Michael Moore’s paradise gone wrong?
Posted by Moonage on 28 Dec 2005 | Tagged as: Opinions
In Michael Moore’s Bowling for Columbine
And what does Toronto blame on this surge in gun related deaths?
Canada’s prime minister and Toronto’s mayor blame weapons smuggled in illegally from the United States, but others point to a growing gang problem……
"The U.S. is exporting its problem of violence to the streets of Toronto," he complained.
Michael Moore couldn’t have said it better.
However, if you look at their immigrant statistics, it paints a totally different picture:
| United States | 37,790 |
| Central and South America | 135,720 |
| Caribbean and Bermuda | 167,415 |
| Europe | 716,245 |
| United Kingdom | 142,990 |
| Other Northern and Western Europe | 75,180 |
| Eastern Europe | 182,680 |
| Southern Europe | 315,400 |
| Africa | 98,975 |
| Asia | 869,510 |
| West Central Asia and the Middle East | 111,415 |
| Eastern Asia | 299,860 |
| South East Asia | 178,820 |
| Southern Asia | 279,415 |
| Oceania and other | 7,295 |
Seems like the US isn’t much of a factor. Asia has over 1,000,000 of Toronto’s population of 4,000,000 or so.
And best I recall, Asia has a gang problem there. Europe comes in a fairly distant second. Europe has gang problems ( remember the Mafia? )
Blame the US first. So Michael Moore. So BS. So doesn’t solve the problem.
2 Comments »
on 28 Dec 2005 at 2:53 pm 1.Harry said …
I’m not sure what you’re trying to tell us using that handy little immigration chart you got there. So your logic is larger population = larger gang problem?? I find it believable that the guns are coming from the states, simply by how tough it is to get a gun yourself here. Also, Toronto is only like 1 hour from the border, and with such lax border control, it would be ridiculously easy to smuggle just about anything across the border. Of course, I don’t agree that we should be blaming the states. Instead, we should we working together with the US to find a solution to this very sad problem.
on 28 Dec 2005 at 3:03 pm 2.Moonage
said …
Well, you have to be familiar with Bowling for Columbine to fully understand where I’m coming from. Moore pointed out that obtaining guns is easy in the US, everyone has them, But, he also implied guns were just as legal in Canada. So, obtaining guns in Canada doesn’t necessarily equate to using them for violent crimes. The crimes would have been committed regardless. The method would simply have changed. That’s not the implication of the story. The implication is crime in general is going up, with murders rising more substantially. First they say it’s US guns. Then, they say it’s US gangs. However, the Asian population of Toronto is huge. The US population is rather small. Are they blaming all the problems on that small US population? I mean, we learned gang philosophy from Europe and Asia. Why couldn’t that be true in Canada?
Bottom line is we both agree that this really is not a US problem. Toronto needs to figure out HOW to solve their problem and not spend one second trying to pass the buck. That never solves a problem. However, since the US has dealt with gangs for a long time, we can offer them some ideas on how to deal with it.
But, this post in general was a slap at Michael Moore, not Toronto per se.