‘Peace House Community Journal’ Archives
Groundhog Day
Peace House Community””A Place to Belong By MARTI MALTBY Back in May, when people had settled into the Covid-19 lockdown, a survey by OnePoll asked Americans how their sense of time was being affected by spending day after day in their homes. The results included: The average American got confused about what day it was five times every week.59% of respondents didn”™t even know what day it was when they took the survey.65% of those polled said they were struggling to stay motivated during self-isolation. When I heard the results, my mind immediately flashed back many months to a meditation discussion I led at PHC. I asked community members what parts of homelessness could never be explained but simply had to be experienced. Several people gave answers that almost exactly mirrored the survey results I just mentioned. Among other things, the community members said: “It”™s like Groundhog Day. Every day is just like the day [...]
Systemic Racism isn”™t the Problem
By MARTI MALTBY In the aftermath of George Floyd”™s death, I”™ve heard a lot about systemic racism. As far as I can tell, though, no one is saying anything new. I first heard of systemic racism in university over 25 years ago, and I”™ve heard it discussed consistently since then, and now I”™m hearing it discussed more loudly. Unfortunately, and tragically, discussing “systemic racism” misses the point. The system isn”™t an impersonal force. It is made and controlled by people, by us. But of course, some of us have more power and control over the system than others. Those (including me) who have power and privilege need to recognize their (our/my) power and privilege and then do something with it. Systemic racism (or whatever other impersonal term you want to use) shields them/us/me from personal responsibility for not doing what we can to change the system. So instead of discussing systemic racism, we/I need to [...]
Peace House Community”“A Place to Belong: Canadian Humor (which I spell “Humour”)
By MARTI MALTBY I decided that this month I wouldn”™t mention Coronavirus (it didn”™t take long for me to fail on that count, did it?) because it has dominated so much of the news that I wanted to give you a break from thinking about it. I hadn”™t fully grasped how pervasive Covid has become until I tried to come up with a topic for this column that didn”™t involve Coronavirus, and I failed. Every topic I thought of somehow came back to the pandemic. As I said, I wanted to give people a break from Coronavirus because of the negative effects the virus is having on our society. I was about to list some of them, but you are probably as aware of them as I am, and if I did list them I would fail even more spectacularly in my effort to give you a break from thinking about Coronavirus. The best I can do at this point is to offer an alternative to the bleak news, so below you will find links to videos of Canadian humor. I”™m [...]
