National Post (National Edition)
Kelly McParland and John Robson,
RANDOM ACTS OF VIOLENCE CAN HAPPEN IN TORONTO. THE CITY HELD UP WELL
Some years ago a reader took me to task for suggesting a random act of violence that took place overseas might carry lessons for Canada. His point was that there was no cause to assume Canadians might be impacted by something happening so far away, since there was no reason to expect anything similar could happen here.
It seemed curious to argue that, in a world interconnected in every other way, senseless slaughter might be the one exception. But it’s clearly a notion that holds with many in Canada’s largest city, which sees itself as a bastion of peace and safety in a dangerous and unpredictable world.
As Monday’s horrific attack unfolded on Yonge Street, Toronto’s main northsouth artery, one resident after another expressed their shock and incredulity that the city wasn’t immune. There was “an overwhelming sense of disbelief,” we were told. “Toronto will never be the same,” a witness remarked. City Council member John Filion said it was “unthinkable” that anything so horrific could happen in a place so proud of its diverse population.
“What happened today will profoundly change the city from here on in,” Filion predicted.
Mayor John Tory echoed that view: “These are not the kinds of things that we expect to happen in this city,” he said. “We hope they don’t happen anywhere in the world. But we especially don’t expect them to happen in Toronto.”
I kept wondering, Why? Toronto has always been a quiet and relatively tranquil place — for years, in fact, the sense that nothing exciting ever happened was a particular target of mockery. But given the number of previous attacks that have taken place across the country — a gunman ran through the halls of Parliament, firing at random, remember? — it seemed an awful lot like wishful thinking to expect the largest and most important population centre to be exempt.
That Toronto is a diverse place is unquestioned — astonishingly so in many parts of the city. That was selfevident as Monday’s attack filled the airwaves: reporters spread out in search of witnesses, and those it found were overwhelmingly nonwhite. Brown, black, coffeecoloured, Asian, South Asian, vaguely Middle Eastern, Chinese — though not necessarily from China itself, given the numbers from Hong Kong, Taiwan and elsewhere. They struggled with the language, with accents, with their shock, no two the same. It takes a certain perversity to resent newcomers when you can’t even tell where they might be from. Indeed, when the identity of the attacker as Alek Minassian first became public, an immediate debate popped up on Twitter as to the possible origins of the name. Much of it, predictably, was among the sort of people who couldn’t wait to assign blame, but it reflected the fact that in a city where more than half the people identify themselves as visible minorities, anyone can be from anywhere.
The city has turned its diversity into an asset, a constant marketing theme. “Diversity Our Strength” it says on the official coat of arms. Hockey Night in Canada has a special team to broadcast Toronto Maple Leaf games in Punjabi. Summer in Toronto sometimes seems like a non-stop cycle of parades, festivals and official fairs celebrating one ethnic community or another — closing the roads and sparking that other local obsession, the lousy traffic. Part of the determination to herald its sense of community is a constant stream of reminders to itself that Toronto is special: the CBC had barely started its coverage of the attack when an on-air host noted it was already receiving complaints that it might, in some way, make any inference that could in any way reflect on who or what the attacker might be. We were reminded of the “importance of inclusion, of diversity, of keeping calm.”
And calm we were, to a degree. One indelible moment took place during the extraordinary confrontation between Minassian and a Toronto police officer who resolutely refused to grant his demand to “shoot me in the head.” As they stood facing each other in the street, the cop pointing his weapon and Minassian repeatedly pretending to draw and aim, yelling “Shoot me!”, a trio of Torontonians out for a stroll on the pleasant spring day wandered past on the sidewalk, glancing over their shoulders at the lifeand-death moment, before continuing on, apparently unconcerned. Maybe they thought it was a movie being made. Maybe they were after an ice cream cone and didn’t want to be delayed. If bad stuff can’t happen in Toronto, why be nervous?
Diversity is strength, but it doesn’t come with immunity. Even setting aside the details of Minassian’s background and motivations, the fact remains that people don’t leave their phobias or resentments behind when they choose a new home. The sort of people who can’t think of any other means of expressing their anger, bitterness or resentment, other than killing some strangers, aren’t likely to be deterred by the fact Toronto considers itself a caring community. The fact that the city enjoys such relative harmony might be just another provocation to a troubled mind.
By nightfall, Torontonians were already accepting congratulations for having emerged from the horrific afternoon with the suspect in custody, without a shot being fired. Life went on. No general lockdown, no outburst of unrest. The hockey game went ahead — amid muchheightened security — after a minute of silence. And the Leafs won, a blow not only against the hated Bruins but anyone who thought the city could be cowed into hiding.
It was all heartening, the sign of a strong community, confident in its identity, but it was also a lesson that while Canada may be lucky, it’s far from immune, and diversity is no guarantee of protection from irrational or disturbed minds looking for a location to endanger the lives of innocents.