By TOBY FOUKS
Let’s not turn a joyful market experience into a political arena (“Censoring sign policy in limbo,” Aug. 7 Driftwood).
The market experience for those who attend should be joyful, not fraught with concerns about situations either far away over which we have no influence, or close to home.
We all have the right to have opinions and to express them in an appropriate way in an appropriate location. We certainly live in a time in which as a result of social media people have grown accustomed to shouting their views out into the digital atmosphere and engaging with others for good or for ill because of those opinions and beliefs.
The space a vendor rents at the Saturday Market is not one of those appropriate places. It is not a public square and it is not a collection of personally owned pieces of territory.
To be clear, this is not about the rights of vendors who insist they should be able to publicize their political or religious opinions in their market stall (or on the cement walkway), it’s about the kind of atmosphere that our Saturday Market requires if it is to remain a pleasurable venue, not a space punctuated by opinions and discussions unconnected to its purpose. It’s what visitors to the market, on whom vendors depend, have the right to expect.
The market should be a place where people can enjoy and appreciate (and we hope purchase) products grown, baked or made and sold by Salt Spring vendors. Such a space should be neutral — free of politics and religion. These fall into what can be highly charged emotional territory which always brings discomfort when there’s disagreement. Our market should be a kind of haven in that way — where visitors are free from troubles for a short while — small, large and quite honestly horrendous — in places near and places far from here — troubles both personal and those affecting others, often causing great suffering.
Vendors have every right to express their opinions in a public square but the market is not a public square. Vendors are renting space and that space comes with conditions. It’s a kind of community bound by common goals.
I am curious about why anyone would feel they must express opinions in that way in a market stall or scrawl graffiti all over the cement or march through in a group chanting at us that “Salt Spring market must not hide.” Do people think that they are going to influence anyone else’s opinion? They are not. Why would a vendor think that it was important that everyone be informed of his/her political views? The market is not about the vendors, or what any vendor thinks or believes. It’s about the products that are made available to visitors in a pleasant, welcoming atmosphere. If anything it can be an escape from worry for a short period of time.
People’s opinions do matter a lot to them and to their associates, but making sure that countless others know what those opinions are should be accomplished not by a poster at a market stall or a march through a market, but possibly a letter to the editor of the Driftwood. Of course, that does take more time and thought.
The writer is a Salt Spring Saturday Market vendor.