22.8.14

bon côté mauvais côté


Bonne nouvelle : Diane Côté m’a récemment informé que le service de référence de l’Ordre des Psychologues du Québec sera corrigé pour inclure les psychothérapeutes qui acceptent des mandats de Santé Canada pour les autochtones.  

Mauvaise nouvelle : ce changement n’aura pas lieu avant le mois de mars, 2015.  

Mme. Côté répondait à un courriel qui l'informait qu'un représentant de Santé Canada a confirmé que les services des travailleurs sociaux, des psychologues, et de tout psychothérapeute détenteur d’un permis délivré par l’OPQ sont tous remboursés par Santé Canada. 

Mme. Côté a par ailleurs écrit qu’elle ne jugeait ‘pas nécessaire’ d’en discuter avec ledit représentant de Santé Canada.

En réponse à Mme Côté, j’écrivais le suivant :
Si j'ai bien compris, la clientèle autochtone qui consulte le site de l'OPQ ne sera pas référée à tous les fournisseurs inscrits dans votre service de référence qui acceptent les mandats de Santé Canada avant le mois de mars, 2015?
On verra si Mme Côté répondra à cette question. 
 
Je lui ai aussi fait savoir qu'à mon avis il était bien nécessaire de tenir le représentant de Santé Canada au courant de sa décision. 

15.8.14

Newsjacking the death of an actor


The initial purpose of this blog was to spread the word on  my petition and document an encounter with various people at the OPQ.

As I heard more stories about the deleterious effects of Bill 21, I researched the various publicity campaigns that introduced it to the public.  I saw a connection to my own experience serving on the Mental Health Commission of Canada (MHCC) where I heard all the same buzzwords.

“Stigma” and “Anti-stigma”

There is a class of “professional journalists” who depend on corporate and governmental sources for their livelihood, and who publicize to some degree the “official line” on a story in exchange for journalistic access to the powerful.  When I see the same keywords disseminated by these journalists whenever and wherever possible, I see a publicity campaign, which is to say, I see the tail end of a coordinated marketing campaign.

Now one of the key techniques of modern marketers is to hijack a story, also called “newsjacking.”  And one of the favorite types of stories to newsjack is the death of a celebrity.  And sure enough, right on time, André Picard, public health reporter for the Globe and Mail, has newsjacked the sad story of Robin Williams' death by retweeting the newsjack of James Kirkbride in order to direct us to the “sage words” of Ian Colman, quoted in another newsjack by Lynn Desjardins of Radio Canada.

James Kirkbride and Ian Colman both just happen to be in the business of getting funding for psychiatric research of the type that the “anti-stigma” campaign is hoping to fund.  (The MHCC and those behind Bill 21 have a very pronounced bias towards funding research, and seem peculiarly unable to take in that they are restricting public access to helpful mental health resources right now, the subject of this blog.)

I do not wish to discuss the particulars here except to say that an argument, based on Mr. Williams’ death, for funding the type of research called for by the “anti-stigma” campaign seems questionable, especially because Mr. Williams cannot speak for himself.  But no matter.  Picard, Kirkbride, Colman, and Desjardins had the hijack angle all figured out before the facts of Mr. Williams’ death were even established.  There really is no argument.  It is propaganda.

Mr. Williams, like most great comics, sometimes had a keen sense of how things work.  An interviewer described one of his recent films as “a devastatingly funny indictment of the modern grief industry.”  When she asked him if things were getting worse, Williams replied: "Well, I think people want it. In a weird way, it's trying to keep hope alive… you just try and keep it in perspective; you have to remember the best and the worst."

Sounds like Robin Williams would have forgiven Picard, Kirkbride, Colman and Desjardins for using the grief over his death to gain marketshare, but I for one wish they might listen to that critical marketing expert linked above, who notes “we stopped counting how many PR people broadly distribute a pitch for their client when someone in the public eye dies."