Trust Awards: Thesis and Antithesis - Alcyonenews

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Islands Trust

Posted May 3, 2019

Trust Awards: Thesis and Antithesis

The Trust News Release is dated “February 20, 2019" but as its serial number “2019-04-IT” indicates it happened someday in April. Here is the message:

“LET’S CELEBRATE OUR COMMUNITY CHAMPIONS VICTORIA.

The Islands Trust is seeking the help of islanders to recognize people, groups and businesses working to protect the environment and enhance life on their islands.”

This is the “Year of the Badges” in the biennial cycle of the event, which mimics the Juno and Oscar awards, all being reminiscent of the Queens handing out knighthoods and the Pontiff bestowing sainthoods.

Please note that the News Release emanates from Victoria, the Trust’s Colonial Metropolis.

Then note how kind of the Trust to allow us to nominate worthy recipients. Such graciousness gives the thing shades of popularity where yawning may be induced and expected.

The award recipients will be selected, not necessarily from among the peoples’ nominees, by the Trust; the selection will be done in the dungeon; we, the people would not even know who was nominated, nor who nominated them; and of course we will have no say in the outcome – this is not “our business” the Trust insinuates; as is common with “saviours”, the Trust claims authority; it also insinuates possessing objectivity in judging, while the thinly veiled purpose of the badge-grant is to advance the objectives of the Trust as interpreted by the Trust itself. But “saviours” are inherently partial and the Trust has often sidetracked impartiality to serve selfish concerns.

In general, the quality of governance depends much on a Government’s Opposition, and since the Trust setup excludes an “official” Opposition within its two-member, colonially-controlled micro-parliament, we the people must ourselves do the “Opposing” and do it directly, invoking the “non-withstanding” facility to override “representative “ democracy. Regrettably we have been letting the Trust get away with too much in the past, and in this instance, I for one, would rise to the citizenship challenge, hence the paper at hand.

Specifically, I hereby nominate the Trust for the Grant Award for Fathomless Failure.

This award is for all that the Trust has done over the years to Booth Canal. The people of the Trust have worked hard to earn the distinction and we must not deny the Trust what it has earned for itself.

After a decade of closely watching the Trust, I have heaps of material substantiating this award, but I will focus on one. My pick is the deliberate “failure” of the Trust to preserve and protect the Canal. And its stubborn fiddling while the Canal slides to its demise. The Trust stance on the Canal is also exemplary of the Trust’ propensity to suppress information so as to avert raising the ire of the people, when it senses dissent. All said and done the Canal story manifest how low the Trust would go to pursue what the people and the Law would not let them do.

True to my innate trend to pursue a better future and avoid lamenting the petrified past, I would give the Trust another chance to change the award about to receive. I would be thrilled by a genuine chance to reverse the polarity of this award, from Failure to Fulfilment. I call on “them” to come up now, on this the sixth anniversary of the infamous 2013 “May One Letter on Booth Canal”, with a “realistic and pragmatic” (Mitchell Sharp line) plan to reverse the demise of Booth Canal and do it before the Trust Award Ceremony date. I would welcome them pulling the carpet from under my feet, on this one.

As for me, I speak authoritatively because I have already been honoured by the Trust with its two highest awards, delivered by the Chairman in January 2016. Since the subject of this paper is Awards, I will cite mine in the byline of this paper, next:

Tom Varzeliotis Public Enemy Numero Uno – SSI, Sole Menace of the Trust – Republic Wide.