We very much depend on interconnections

SOCIAL STUDIES - Published Monday May 4th, 2009

A pandemic flu virus shows us something that we often overlook. The whole world is connected.

That should be obvious by now, but for many of us, the immediate surroundings constitute our entire understanding of the world. Even if you travel, or have friends in other places, there are days when "here" is the only place you think of.

It is hard to think of everything; but consider how far flung the swine flu has become in just a few days. This is almost entirely accounted for by travel. People from every country come in contact with people from every other country in a relatively short period of time.

This is very much like that old party game, seven degrees of separation. You might remember the game; you can connect yourself to any person in the world, supposedly, in seven steps. For example, my brother is a producer and used to work for Salter Street Films. One person I know he had drinks with once is Jason Priestly. That pretty much makes me two steps away from half of Hollywood.

A few weeks ago I had a great conversation with Bob Hallet, a member of Great Big Sea, who of course works with Alan Doyle, who is friends with Russell Crowe. Again, only three steps. I know a senator, Lois Wilson, who knows the prime minister, who knows the American president. Only three steps.

Most of us could do something similar. Which I am using simply to ask the question, how many steps away from someone who has been to Mexico in the last two weeks do you think you are? I bet not many of us are more than three steps away.

Even more importantly, half of the food we eat in our winter deprived land of produce comes from Mexico. I have asparagus from there in my fridge right now. I also have oranges from Spain, which is another country where the flu is spreading.

What do you think would happen if we closed the borders of any given country in the world? The answer is simple, chaos.

Conservatively, Mexico exports over $200 billion worth of merchandise to the United States alone. Some of this is stuff we would never have thought of. Here are some of the top exports out of Mexico: Crude oil, car parts and accessories, video equipment, passenger cars, electrical apparatus and parts, telecommunications equipment, computers, tin, gold, sugar, natural gas, and zinc.

There are many more. This just serves as a reminder of what one country exports to others in our global economy. I cannot possibly imagine what an actual pandemic is going to do to us. Imagine for just one second that everything in Mexico stops for one week because they all get sick. Even if we assume everyone gets better, a one week stop in any given place would put the entire world so far behind in terms of import/export that everything would be affected.

It is not just the global world that is interconnected. It is the local world as well.

Consider this. The government recently reduced its funding for a program run out of the YMCA called RECONNECT. Essentially this was a street based aid program that provided a couple of social workers to help out people who were at the end of their rope.

Don't kid yourself, we could all be there tomorrow, and as the economy tanks these are the first programs to get killed, while the need grows exponentially.

RECONNECT provides services to 2,500 people in Metro every year. Yes, 2,500 people who are homeless, or living below the sustenance level of life. I am sure they are not getting everyone. Harvest House helps, oh wait, their funding has been cut too.

How many of us will cut our own donations to food banks and helping agencies as we tighten our belts?

Back to my interconnected bit, do you think that it would make no difference to any of us if the 3,000 or so people in our city are not cared for? Who do you think will be there to help us when we need it the most? What will get cut next?

So here we have a stalled and destructive economy, which although it is not hurting Moncton like other places, has definitely caused a change in the price of groceries, for example, and created a work climate of fear.

Then we have a global pandemic on the rise which, if it actually hits, could cause a third of the people of the world to be off work all at once.

In the midst of that we are cutting back on our social safety net.

Personally, I have been shown over and over that I need other people. In large and small ways the people around me contribute to my ability to get through this challenging life. I have no doubts that we live in a very complex interconnected system where any change or pressure on one part of the web causes ripples.

I guess what I am hoping is that we can all take it a little easier on each other in times like this. We need each other; and no one I know of is having an easy time of it. Every day seems to get a little more scary.

But together, we can make sure we get through.

That is what Maritimers do.