Friday Tunes: The Idiot

This week’s installment of labour themes in popular culture is Stan Roger’s The Idiot. I can’t say I’m a huge fan of folk music, but Roger’s is something of troubadour of the common Canadian (wo)man. This song examines the inter-provincial migration that has characterized the working lives of many Canadians.

Rogers writes from the perspective of a migrant who has come west to take a job in the oil patch but whose heart remains in the east. Rogers taps into notions of pride, with the worker moving rather than accepting unemployment insurance benefits. While questioning this decision, Rogers notes the pride the worker feels in earning is living (“There's self-respect and a steady cheque in this refinery”), which is a refreshing change from the usual “workers are malingers” narrative of corporate Canada.

Rogers also talks about the difficult working conditions (“But work I must so I eat this dust and breathe refinery”) and the difficult living conditions (“Oh, the streets aren't clean, and there's nothing green, and the hills are dirty brown”) and missing home (“Oh I miss the green and the woods and streams and I don't like cowboy clothes”). But, ultimately, there is self-respect to be found in working (“But the government Dole will rot your soul back there in your home town”).



I often take these night shift walks when the foreman's not around.
I turn my back on the cooling stacks and make for open ground.
Far out beyond the tank farm fence where the gas flare makes no sound,
I forget the stink and I always think back to that Eastern town.

I remember back six years ago, this Western life I chose.
And every day, the news would say some factory's going to close.
Well, I could have stayed to take the Dole, but I'm not one of those.
I take nothing free, and that makes me an idiot, I suppose.

So I bid farewell to the Eastern town I never more will see;
But work I must so I eat this dust and breathe refinery.
Oh I miss the green and the woods and streams and I don't like cowboy clothes;
But I like being free and that makes me an idiot I suppose.

So come all you fine young fellows who've been beaten to the ground.
This western life's no paaradise, but it's better than lying down.
Oh, the streets aren't clean, and there's nothing green, and the hills are dirty brown,
But the government Dole will rot your soul back there in your home town.

So bid farewell to the Eastern town you never more will see.
There's self-respect and a steady cheque in this refinery.
You will miss the green and the woods and streams and the dust will fill your nose.
But you'll be free, and just like me, an idiot, I suppose.

-- Bob Barnetson