Toronto The Bad

Hogtown has grown up, become sophisticated, has learned to handle the outrageous things that happen when a diverse citizenry sometimes goes amok.  Of course Toronto always had its share of thugs, people who inhabited the seamy sides of society and who found it personally useful to become social predators.  Every society has its share. 

But, along with a desire to increase the population for a larger workforce that would contribute to society, a more diverse population became a reality in an otherwise-bland-sea of white faces that once was the norm in Canadian society.  People have flooded to Canada to accept its welcoming open arms from across the Globe.

Toronto is the most population-diverse city in the country, a true pluralist society, where the federal government still cleaves to the concept of multiculturalism, long past the time when it had proved to be significant or useful.  It is past time that the concept of multi-social, multi-culture, multi-heritage be put to rest, and a far greater emphasis take its place on immigrants becoming unhyphenated Canadians.

Some elements of foreign culture from societies where crime has always been an endemic feature of those societies have entered Canada along with the immigrants.  Some social conditions not quite conducive of impelling people drenched in another, more familiar culture, accepting Canadian culture, have not been seen to be appropriate to the Canadian way of life.

The tradition of relaxed attitudes about single mothers raising large families, with absent father figures and unruly youngsters who gravitate toward street gangs and drugs, crime and guns, is an unfortunate importation that has become part of the Canadian way of life for some segments of society unable to wrest itself away from a social system that has proven time and again to be inimical to human values.

 Photograph by: Matthew Sherwood for National Post 

The week-end shoot-out at the Toronto Eaton Centre that took one life, left six people wounded, and created fear-driven chaos among thousands of shoppers represents a replay of things that go awry when gangs and guns exist and police are unable to halt the smuggling into the country of guns, and social workers are incapable of herding children of inadequate parenting away from gang values.

What occurred on Saturday in Toronto, according to Toronto police, is that merely by coincidence three members of the same street gang just happened to face off in a busy and crowded food court at the Eaton Centre.  They were so moved with thrilled emotion over seeing one another in that environment that a gun was pulled and the shooter expressed his joy of the casual meet by shooting two of his gang colleagues.

And just incidentally, a thirteen-year-old boy as well, and another handful of young people out shopping.  People shot in the leg, in the abdomen, in the hand, casualties of an unexpected meeting of gang members.  "Our investigation clearly suggests this is a targeted shooting and not a random act of violence against the general members of the public.  Regardless, it was committed in a busy mall, in the heart of the city, with no regard for members of the public simply going about their everyday business and pleasure."

The city's mayor assures the public that: "We will apprehend this suspect, I will guarantee it.  This is a safe city, and I want people to continue doing what they do day to day, go out with their families, go shopping, have fun.  We're not going to tolerate this in our city".  That will allay the trauma and fear of a great number of people in that great metropolis of seven million.

Christopher Husbands, facing a charge of first-degree murder and six counts of attempted murder after the shoot-out that caused mass panic in the public, was supposed to be under house arrest on a completely other criminal charge at the time of the unfortunate occurrence.  The dead man, Ahmed Hassan, was also known to police as someone with gang affiliation, formerly charged with drug offences.

And a third man, whose condition is deemed to be critical, having been the recipient of multiple gunshot wounds to his neck and abdomen, is another of the criminal-underbelly trifecta that celebrated their unforeseen, poorly-celebrated reunion at the Eaton Centre on Saturday.

Toronto has grown up.  It is now a super-metropolis, a city of multitudes, a cosmopolitan home to a multiplicity of ethnicities, religions, cultures and hopes for the future.