If you read time and life and those other periodicals that come to us from south of the border, you have no doubt followed the events leading up to the Republican convention, when Goldwater, Scranton, Lodge and Rockefeller were fighting it out, we read a lot about getting back to the “mainstream” of Republican thinking. Well, I have never been a strong believer in advocating that the populace of any country should submerge themselves in the “mainstream” of political thought. To me, “mainstream” and “conformity” are exactly the same thing and I have never been one for conformity. Here in our own country, the political parties draw closer and closer together and it's hard to tell one from the other without program. In politics, in religion, in the arts, in all fields which affect our lives, there is a crying need for left-of-centre thinkers, right-of-centre thinkers and for some “mainstreamers". Nations need to grow. We must entertain new ideas and question their validity. People should challenge long held theories and beliefs rather than accepting them just because they have been around so long. What we need in this country and in every country is a few more people who are willing to swim against the current, people who are eager to channel off the “mainstream" to see if something more worthwhile shows up in the backwash. When you read the goings on in our own Parliament, do you not often feel that you’ve heard it all before, that it is just the same old stuff your grandfather was asked to digest. I'm no revolutionary, but I do think a little civic thinking is now required of intelligent people everywhere.
No comments:
Post a Comment