Are you kidding? Just fill it out.

If you aren't familiar with what's going on, check out this or this or this (The last is, I believe, a very well-balanced editorial).

There are a couple things going on here that really bother me. The first is that the Conservative government is making a very important policy decision while ignoring those whose professional opinions are directly relevant, and ignoring overwhelming opposition. They are doing this as a minority government, meaning the opposition actually represents the majority of represented Canadians. In terms of the professional opposition, the now-former head of Statistics Canada has resigned as a direct result of this decision.

The issue has revolved around the essential differences between the reliability of data gathered from a voluntary census versus a mandatory one, and the excessive nature of the penalty for not filling out the mandatory census. I'll admit, I had no idea that you could go to jail for failing to fill out the census. But that might be because no one ever has. All the same, the notion of removing that penalty is one I'd support. One official also pointed out that in the past 20 years, only 50 complaints about the census have been received. An average of a little more than two per year, in a country of over 30 million.

That being said, the census isn't something everyone has to do, and it's a very infrequent inconvenience. That brings to mind one of my largest concerns about this entire issue. The notion that all people are willing to do for their country is pay their taxes is quite frankly offensive to me (and 'willing' is a generous term in that sentence as it is). This country has its problems, but we're sure as hell not going to solve any of them by complaining about providing policy makers with accurate information. Or by refusing to fill out a form once in a while. There is an issue of privacy that has been attached to this debate but in listening to the questions given as examples, I cannot imagine why anyone would have a problem giving up that information.

Still, few people were complaining at all. The sitting government is pushing through a reform that few constituents, if any, wanted, needed or care about. And they are wasting everyone's time by doing so. They have caused, perhaps indirectly, one dedicated public servant to abandon his post, because he could not in good conscience to his profession carry on.

I'll echo the Globe in one respect - do away with the threat of jail time and leave the rest as is. I would like to hear some citizens first-hand who would find it so unbearable in that state.