Please note…
The series, “13 Things You Can do to Kill Your Community,”
is a set of satirical open letters by
Doug Griffiths
which appeared as individual weekly contributions to
The Wainwright EDGE
during the spring and summer of 2005.
The series is not intended to be taken as instruction
for actually harming your community; rather its critical aim is to
increase awareness of everyday things we may not
recognize as being detrimental to our community.
13 Things You Can Do to Kill Your Community
by Doug Griffiths, MLA Battle River - Wainwright
Don’t Include Seniors
In the list of thirteen ways to ensure your community fails, number eight is to ensure that seniors are not included or involved in you community. The best plan is to ‘warehouse’ them in senior’s homes and housing complexes, and forget about them completely. I know that some of you may consider this method of failure rather weak, but let me assure you seniors are a powerful force and have been at least partly responsible for the success any community enjoys.
Seniors are a powerful group with time on their hands, and usually some money, which can also ’cause’ success in some incredible ways. Achieving failure is sometimes hard but by completely ignoring those who helped build your community, you can bring failure that much more within reach.
Please keep in mind that there are seniors that will help you destroy your community too. They will always tell those who are seeking success that what they are attempting can’t be done, they will talk about the past and previous failures incessantly, and they will talk about how they built this country and everything is now owed to them (for they fail to realize that there is more building to do). These seniors will help you fail so keep them on side, and keep them talking.
The ones you have to watch are the ones who volunteer in and for everything. They have often retired, only to find themselves volunteering more hours than a full time job (thanks Mike G). They do it because they believe in their community, because they believe in the quality of life in their community, and because they know that the building process goes on forever. They are ever optimistic and encouraging, and share the experience and wisdom they have acquired to guide others to success. They make things happen, just to make things happen.
Now, when I say seniors have money, I don’t mean that they are, or should be, giving it away to keep the community going. What I mean is that many successful communities have realized that seniors have particular needs, require particular services, and that seniors can and will pay for them. As a result those communities have built seniors’ appropriate housing, and have attracted businesses and services they know seniors need. Not only do seniors stay in those communities and spend their money locally, but other seniors locate in those communities and spend their money, and those communities grow; as do the number of businesses, the number of jobs, and the number of opportunities within the community.
As you can see, seniors are a powerful force. If failure is your ultimate goal you must work hard to relegate them to the sidelines, warehouse them in senior’s homes, cut them off from the rest of your community, ignore their needs and the opportunities that surround them. Most importantly, don’t ever see them as a part of the future or that will lead your community to success; think about them as the past, treat them like relics, and always view them as part of the problem, not the solution. Do this, and failure will get very close.
