Nenshi calls behaviour ‘derogatory and juvenile’

… Torn between sending him to a corner without dinner or grounding him for two weeks.

When it leaked to the media that the city integrity commissioner would be assessing it Monday afternoon, he says, “It becomes 100 per cent political at that point.”

While I’ve been employed as a journalist longer than many of my colleagues who cover city hall have been alive, Monday is my maiden visit to our local council chambers.

The cavernous room has a regal air, with flags of the city, province and country against a wall and, over the head of Mayor Naheed Nenshi, the city crest.

It all feels so grown up, too, as the 14 councillors — 12 men and two women — sit in a semi-circle facing the spectator area and the cameras.

While a one-dimensional video doesn’t tell the whole story — Sutherland could be making those gestures past Farrell and over to Chabot — it just makes it a matter of idiotic behaviour versus sexist idiotic behaviour.

As defiant as Sutherland is, by late morning the longtime community advocate is trending on Twitter thanks to his antics, the video being re-tweeted umpteen times and with local luminaries like Dragon’s Den star Arlene Dickinson — “Torn between sending him to a corner without dinner or grounding him for two weeks” — chiming in.

Ward 11 Coun. Brian Pincott, who isn’t seeking re-election in the fall, tells me he believes it’s part of a pattern of behaviour among some councillors, a “dismissiveness, particularly of female colleagues and misogyny.”

Among some of my fellow journalists at city hall, it’s akin to the “Is it a white and gold or blue and black dress?” argument.

“If this were the NHL, it would be ruled inconclusive,” says one of the video.

On this same day, city council is dealing with some big issues like the contentious Green Line LRT route and tax hikes.

Still, Nenshi shows the same passion answering a question about Sutherland, along with the ones dealing with the big, important stories of the day.

“If you believe the evidence of your eyes, then you will see a councillor behaving in a rather juvenile and derogatory manner to another councillor,” he says.

“If you believe that councillor’s story, he wasn’t looking at her at all, but he was behaving in a derogatory and juvenile fashion relating to another councillor. Those are both bad.”

According to the mayor, Sutherland performed his mime act on the same day council had discussed the issue of respect during hearings and in the middle of a very important land use decision.

By Monday afternoon, Sutherland appears to have had a change of heart, apologizing to his fellow councillors on Twitter for his “animated side conversation,” adding, “It simply will not happen again.”

When asked her thoughts on the apology, Farrell responds on Twitter that it’s hard to evaluate because “I’ve just been blocked. Apparently the apology wasn’t for me.”

Call it another day in the sandbox, call it just another example of council in-fighting or political sniping. Only one thing is for sure: Coun. Ward Sutherland tossed the first childish fistful of sand.

Maybe he can find solace in comments he made to a Herald reporter when he was running for his seat in 2013: “One can learn from every life experience.”