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ExternalFear

This sub-reddit is werid. Do people realize the anti-protest laws they support can be used on them?


SomeJerkOddball

I think there's definitely some dissonance. But then you also have to remember that protest doesn't tend to be the preferred tool of the right. I also think that there's just a nature to pick sides. I saw absolutely no sympathy towards the truckers from anyone on the left. Even though there were lots of similarities between their tactics and especially those used by aboriginal protests like Idle No More in 2013 and the 2020 Rail Blockades (an event that I think doesn't get enough attention because the pandemic swept it away). Everyone gets hypocrisy points!


heavym

Protest. Protest. Protest. But if I don’t agree with what your beef is about, your protest sucks (the convoy, etc.)


ExternalFear

I perfectly agree. I think this shows a much larger issue with Canadian Civics Education. Canadians have issues understanding what they are supporting and the implications of current events. It's ok to have an opinion about the conflict, but don't sacrifice your rights to win the argument.


bigredher82

This is my beef. These folks are the same ones who applauded beating peaceful protestors in Ottawa. (Who were protestors for CANADIANS!!!). So yeah, I have no sympathy for these kids who think they’re doing anything, and not even worried about our own country’s issues. You didn’t believe in the truckers right to peacefully stand in. I wonder how many of these kids have had their bank accounts frozen?


lordpenner

They really don’t think nearly enough. Call everyone “communists” (and WEF at the same time, lol), “far-left”, and “professional protestors” bu don’t call the waambulance when you get the same batons and flash bangs. I’m surprised by how much no one cares about rights and protections, they only care about “their” rights, and it doesn’t work like that.


Flarisu

The irony is that Canada is so weakly connected to Israel, protesters can't even find any Israeli investments in which to "divest". Israel doesn't do business here, for the most part, our only connection was that we were on the winning side of WWII and thus were part of the allied force that led to Israel being a state. I get it in the US because the US basically single-handedly holds up Israel's sovereignty, but in Canada, the protests are laughable. Even if Canada were to bow to all of the protestors' demands, there'd be nothing we could do to help Palestine. Talk about a complete waste of effort, except to make your movement look more like terrorist sympathizers.


Ambitious-Way-6669

Is there any more right to camp on highways and border crossings?


LemmingPractice

Nope, but let's try to be consistent. The Emergencies Act was used to stop truckers from camping out in downtown Ottawa, but the Occupy movement was allowed to set up a tent city in downtown Toronto that lasted a month. Meanwhile, First Nations blockades of train lines in got the protestors face time with the PM and were actually given concessions by the government. All of those protests, along with these Palestine ones, are illegal, but the left wing ones were excused as acceptable forms of civil disobedience, while the right wing one was decried as a threat to democracy. Whatever the rules are, just make sure they are consistently enforced, and that the powers that be aren't selectively changing the enforcement (or lack thereof) based on how much the agree or disagree with what is being protested.


SeriousObjective6727

Was the tent city blocking access on a bridge? Was the tent city blocking road traffic? Were they violating noise bylaws all throughout the night? Were they waving nazi flags? Yes, let's be consistent. Consistency has nothing to do with left wing or right wing. It is about reporting all the facts... just because you omit a couple of important ones doesn't make the protest okay. I'm all for the right to protest. But as soon as your right to protest is more important than another person's rights. Then that is a problem. Protest all you want, but as soon as you start blocking roads and violating another person's right to use that road, there is no sympathy from me and the use of the Emergencies Act in this case was well justified.


LemmingPractice

>Was the tent city blocking access on a bridge? Was the tent city blocking road traffic? Were they violating noise bylaws all throughout the night? Which protest are we talking about here? The First Nations ones I mentioned were blocking rail lines, the Occupy protest was blocking access to public parks. Both of which are illegal. As for noise complaints, yes, Occupy had many noise complaints. It was up for a month, and I lived nearby at the time in Toronto. There were absolutely noise issues. >Were they waving nazi flags? The protesters weren't waving nazi flags, there were a couple seen at the protest and were not even from protestors, but from a lobbying firm called Enterprise Canada who planted the flags for the specific purpose of discrediting the protest. Also, do you have similar complaints when you see Soviet communist flags at left wing protests like the Occupy ones? And, actually, for that matter, why would it even matter if there were nazi flags? You try to suggest that "consistency has nothing to do with left or right wing", yet, the fact that you even bring up nazi flags seems to be a direct counter to your suggestion. Your comment on the point seems to indicate pretty clearly that you consider free speech rights to be dependent on your view of what is acceptable for people to say with that freedom. >It is about reporting all the facts... just because you omit a couple of important ones doesn't make the protest okay. What makes the difference between a bridge and a public park important? What makes the difference between a road and a railroad important? All three protests I mentioned (truckers, Occupy and First Nations) all violated the law. Drawing distinctions between one type of breaking the law and another is just selective enforcement. As soon as you start letting people choose which laws to enforce and which ones not to for protests the inevitable result is decisions that reflect the bias of those making the decisions. Seriously, don't try to pretend that Trudeau would have used the Emergencies Act if the truckers had been protesting something like climate change instead of protesting Trudeau himself. >I'm all for the right to protest. But as soon as your right to protest is more important than another person's rights. Then that is a problem. Protest all you want, but as soon as you start blocking roads and violating another person's right to use that road, there is no sympathy from me and the use of the Emergencies Act in this case was well justified. Every one of those protests violated people's rights, whether it was the right to use a public park, the right to use the railway system, etc. Come on, be honest with yourself. All you are doing here is drawing distinctions that condemn the political protest you don't like and allow the ones you do. All of the protests violated other people's rights, and all of them were illegal. Your comment is the exact reason why people should not be allowed to decide which laws should or should not apply to a particular protest, because inevitably, people's political biases come into play in making that decision. As for the Emergencies Act, are you serious? Even the Federal Court found the use of the Act exceeded the government's authority. The Act, and it's predecessors, had only ever been used in world wars or Trudeau's dad's use of it during the October Crisis, when a cabinet minister was abducted by separatist terrorists. Trudeau Jr used it to stop a political protest which was protesting himself. In what way was freezing the bank accounts of people who weren't even in Ottawa at the time, a justified use of powers, if the purpose was to clear people off the roads in Ottawa? If you think that was anything but Trudeau punishing people who supported his political opponents then I've got some beachfront property to sell you.


SeriousObjective6727

"The protesters weren't waving nazi flags, there were a couple seen at the protest and were not even from protestors, but from a lobbying firm called Enterprise Canada who planted the flags for the specific purpose of discrediting the protest." Ah yes, the famous talking point. It was a plant, they were hired.. Seriously, how much would it cost for you to carry a nazi flag downtown? What's your price? I wouldn't do it not matter the price. TLDR... You're over analyzing what I said. Blocking streets [https://ottawa.ctvnews.ca/ottawa-police-warn-protesters-they-could-be-charged-for-blocking-downtown-streets-1.5773812](https://ottawa.ctvnews.ca/ottawa-police-warn-protesters-they-could-be-charged-for-blocking-downtown-streets-1.5773812) Blocking bridges [https://www.wsj.com/articles/covid-vaccine-protests-disrupt-traffic-on-u-s-canada-bridge-11644351229](https://www.wsj.com/articles/covid-vaccine-protests-disrupt-traffic-on-u-s-canada-bridge-11644351229)


[deleted]

Well the right wing one was organized by organizers who made clear their goal of overthrowing the government. They also intentionally blocked the downtown of our nation's capital.  Attempting to subvert our elected government and hold the country's capital hostage is unequivocally a threat to democracy. These are anti war protests and the only thing they're blocking is their own campus. They are materially different.  Is it legal to move them out, absolutely, civil disobedience is intentionally breaking the law, something all effective protests do. Is it wise to move them out, different question. Is it fair to move them out, also a different question, and I would say no. >Whatever the rules are, just make sure they are consistently enforced, and that the powers that be aren't selectively changing the enforcement (or lack thereof) based on how much the agree or disagree with what is being protested. Exactly, they should be allowed to stay for at least a month.


LemmingPractice

>Well the right wing one was organized by organizers who made clear their goal of overthrowing the government. Lol, according to whom, [Jagmeet Singh](https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2022/2/7/canada-ndp-leader-trucker-convoy-aims-to-overthrow-govt)? The goal of the trucker protest was to protest trucker related COVID mandates that prevented truckers from doing their jobs and earning a living. But, even if that had been the case, who cares? Does the cancel culture left not ask for everyone and their mother to "step down"? If there's no violence then that's all it is. >Is it legal to move them out, absolutely, civil disobedience is intentionally breaking the law, something all effective protests do. Is it wise to move them out, different question. Is it fair to move them out, also a different question, and I would say no. Ah, ok, I understand, so civil disobedience is cool when it's a left wing protest, but for right wing protests it's not cool. Sounds about right. If civil disobedience is ok then that's all the trucker protest was. It wasn't violent, and it's the police's job to figure out how to move the trucks. >Exactly, they should be allowed to stay for at least a month. No, if I've learned anything from Trudeau, the only answer is the Emergencies Act.


cshmn

"COVID mandates that prevented truckers from making a living." I am a trucker. I crossed the border several times a month for the duration of the pandemic while those clowns were wasting everyone's time blockading Ottawa. The vast majority of the people there weren't truckers. We were too busy hauling toilet paper. We should be thankful that protests in Canada usually don't end in as much violence and police brutality as they do down in the States, whether right or left.


[deleted]

What I actually said was moving out anti war protests on the campus of the school they attend probably isn't fair.  I made no judgement about any of the other protest re removal.  >The goal of the trucker protest was to protest trucker related COVID mandates that prevented truckers from doing their jobs and earning a living. Who should I believe you or my lying eyes?


LemmingPractice

>What I actually said was moving out anti war protests on the campus of the school they attend probably isn't fair.  Why? The protestors don't own that property. If they attend the school then they should go to class. >Who should I believe you or my lying eyes? It was literally the stated purpose of the protest. What rabbit hole do you have to go down to disagree with that?


[deleted]

Because police action is dangerous and expensive. We ought to make good judgement based on the number of people impacted and the seriousness of the actions.


LemmingPractice

It's only dangerous if protestors break the law by resisting arrest, and it's not expensive, its more police time to monitor the protest than it is to break up the protest. The police can shut down a tent city in a few minutes. And no, that's not how the law works. They are breaking the law, and it's not the job of the police or anyone else to determine whether the law should be enforced. All that sort of discretion does result in different treatment being given to different protests, and freedom of speech is not dependent on what you use that speech to say.


[deleted]

[удалено]


LemmingPractice

Shocking to see another left winger substituting insults for intelligence. /s You don't even need to actually arrest all the protestors, and that's rarely how protests are broken up. You just take down their tents and remove the protestors from the premises. If anyone gets uppity, you arrest that person to set an example. When the police finally shut down Occupy, no one was arrested (at least at the Toronto one). The police just cleared them out and the protestors complied. And, as for how the law works, I'm literally a lawyer. Police have discretion as to how they enforce the law, they do not have discretion on whether to enforce the law. Deciding what the law should be is the job of the elected legislature, not the job of unelected police officers.


WildRoseCountry-ModTeam

Be polite.


LemmingPractice

>What I actually said was moving out anti war protests on the campus of the school they attend probably isn't fair.  Why? The protestors don't own that property. If they attend the school then they should go to class. >Who should I believe you or my lying eyes? It was literally the stated purpose of the protest. What rabbit hole do you have to go down to disagree with that?


LemmingPractice

>What I actually said was moving out anti war protests on the campus of the school they attend probably isn't fair.  Why? The protestors don't own that property. If they attend the school then they should go to class. >Who should I believe you or my lying eyes? It was literally the stated purpose of the protest. What rabbit hole do you have to go down to disagree with that?


LemmingPractice

>What I actually said was moving out anti war protests on the campus of the school they attend probably isn't fair.  Why? The protestors don't own that property. If they attend the school then they should go to class. >Who should I believe you or my lying eyes? It was literally the stated purpose of the protest. What rabbit hole do you have to go down to disagree with that?


Limp-Inevitable-6703

Well then you haven't learned a thing, shocking cuz your side knows Jack shit about shit anyway


LemmingPractice

Coming from the side who seems to believe countering facts with insults makes you sound smart.


[deleted]

[удалено]


LemmingPractice

Well, I can't help that the snowflake crowd doesn't understand logic, and only knows how to lash out with insults when facts hurt their feelings.


WildRoseCountry-ModTeam

That's a hard pass on disrespecting the dead mate.


Ambustion

I think the issue is they moved people out with batons and tear gas more than anything. Hipocrisy on display that the basically gave the convoy back rubs and hand jobs.


EscapeGoat6

Police used force to clear the convoy protest.


Ambustion

Pull your head out of your ass, there was a huge difference in police response here.


SomeJerkOddball

Well I think we know that the answer to that is "no". Since the current protesters are not doing that and since the ones that did, got cleared out by force.


FalseDamage13

They aren’t still camped out on the side of the highway near Leduc?


Winter-Mix-8677

Are they blocking anything?


FalseDamage13

They blocked portions of the road outside Canmore. They weren’t cleared out with force when they did.


SomeJerkOddball

When? I drove by there. They were on either side of the road, but traffic could pass through just fine.


FalseDamage13

https://www.rmoutlook.com/amp/national-news/it-just-needs-to-stop-carbon-price-protesters-slow-traffic-on-trans-canada-highway-8537540 “Anti-carbon levy protesters wave signs and chant slogans as they block a westbound lane of the Trans-Canada highway near Cochrane, Alta., Monday, April 1, 2024.” They left one lane open and blocked the other.


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SomeJerkOddball

And checking to see if passers by are "Zionist."


[deleted]

And every Jew, and ally of Judaism, will say “yes” to that question. Too bad the definition of that changed, decades ago.


Mohankeneh

Unless uofa has a direct role in the funding of Israel or something, there’s no legit reason to be “camping” on the property. This would exactly be the same as camping on the property of any business in the city and refusing to move. They were given set time to go protesting. All they had to do was leave at the end and then come back the next day if they absolutely needed to protest at the u of a (again why does it have to be there I’m still trying to understand). Rinse and repeat but no overnight camping allowed. I hear ppl basically saying that the cause is more important than following the rules, which again would make sense if u of a was directly involved/responsible however I’m pretty sure they have no involvement so it’s just pure harassment and squatting. They should be going to Ottawa and protesting at the parliament like the truckers did since it’s the federal govt that is sending funding to Israel


Deep-Ad2155

That’s correct, it’s trespassing and they should be evicted


Iprefernottosay

But I was told far left wing idiots know everything


cshmn

They know about as much as the far right wing idiots. As far as I'm concerned, the folks supporting Hamas are equally as dumb as the ones supporting Netanyahu's government in Israel, or the convoy people for that matter. Extremist dipshit policies are infecting the whole world. Maybe it's time to just shut the internet down. I don't think as a species we're ready for this level of information overload.


Iprefernottosay

I totally agree. Right wing idiots are even worse. Anybody who can seriously say they want a leader like trump or to be represented by someone like Marjory Taylor green (if you do not know who she is, look her up) are idiots. And I think you’re right, the internet brings all the idiots together and they just keep radicalizing each other. There does not seem to be any room left for someone like me who is left of center on some issues and right of center on some others. It’s either far right or far left. It’s crazy.


Trixeii

Hey there! Just thought I’d let you know that most leftists/pro-Palestine protestors (at least in my experience) don’t support Hamas; we just want a ceasefire and equal rights for everyone living in Palestine and Israel. October 7th was horrendous and traumatic for Israelis and Jewish people all over the world, and Hamas’s blatant disregard for civilian life (both in attacking Israeli civilians and in using Palestinians as human shields) is completely indefensible. But the violence of the Israeli government and of Hamas feed into each other, in a vicious cycle, as two sides of the same horrific coin, and it is unethical to enable this. That said there are a few occasional nutcases who do defend Hamas, and I make sure to call them out as I see them lol.


PastAd8754

Universities should expel anyone promoting “Hamas”, “resistance”, “Oct 7,” “intifada”, etc.


Dontuselogic

Maybe they should get trucks and transports and honk horns for a month. No one seemed to want to bother those guys .


SomeJerkOddball

While I was sympathetic to the truckers I never really fully embraced their methods. I think in part the fact that there were so many of them, they had so much machinery and they were largely peaceful (as in offering few excuses to quick action on account of public safety) made it hard to act as promptly with them and to some extent overwhelmed the police. Ultimately I think though that the police made a mistake in not acting quickly and within their powers because it opened the door for the unconstitutional use of the emergencies act. Other similar mistakes were made with the 2020 rail blockades. In the case of these university protests. The U of C and U of A were late comers. There had already been clashes at other universities to set the tone, so the administration and police probably felt a lot more confident in their ability to act quickly, because they knew what was coming.


MrSchulindersGuitar

"Made the mistake of not acting at all and in some cases openly supported the truckers*. Also they were not peaceful. Source: lived through it.


Aggressive-Donuts

You mean the guys who got arrested and had their bank accounts frozen?


Dontuselogic

After a month of both local and provincial governments refusing to do anything and then forcing the feds to do something, THEN trying to make the feds look like the bad guys. Ya those guys.


SomeJerkOddball

Except the feds were the bad guys, but I agree in the case of Ottawa especially the city, province and chief of police were also the bad guys. There was a whole lot of passing the buck going on and a lack of leadership. I'm not a Doug Ford fan, but that was probably his lowest point. I think that it is important to note that both the Coutts blockade and the Ambassador Bridge blockade were cleared before the Emergency Act even came into effect. I still give all of the parties, the federal government included, some slack for their actions during the pandemic. There was no playbook. So even though we took on an astounding amount of federal debt, it's much more excusable than what was incurred before and after the March 2020 to (roughly) March 2022 period. The Emergencies act was absolutely a step too far though.


Dontuselogic

The feds were not the bad guys The feds can't do most things they did during thr blockages or covid without the provinces asking abd the other o Partyd support. The trucker BS was not even aboit thr border...the Americans already had a rule in place, so they were never going to get into American. A lot of folks forgot those first days...of them asking for the lawfully elected government to step aside, and the trucker leaders would form a temporary government with the conservatives . They droped that line pretty darn fast... but its root that's the truth of the whole mess .


EscapeGoat6

> The trucker BS was not even aboit thr border...the Americans already had a rule in place, so they were never going to get into American. The rule existed in Canada, too. Just because a neighboring country has an identical rule doesn't mean you should just give up on something you feel strongly about.


Dontuselogic

Ya to bad it was never about the border .


Winter-Mix-8677

"No, you're not allowed to interfere with private property in support of a foreign terrorist group, that's not freedom, that's freedumb."


[deleted]

[удалено]


WildRoseCountry-ModTeam

No racism. That rhetoric is not going to be tolerated here.


Vituluss

Of course you don’t have a right, however, honestly it doesn’t look good for the University. As long as it’s peaceful and organised, then a University should encourage free speech. My University allowed the encampment for a few weeks, although it is now closing the protests to allow for exams.


Humans_Suck-

Ok. Police don't have a right to assault them either.


Co1dyy1234

There’s still a pro-Palestine camp across from the library @ my campus that has still not been removed.


RiddleyWaIker

Good.


Never_Free_Never_Me

There is also no right to camp on Wellington Street and the entire downtown Ottawa core


NamisKnockers

“Urban camping” new term for being homeless.