Government was constructed neither for ability nor for the exercise of loving care; government was built for the use of force and for necessarily demagogic appeals for votes.
- Murray Rothbard
And those who gather to oppose "government" through means of governing what people can and can't do themselves form a government. That's the hypocrisy of "freedom" movements like "freedom" convoy, coming together to form a governing body to block roads so you can't freely use them.
Careful we don't over-romanticize the so-called freedom-fighters because in the end they're usually anything but that. Some of those same people would probably be happy to see me locked up for some of my rather benign beliefs, let alone actions.
It won't. I understand there's more sympathetic media for this convoy in certain US media outlets but even my conservative Canadian in-laws HATED this thing and saw it as a massive embarrassment.
This article was old, apparently, but this is what made me think it would have a big impact:
> Twenty-seven seizure orders were issued to large truck operators from outside the province, banning them from operating any commercial motor vehicle in Ontario.
These vehicals spent a month sitting and blaring horns 24hrs/day. They could have been working and not breaking the law and terrorizing people. They got kid gloves the whole time they where there and mostly went without consequence if they left before the police forces got their acts togethor.
Apparently advocating for the violent overthrow of the government might get you in trouble with that government. Who knew?
Ask yourself, if a bunch of randos in trucks rolled into your capital city, demanding that the democratically elected leader step down and they form government what would you want to see happen?
Thank you, the timing seemed weird, but it makes much more sense in February.
After all Trudeau's point was to make an example of the protestors and ensure that Canadians know that any protesting will be met with asset forfeiture, extra-judicial de-banking, and literal trampling.
What Trudeau wants or doesn’t want isn’t relevant. Ontario is acting and that’s premier Ford. Who’s a member of a Conservative party which opposes the provincial Liberals.
There are several lessons from the trucker convoy I don't think people have learned.
1. Public support matters. If you don't have public support, it will undermine your position as you force people to side with the state. This has long term consequences. So here you had people siding with the state to get their Amazon deliveries because the given cause (ie vaccine mandates) did not enjoy public support;
2. Annoying people by clogging up residential areas and blowing your very loud horns at all hours turns people against you. Blockade freight terminals, offices, factories and freight terminals if you must blockade something;
3. The very fact that the state took action here, both at the time and now, demonstrates that collective action has power. This is good. But it has to be used responsibly. People turning against excessive union corruption in the 1970s and 1980s is what allowed the state to eviscerate unions and the labor movement and led to 40 years of no real increase in wages; and
4. Outside money played a big part in this [1]. Any movement is at risk of being coopted by outside interests for their own purposes. Another example of this is BLM. BLM the movement is very respectable, raising awareness of police violence against African-Americans. But there's also BLM the charity, which is nothing more than an opportunistic cash grab. BLM the charity bought a $6 million house [2].
It is worth noting just how stupid the vaccine cause was and is. Canadian truckers were protesting the Canadaian government having vaccine mandates. But most Canadian truckers have to travel to and from the United States. The US already had a vaccine mandate so, at best, this only affected Canadian truckers who didn't travel to and from the US.
Nearly 90% of Canadians received a vaccination, over 80% got the two most-important shots. Over 55% also boosted.
The vast majority of Canadians are sensible people. The media over-represented the protests. The local and provincial governments were weak and the police, negligent.
> The vast majority of Canadians are sensible people.
This agrees with my point. Most of the money funding the protests was American not Canadian.
> The media over-represented the protests.
There was a lot of localized disruption. It fit into a wider issue of vaccination opposition. Seizure of protest funds is a story (agree with it or not). Whether it would spread to the US was a legitimate angle. So even though I disagree with the protests it was certainly newsworthy IMHO.
> ... and the police, negligent.
Here I will disagreee. The police and these protesters were largely the same people. This wasn't negligence. This was tacit approval leading to deliberate inaction.
In the US, dying from Covid, even after having refused an available vaccine, was counted as a death in the line of duty in US statistics. This then fed into a narrative that police work was dangerous.
I never understood why, among other things, the City of Ottawa didn't just fine every vehicle the same way they'd fine any vehicle parked illegally in the roadway (or at an expired meter), with a new ticket every 12 or 24 hours. They could do this all after the fact, if they took photos of every license plate/vehicle daily, and just mail them a big stack of tickets.
Park - prevent removal of previously parked vehicle $60
Park - prevent ingress to metered parking space $60
Park in no parking area $85
Park in excess of posted time limits $65
Park heavy vehicle on a highway $70
Park vehicle on highway - obstruct traffic $95
(There's more, these are obvious ones)
These tickets/fines are linked to plate renewals, and my understanding is the fines can also be transferred from an inactive plate to another active plate with the same owner, so you can't just sell the car. About the only way around it is never licensing a vehicle in Ontario again.
20 comments
[ 6.1 ms ] story [ 53.5 ms ] threadCareful we don't over-romanticize the so-called freedom-fighters because in the end they're usually anything but that. Some of those same people would probably be happy to see me locked up for some of my rather benign beliefs, let alone actions.
Now that the supply chain crunch is getting under control, let's make it worse again!
> Twenty-seven seizure orders were issued to large truck operators from outside the province, banning them from operating any commercial motor vehicle in Ontario.
Ask yourself, if a bunch of randos in trucks rolled into your capital city, demanding that the democratically elected leader step down and they form government what would you want to see happen?
Hm.
After all Trudeau's point was to make an example of the protestors and ensure that Canadians know that any protesting will be met with asset forfeiture, extra-judicial de-banking, and literal trampling.
1. Public support matters. If you don't have public support, it will undermine your position as you force people to side with the state. This has long term consequences. So here you had people siding with the state to get their Amazon deliveries because the given cause (ie vaccine mandates) did not enjoy public support;
2. Annoying people by clogging up residential areas and blowing your very loud horns at all hours turns people against you. Blockade freight terminals, offices, factories and freight terminals if you must blockade something;
3. The very fact that the state took action here, both at the time and now, demonstrates that collective action has power. This is good. But it has to be used responsibly. People turning against excessive union corruption in the 1970s and 1980s is what allowed the state to eviscerate unions and the labor movement and led to 40 years of no real increase in wages; and
4. Outside money played a big part in this [1]. Any movement is at risk of being coopted by outside interests for their own purposes. Another example of this is BLM. BLM the movement is very respectable, raising awareness of police violence against African-Americans. But there's also BLM the charity, which is nothing more than an opportunistic cash grab. BLM the charity bought a $6 million house [2].
It is worth noting just how stupid the vaccine cause was and is. Canadian truckers were protesting the Canadaian government having vaccine mandates. But most Canadian truckers have to travel to and from the United States. The US already had a vaccine mandate so, at best, this only affected Canadian truckers who didn't travel to and from the US.
[1]: https://www.nationalobserver.com/2022/02/16/news/meet-some-w...
[2]: https://nymag.com/intelligencer/2022/04/black-lives-matter-6...
The vast majority of Canadians are sensible people. The media over-represented the protests. The local and provincial governments were weak and the police, negligent.
This agrees with my point. Most of the money funding the protests was American not Canadian.
> The media over-represented the protests.
There was a lot of localized disruption. It fit into a wider issue of vaccination opposition. Seizure of protest funds is a story (agree with it or not). Whether it would spread to the US was a legitimate angle. So even though I disagree with the protests it was certainly newsworthy IMHO.
> ... and the police, negligent.
Here I will disagreee. The police and these protesters were largely the same people. This wasn't negligence. This was tacit approval leading to deliberate inaction.
In the US, dying from Covid, even after having refused an available vaccine, was counted as a death in the line of duty in US statistics. This then fed into a narrative that police work was dangerous.
Looking at the list of fines, this could be seriously costly to those involved: https://ottawa.ca/en/parking-roads-and-travel/parking/regula...
Park within 9 m of intersection $75
Park within 1.5 m of laneway $80
Park - prevent removal of previously parked vehicle $60
Park - prevent ingress to metered parking space $60
Park in no parking area $85
Park in excess of posted time limits $65
Park heavy vehicle on a highway $70
Park vehicle on highway - obstruct traffic $95
(There's more, these are obvious ones)
These tickets/fines are linked to plate renewals, and my understanding is the fines can also be transferred from an inactive plate to another active plate with the same owner, so you can't just sell the car. About the only way around it is never licensing a vehicle in Ontario again.