I'm in Canada for a week to hang out with my family over the holidays and It. Is. Brilliant.

I'm staying with my sister's family. As well as being the best sister EVER (this is undisputable fact so don't even try to argue the point with me), she is also pretty much the best cook in the world. She's a vegetarian so just being here means that I'm getting healthier and eating more veggies - a very good thing before I live in hotels for 6 weeks in Europe.

My nieces and nephew are fully awesome people so spending time with them is one of my favourite things to do. They're funny, interesting, engaged with life and actually care about the world outside of the usual teenaged preoccupations. My youngest niece is 14 and she's the one who gets kicked out of her room to make space for me when I come to visit. At night, I curl up in a single bed under the watchful eye of a signed photo of Rick Mercer. That's right. My 14-year-old niece has a signed photo of a Canadian political satirist in her bedroom instead of Justin Bieber. Better yet, it was a gift from her older sister. I could not be more proud.

The world is a complicated and scary place sometimes and disappearing into the latest celebrity gossip or pop star scandal can be a more attractive option then seeking out information on the various problems our countries are facing. Being socially/politically aware can be scary (not to mention depressing) so I'm even more proud of my nieces and nephew for being interested in what is happening in the wider world, rather than just Hollywood.

But then I would think this, as apparently I have a preoccupation with (in the words of one disgruntled reader) "liberal crap" like Gay Rights and Corporate Greed.

I made a few people angry on Twitter (@KaraOTR) this week with the aforementioned "liberal crap." Angry to the point of seeking out some of the companies that I work for and expressing their disgust at my trying to push my liberal Human Rights agenda through social media.

Sigh.

My twitter account and this blog are places where I try to be a bit more honest than I am with my usual work persona. I'm definitely, firmly on the liberal side of the sociopolitical spectrum but not being American, I can't (and won't) claim allegiance to either political party. I'm interested in what is going on though, here and worldwide and I will continue to tweet about things that catch my eye, including strides in LGBT Rights, the danger facing journalists trying to expose corruption in their own governments and social justice issues including poverty and inequality.

This does not mean that I think I have the answers. Far from it! Rather, I'm happy to seek out information and am more than happy to hear alternate points of view. What I don't want and won't engage in, is pointless, angry debate where the main goal is 'winning' rather than gaining a better understanding of whatever issue it is that we're talking about.

The most dangerous thing that any of us could do, is close our eyes and our ears and ignore what's happening around us. Through social media like Twitter, we have this incredible chance to watch history unfold all over the world, from a first person perspective. Social Media is already changing the world and this year was linked to things as disparate as the revolution in Egypt and the London Riots. The latest issue of Wired Magazine has a really cool article about this topic, if you're interested in it.

Of course, the nature of Twitter means that we have to learn how to weed out bad information (or misinformation) from the good. With a little effort, you can find news agencies and journalists with information you trust. And you can seek out the opposite point of view just as easily; to make sure that your understanding is better rounded.

But we can only do this if a) people are able to keep using Social Media to document events, and b) if we remain able to access it freely online. That's a whole other topic though.

In my mind, the important thing is to keep our eyes and ears open. Keep asking questions and try not to shut down other people becuase they have different views than we do.

Keep the conversation going.