The value of shared public celebrations

Opinion

Hey there, time traveller!
This article was published 07/04/2019 (1992 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

As journalism students planning to host a party in our apartment, our pre-emptive tactic was to door-knock neighbours in nearby suites and invite them to join us as guests. The unspoken assumption was they wouldn’t want to attend but, because they had been invited, they were less likely to complain if our party was loud and long.

It’s like that with two upcoming public celebrations. Organizers of separate gatherings — Manitoba’s 150th anniversary celebration and Whiteout street parties — held recent news conferences to outline plans.

All Manitobans are welcome at both bashes. But despite the wide-open invitation, some people will still complain.

For people looking to save the date, the 150th celebrations are still far off. Manitoba became a province on May 12, 1870, so the whoop-it-up sesquicentennial isn’t until 2020.

The 150th celebrations will be funded largely by public money. Cost to taxpayers? The province committed $2.5 million up front, and said it would match private donations of up to $2.5 million more.

The Whiteout street parties at Winnipeg Jets playoff games attracted tens of thousands of fans last year for the joyous ordeal of standing shoulder to shoulder with strangers for hours, united only by our shared yearning to see a six-ounce disc of vulcanized rubber fly past the opposing goalie. Cost to taxpayers? Whiteout expenses totalled $2.2 million last year, which was split between the city, the corporation that owns the team and Economic Development Winnipeg, which is partly funded by taxpayers.

There have already been murmurs that tax money shouldn’t be spent on such merriment. In this paper’s letters to the editor, social-media posts and phone calls to radio talk shows, a few citizens have questioned the value of tax-funded celebrations.

It’s hard to disagree when these party poopers argue there are more significant uses for public funds. A partial list: improving health care, fixing roads, planting more trees, improving public transit and offering more help for people with mental illness and addictions.

They’re inarguably correct when they say such social needs are more important than parties. But are we terrible people if we divert relatively small sums to events that help us feel better about being Manitobans?

The value of public celebrations — the opportunity to cut loose and revel as a community — is less tangible than filling potholes, but there are benefits nevertheless.

Officials are quick to cite spinoff economic value. For example, after last year’s Whiteout parties, Travel Manitoba CEO Colin Ferguson said, “Anywhere you go on social media, they’re talking about Winnipeg and Manitoba very positively and I think that will result in further investment, more tourists and meetings and conventions.”

It may be a stretch to suggest people outside of Manitoba will invest here or bring conventions here just because they see media reports of crazed Jets fans. Perhaps it’s more realistic to expect such celebrations will build a pride of place among people who already live here, and they will become ambassadors who share their positive perceptions with friends and relatives in other places.

Glen Murray tried to shift public perception. When he was mayor, downtown Winnipeg was considered desolate and dangerous by many people from the suburbs. He instituted summer festivals that were much like the current Whiteout street parties. He called his idea Get Together Downtown and, in 2001 and 2002, tens of thousands of people gathered on Portage Avenue to see publicly funded concerts featuring such acts as Remy Shand and Great Big Sea.

Did Murray’s public parties help change the image of downtown? Perhaps, although not nearly as much as the return of the Jets did.

Public celebrations are a good investment if they inspire networks of individuals to participate.

That seems to be the commendable strategy of the 150th anniversary organizers — they are planing a made-in-Manitoba concert, a community foundation legacy program and a community caravan, and they’re inviting Manitobans to suggest more projects. The common theme seems to be encouraging people to think about ways they value Manitoba.

Public celebrations are also a good investment if they prompt people to turn off their multiple screens, emerge from the isolation of their technological cocoons and encounter fellow Manitobans in an old-school, face-to-face manner.

Most of us usually stay within social circles of people who are like us in age, income, education, faith or race. Public celebrations are invitations to venture outside of these safe circles and encounter the greater community in an atmosphere of fun and acceptance of diversity. Memorable moments can result.

During one Whiteout last season, I was next to a guy who appeared to be Sikh. Mark Scheifele scored one, and this turbaned stranger and I high-fived with exhilaration, which felt like a cool multicultural moment.

When the playoff party begins this week, thousands of excited Manitobans will show up. Let’s hope the Jets do, too.

Carl DeGurse is a member of the Free Press editorial board.

carl.degurse@freepress.mb.ca