My dinner with Egerton

There is a local restaurant that I really like. It cooks good meals and moreover, it is committed to respecting its staff and paying them properly. Many of the dishes are splendidly delicious. It is an entirely admirable establishment.

But my first meal there years ago, was a dud (the homemade ginger ale tasted like rainwater in a box of car parts.) Some of its homemade specialties, like deep-fried duck hearts, are revolting to me. There is no guarantee that when I return there, I won’t be disappointed or worse.

Do I condemn it based on one, two or even three disappointments? No, because I admire the spirit and courage it takes to go wrong sometimes. Being somewhat imperfect myself I would be a hypocrite to demand such a standard in anyone else. And besides, other people may like duck hearts.

But even if the place poisoned me, and I elected never to dine there again, here’s what I would not do: I would not set the place on fire. I would call the health department, not smash the windows.

Which brings us to Egerton Ryerson.

Egerton Ryerson (1803-1882) essentially founded public education in Ontario and his work ultimately resulted in free public education. He has been much honoured, in death, as a towering figure in early Canadian pedagogy.

That is one reason why, long after his death, Ryerson’s 1847 paper on using residential schools to assimilate natives shaped Canadian government policy. In design and particularly through cruel implementation, that policy brutalized generations of native Canadians. Canada failed in its goal to kill native culture, but irrevocably wounded it.

Ryerson himself died long before that happened. He was a “moderate” in his time, and believed simply that his cultural heritage was superior to all others, including that of Indigenous peoples. Like you, he existed in his own time.

The question of whether Ryerson should still be honoured can only be answered by weighing his good contributions against his bad. That’s a constantly shifting thing, because standards change. As had been said, “The past is a foreign country. They do things differently there.”

However, whether Ryerson merits respect or shame, does not decide how existing monuments to him should be treated. No mob should be permitted to decide their fate. The laws that protect what we value (our loved ones, homes, restaurants) also protect what we revile.

As Thomas More said in “A Man for All Seasons”: “This country is planted thick with laws, from coast to coast, Man’s laws, not God’s! And if you cut them down… do you really think you could stand upright in the winds that would blow then?”