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articles by Constable Gayden
The Unknown Country
By
John A. Gayder
This article was published
during 1999-2000 in Canadian editions of Safari Times under a column
called
"Jag: thoughts from behind the badge".
The
events in both of the following events are true and occurred within two months
of each other in the spring/summer of this year. They occurred in two different countries.
The object of the exercise is to match the situations described with the
country they occurred in. We will
then examine the results.
Scenario
1: “Bob” was flying from one
city to another within country “x”. As
he went through the pre-boarding security check the metal detector found a
pocket knife which Bob had forgot to pack in his luggage.
The knife had a folding, razor sharp four-inch blade that was partly
serrated, a pocket clip and black plastic handles. The knife was taken from him by the airline security people
and placed in a special pouch labeled “Dangerous Prohibited Device”. Bob was
given a receipt for the knife and the pouch. When he landed at his destination
city a friendly and apologetic member of the flight crew returned the knife to
him.
In
which of the following countries did this happen to Bob?
(Circle one) Canada, China,
America or Switzerland.
Scenario
2: “Randy” was flying from one
city to another within country “y”. As
he went through the pre-boarding security check the metal detector found
Randy’s house and car keys that were in his front pocket.
As a key fob, Randy had his ring of keys attached to a martial arts
weapon know as a Kubotan. This
device is a round bar of ribbed aluminum about five inches long and
three-eighths of an inch round. With
training it can be used for inflicting strikes and painful joint locks, however
it is about as dangerous as the magic marker it closely resembles. Kubotan can be purchased without restriction at flea markets,
Karate gyms and surplus stores.
The Kubotan was immediately seized by the scowling security people.
Randy was told he could never get it back again unless he chose to leave
the airport immediately and take it with him.
Since he had his wife and infant daughter with him and his plane was
about to leave, Randy chose to abandon it to the security guards.
He was grudgingly allowed to keep his house and car keys.
In
which of the following countries did this happen to Randy?
(Circle one) Canada, China, America or Switzerland.
Answers:
Scenario number one occurred in the supposedly brutal totalitarian communist
China. “Bob” was flying from
Beijing to Xian on an airplane owned by the Chinese government.
Scenario
number two occurred right here in Canada. “Randy”
and his family were flying from Toronto to Vancouver on a commercially owned
airline. Randy is a colleague of
mine and I had given him the Kubotan upon his graduation from police college ten
years ago.
Analysis:
In a contest of lethality, Bob’s knife is far and away more dangerous than
Randy’s Kubotan, yet Bob was allowed to keep it. Although a foreign tourist in a supposedly Stalinist regime,
he was treated with courtesy and respect by the security personnel.
Despite being an honest citizen at home, Randy was treated like a
criminal alien in his own country.
How
could this have happened to Randy in what was once one of the freest nations in
the world? The answer lies in the way each country views both people and
weapons.
The Chinese have apparently come to understand some simple truths now forgotten by Canada’s Liberal minded policy makers: that no matter how potentially dangerous an item is it can still be effectively controlled by employing sensible, non-confrontational policies that do not unduly demean or insult people. Perhaps the massacre Tiananmen Square made the Chinese finally realize that citizens will only take a certain amount of regimentation and degradation in their lives before their frustrations boil over into the kind of ugly, bloody revolt in which they are forced to massacre their own people. Its as if they finally remembered the ancient Chinese philosopher Lao-Tsu’s wise words that said, "Governing a large country is like frying a small fish. You spoil it with too much poking."
In
view of Canada’s current trend towards ever increasing weapons legislation,
coupled with the expansion of laws into almost every other sphere of activity,
(got your Boating Licence yet?) I
fear we are doomed to learn the same terrible lesson.
Biography of the author and disclaimer: (See attached Curriculum Vitae for additional info)
The author has been a Constable for eight years with the Niagara Parks Police in Niagara Falls, Ontario. The views expressed in this article may or may not represent the official position of his employer.
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