoms, our citizen viability, depends on our capacity to make difficult choices together about the kind of Canada we want and how we will share our resources together to achieve it, regardless of our individual consumer traits.For all of this we will require tools such as the Internet, but there is no way we can really use it for education, training and democratic uses unless we make such choices as public citizens. Should we continue to yield public choices to private individualism with the Net, our collective health will be eroded. We can have all the freedom we want in private choices concerning our use of the digital world, but in the end it is irrelevant to our public life and our responsibilities to one another.Those who have traveled extensively beyond our shores know it well enough that this country is primarily seen and appreciated as a “public” wonder – healthcare, national parks, multi-culture, and, yes, peacekeeping.  We might indeed have some of the best of consumer choices, but our greatness is to be found in each other – a reality we are losing bit by bit with each passing year. If all of our random pursuits using our browsers can’t eventually bring us to one another, then our use of the Net will have failed. But should they call us together, the Net will have achieved its public purpose.