Thank you Dennis and others addressing the what to do issue.
I absolutely agree that these simple actions are underestimated and
underused. 

I have an idea to have a "one time gathering" (who knows maybe we'll
have fun and want to meet again if the pressure is not huge to commit to
an ongoing group). So I've decided to  post an email to my friends and
interested colleagues to attend "The Upstream Downtown People Over
Poverty" evening at a local coffee house in early April where I think we
should focus on actually writing our letters, bring addresses, envelopes
and stamps and all head out to the mailbox together at the end of our
coffee session. Anyone on this list serv attending, please note the
addition to the agenda :)

Shannon Lavell

-----Original Message-----
From: Social Determinants of Health [mailto:[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of
Dennis Raphael
Sent: Saturday, March 18, 2006 5:58 AM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: [SDOH] Poverty and what to do...


I despair at times as well. One of my biggest beefs is that in addition
to the absolute lack of concern by elected representatives, is the
failure of supporters to take the necessary action.  What I mean by this
is:

1) How many of you on this list take the time to send letters to
editors, your elected MPs or others?  If you do, great, if not, why not.
They will not fire you.  They simply count letters, emails, etc.

2) In addition to members of this list, there are literally thousands of
people who read our stuff, attend our lectures, see themselves as
supporters, but do nothing.

The reason the Globe and Mail, Toronto Star, other media, elected reps
-- the Sandra Pupatello's, Gerard Kennedy's the Jack Laytons (whose
platform is good, but dare not speak the word poverty in public)  get
away with this is that they see NO consequences for their actions.

If Edward Greenspon and Paul Taylor -- the evil editor and health editor
of the Globe and Mail respectively were told  - repeatedly -- that their
health coverage is crap, they might be more receptive to doing something
about it.

So, let's begin right now!

[log in to unmask]
[log in to unmask]
[log in to unmask]

Ontario
[log in to unmask] -- Minister of Community and Social
Services [log in to unmask] -- Former Director Daily Food
Bank, now Minister of Education [log in to unmask] -
Premier of Ontario


Provide similar emails to the list for your province/state!

By the way, the following appeared yesterday in the Toronto Star, but
not in the internet version...
------------------------------------------
Re: Protecting our social programs, March 16, 2006.  While in
Opposition, Sandra Pupatello made the rounds of anti-poverty and Faith
groups groups commiserating with them about how awful the Conservative
government was treating people on social assistance.  Her party promised
to end the claw-back of the National Child Benefit to families on social
assistance. Once elected, they changed their mind. Enough said.

Dennis Raphael

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