For the past two weeks, there have been ongoing protests and blockades along the US-Canada border against the COVID-19 vaccine mandates and restrictions. The protests, coined the “Freedom Convoy,” first converged in Ottowa on January 29th, leading to a rally at Parliament Hill. While the original cause for these protests was an outrage for requiring truckers to show a vaccine passport when crossing the US-Canada border, the protest’s values have broadened to include even vaccinated Canadians looking to decrease COVID-19 restrictions, and those vehemently against the current prime minister of Canada, Justin Trudeau. These protesters have refused to leave until all COVID-19 restrictions have been lifted – despite some of these restrictions (like the US-Canada Border vaccine mandate) having two countries involved, thus Canada lifting the vaccine mandate wouldn’t amount to anything if the US still requires it to cross. Despite a lack of widespread reports of violence from local police, this protest has been anything but peaceful – creating huge blockades in cities like Ottawa have put a stop to many people’s livelihoods and interruptions to daily life. Some have even characterized this event as closer to a “siege” or “occupation” rather than a “protest.”
However, in a very ⅙-esque attempt, far-right-leaning groups in Canada have called for a storming of Parliament Hill, the Canadian equivalent to the US Capitol Building, in order to get what they want.
While these plans have been publicly denounced by the event organizers, the fact is that these sentiments are growing in Canada, and could inspire a similar anti-COVID-19 restrictions protest in the US too, since right-leaning media outlets have reported this event in a positive, nearly inspirational light (The US already has similar protest, but not nearly to the extent with what is happening in Canada right now). The sentiment is the same in Canada or the US – 'freedom lovin patriots' who want less government control. And while the protests are part of a vocal minority – 90% of Canadian truckers are fully vaccinated – the number of people aligning with the sentiment of ‘fighting for freedom’ is growing at a scary rate. It’s inspiring similar protests around the world, such as in France. While people should retain some wary eyes at how the government protects their rights, the danger of being too untrusting is being easily manipulated – latching onto the first politician who “seeks support by appealing to the desires and prejudices of ordinary people rather than by using rational argument” – the Oxford Language definition of a demagogue.
Serious moves to de-escalate and disband the protests are still ongoing. Just this Monday, Trudeau announced the Canadian government is enacting The Emergencies Act for the first time since it was passed by parliament in the late 1980’s. According to CNN, it can “temporarily suspend citizens' rights to free movement or assembly,” thus making the current protestors viable to arrest. While the Emergenices Act also allows for Trudeau to bring in the military, this power has not been exercised.
In any case, protests like the one in Canada are a threat to democracy – while protesting is all good and dandy, the idea that one group can just hijack and make the government do whatever that group wants is and should be scary. Trudeau has tried to de-escalate the situation at hand by talking about how restrictions might lessen in the near future if case numbers continue to go down, but I think offering any concessions to what is essentially an occupation in Ottawa is setting a dangerous precedent for future groups to do the same. The most important course of action that needs to happen is to label events like ⅙ and the Freedom Convoy a complete and utter failure, so as to ward off any inspiration for future groups. The government cannot give in to any of the demands that these people are making.
Questions:
1. How do you think the Canadian government should have/should be responding to these protests? Should the military be brought in, or would that lead to more violence?
2. How else can the Freedom Convoy be related to growing disdain for the government in the US?
Sources:
https://www.nytimes.com/2022/01/29/world/americas/canada-trucker-protest.html
https://www.cnn.com/2022/02/11/americas/canada-truckers-protests-covid-friday/index.html
https://www.cnn.com/2022/02/14/americas/canada-truckers-protest-monday/index.html
https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2022/02/15/freedom-convoy-canada-trudeau-border-emergency-act/
2 comments:
I think the Canadian government is showing great restraint in the way they deal with protesters. The fact that Trudeau could but hasn't yet authorized the arrests of all the protesters demonstrates how the government is truly trying to handle this in the most efficient and less violent way possible. For now, I think diplomacy is the best way to handle the situation, however, if protesters were to start acting more violently and causing severe harm, military intervention should start becoming a more feasible option. The reason I think it should only be used as a last resort is because one, it will inevitably bring violence (from angry protesters), and two, it could end up snowballing and leading to more public outrage if protesters are injured or killed in the process.
I think any protest can be related back to the simple and pretty obvious fact that people are unhappy with something the government is doing. In this case, I think it relates a lot to the seemingly slow and inefficient process of returning life back to normal following the pandemic. I wrote an blog post earlier about the Los Angeles County facing a lot of backlash because Governor Newsom was seen without a mask at a NFL game. In both cases, citizens are upset that they are being forced to comply with mandates and restrictions that seem to bring no change or improvement. I will say that the Freedom Convoy does make it seem like the tensions are reaching a boiling point especially since it has been more than two years since the pandemic started. I'm fairly certain that there haven't been similar protests of this scale or intensity before but from my perspective, it seems like this could be the start of more COVID-based protests if the government fails to discourage future potential protesters or handle the Freedom Convoy situation properly.
I agree with Edan. It is the trademark of authoritarian countries like China or Russia to meet protestors with violence and heavy policing to crush dissent. Western Democracies cannot stoop so low. In addition, meeting the protestors with violence will only invigorate them further on social media and give them more ammunition to attack the Canadian government with. But, if the blockades and speech of storming the capital continues, something needs to be done. I think that maybe Trudeau was strategic in letting the protests go on and blockade unabated for a time to firmly sway public opinion against them, which makes it easier to clean them up with police once they have lost credibility and support amongst the people. I think this is the best solution: criticize them, implore them to stop the blockade, to make it seem like you tried all you could through words and they are just stubborn and wrong, and then use police to remove them once they have lost support from the reasonable majority. And, most importantly, do not give them concessions if they are wrong and only represent an extremist fringe.
The actions of the protestors are shameful. Their blockades block traffic and disrupt the daily lives of innocent people going to their jobs who have nothing to do with COVID or the restrictions. I see this entire protest as a clear overreaction to the COVID restrictions. The government is doing its best to protect public safety in a bad situation and does not warrant such massive protests and hate of Trudeau. I think that a certain amount of riling up has been done through social media to get the people to react to this degree, same as our 1/6. I also think that as we nearly enter 2 years of restrictions, people are tired and are venting their anger in protest and funneling it in hate towards the current Canadian government. As Anthony said in his post, this is also just a vocal minority that does not represent the mainstream opinion, another parallel with the insurrectionists in the US.
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