WHITBà FREE PRESS, WEDNESDAY. NOVEMBER 27, 1985,PAGE 5 "I have sworn upon the altar of God eternal hostility against every form of tyranny over the mind of man." - Thomas Jefferson THE y -w BUW5 /Y UV NOEN /A/ 7/NE RMFCI C ROW'S N EST WAL/itKED OFF W7// by Michael Knell In the name of God an act of war was committed against not only the Dominion of Canada but against the entire civilized world in the early hours of last Monday morning on a deserted airstrip on the tiny island nation of Malta. Five fanatical Moslem terrorists, instead'of surrendering to authorities, tossed hand grenades into a crowd of frightened, innocent people including two Canadians, one of whom was just a babe-in-arms and the other, his 27-year old mother. And do you know why these people died? Notwithstanding the obvious fact that the war criminals holding then hostage were insane, they did it in the name of God. I don't believe it, I can't believe it - people who believe passionately in a kind, benevolent God (Moslems, after all, also pledge allegiance of the God of Abraham) cannot be capable of the kind of disgusting, unhuman violence that the world witnessed in horror two days ago. Regular readers of this column know all too well that I have been critical of fundamentalist religion and the insanity of ideas that it represents. A few hours after listening to the radio accounts of the murder of two Canadians I started to think about the connection between religion and violence. Over the last 2,000 years, man has managed to commit a great deal of carnage in the name of God. One bas only to think of the various crusades (lead by Popes anxious to reign as Charlemagne did), the English Civil War (which was more about religion than anything else), the current situation in Northern Ireland or the crisis in Lebenon. Al of these acts of sheer lunacy are being perpetrated in the name of GocI. Doesn't it just boggie the mind? What ta even worse is that I don't know what to do about it? Is the need to believe, or to have faith in a Supreme Being so great that it saps us of our sense of reality? Do we need that crutch so much that we are willing to give up our sanity for it? I'm not what you would call an active, or regular church-goer. I gave up on organized religion years ago. But my hope in the existance of God is still as strong as ever. However, I may snicker at the banalities the church he left behind has committed, I still believe that Jesus Christ gave mankind the only trulyworkable set of rules for social conduct ever seen on this planet. But what happened after that î§ anyone's guess. I certainly don't know. Ail I know is that when I listened to the radio Monday morning I felt myself getting angry. I was angry at the Maltese and the Eygptians for letting things get out of hand, I was angry at the Moslems for being such fanalical jerks and I was angry at my own country for not having the foresight to understand that something like this could happen (after ail, we're supposed to have one of the finest intelligence services in the western world - where the hell were they?). When my anger subsided and my grief for that poor woman and her son had cooled I started thinking about the whys of it all. What prompted those five men to attack an airliner, take its passengers hostage knowing that it was possibly necessary (from their point of view) to kill them in cold blood? They submitted to the Will of God - then they committed the most despictable crime known to man. While one set of religious fanatics are bent on murder and mayhem, another is gathering in Rome to wax philosophic about the future of the Catholic Church. Granted, one doesn't have much to do with the other but there are some similarities between them. Both are seeking to express the Will of God. One bas taken a route full of violence while the other group denies the basic civil rights of half the human race. Then in the United States there is a group called the Moral Majority who don't want to commit mayhem in the name of God but they do want to pass judgement, even control, what we read, know and understand. Why are ail of these people who claim to love God and believe in the message of brotherhood, hope and faith in a better tommorow bent on killing half of us, denying half of us our civil rights or controlling how we think and how we feel? You know, I always thought that the Church was supposed to answer these questions. The Church and those who claim the right to lead it have, in my opinion, forgotten that the religion they preach is supposed to unify people, to bring them closer to God. Yet these fanatics are bent on dividing us, on driving us away from the principles we ail try to believe in and embark us on a course of anarchy and destruction. Religion seems to be the cause of so much evil in the world. Lebenon. Nor- thern Ireland. Look, religion is even dividing the people of Ontario (if you don t believe me take a look at the effect of Bill 30, if that hasn't set Catholic against Protestant I don't know what bas). This column bas only questions. I'm not even sure that there are answers. I'm not an historian, but from what little history I know religion bas divided the human race since the dawn of time and will continue to do so until after Ar- megedon. The only thing I'm sure of is that I don't understand why these things are hap- pening at this point in the 20th century - a time when the arts and sciences are at their greatest peak. Man bas never known so much, has never had so much and yet he still insists on killing his brother in the name of God. I wonder if God him- self bas an answer. I sure don't think the professional clerics nor the fundamen- talists can provide one either- WITH OUR FEET UP By Bill Swan Extra-billing by doctors has generated not a little heat lately. Most of that has come from doctors, who are affected directly by the matter. Patients who agree to pay extra do so by choice; those who prefer not to so pay can always sWk out another doctor. But for the individual doctorVhis is a matter of pay day proportions. It is with no little surprise -then that support for extra billing comes from some of the strangest sources. To wit, labor leader Elwood "March" Picketline. Mr. Picketline admitted to this writer that he approves of extra billing, despite labor's usual stand in opposition to it. uWhich means that most labor people are against extra billing.) Doesn't his stand violate union principles? "Not at all," says Picketline. "In fact, now that we've had tine to consider the matter more deeply, I am starting a crusade throughout the union movement to adopt principles of extra billing." "Do you mean," asked this writer, "that you are in fact supporting the doctors? That you are saying that extra billing is bad?" "Careful, there, son," replied Picketline. "I'm not saying that we support the doctors. What I said was, the principle of extra billing should be applied to the labor movement. I see a great new era ahead." Couldhe be more specific? "Of course. When doctors extra bill, what they are saying is that they should have the right to write their own contracts, right? I mean, here the provin- ce has set up the accepted medical fees within OHIP, and the doctors claim that they have the right to set their own rates." So how would this apply to the labor movements? "Easy," Picketline replied, pulling himself upright in his chair and warming to his subject. "Every labor union negotiates a contract with the employer, right?" I opined that not all did - some employers still think unions are a commie plot and have both feet firmly planted in tlie nineteenth century. "Yeah, and extra billing would take care of that, too. See what happens is, a union negotiates a con- tract with the company. The workers are then stuck with that pay rate for one, two, maybe three years. "'But with extra billing, workers have the right to charge extra for extra services. Now, no good union man is going to object to that. Suppose a guy works at Generous Motors on the assembly hne. GM pays him the going rate each pay day. But just as doctors extra bill, each worker would have the right to extra bill for his or her duties. But doctors collect from patients. How would workers collect? "The details are still being hammered out, but several plans have been mentioned. First the workers could bill GM directly. Or the worker could bill the person who purchases the car directly. That of course would be somewhat awkward. We're still working on the details." It would work on the shop floor. But what about other areas? "Well, nurses, for one, should be looking at it as the purest form of combining professionalism with stiff union practices, just as doctors have done. For example, nurses could direct bill the hospital for some services; the patients for others; and, of cour- se, nurses could also direct bill the doctors, since of- ten the primary health care comes from the nurses. They are the ones who make the doctors look good." You mean, they could give doctors some of their own back? "Precisely. Teachers, too, have a golden oppor- tunity. Extra billing of students would be in perfect keeping with the philosophy of professionalism. Af- ter-hours consultations, $5; telephone calls at home, $7; attendance at social functions, $15. You get the picture." But what about the doctors right to set her/his own fee schedule? "What about the nurse's right to do the same? The teacher's? The average union member? If doctors CONT'D ON PG. 21