Category: Freespeechers

Lest We Forget

Can anyone forget this scene from Sunday, February 6th, 2022 when an old man in Ottawa was brutally handled by 2 police officers and then arrested?

Fast forward 1.5 years and all charges against him have been dropped:

A 4ft-10inch great grandfather was handcuffed and arrested by two Canadian cops for honking his horn in support of Freedom Convoy protesters in Ottawa on Sunday – a day before a judge outlawed blaring horns due to left-wing backlash against the anti-mandate protesters who have been smeared by Prime Minister Justin Trudeau as ‘swastika-wavers’.

A bystander filmed while two officers pulled over Gerry Charlebois, 78, for beeping his horn.

‘What did he do wrong?’ the bystander asked. ‘None of your f****** concern, man,’ one officer responded.

h/t James MacMaster

Revolutionary violence

Lenin used to make a phony distinction between revolutionary violence and counter-revolutionary violence, the former being appropriate and the latter completely unacceptable. It’s not likely that we’ll ever see these revolutionaries arrested for anything, much less having their bank accounts frozen. The crown is far too busy prosecuting Tamara Lich anyway.

Senator Don Plett says he was stopped and harassed by “probably 30 or 40” protesters as he drove into a building for the meeting. They blocked traffic and insisted drivers take pamphlets, and targeted him as he attempted to drive around them.

“They actually jumped on to my car. They were banging on my windows, they were laying on the hood of my car and they were trying to prevent me from moving,…”

“And when they had asked PPS (Parliamentary Protective Service) over at the House why they weren’t being given any help the answer was, we don’t have enough staff. They seemed to have enough staff to stop all the hot tub parties and barbecues when we had some friendly protesters here and now they don’t have enough staff when many of us feel very unsafe.”

Anika Navaroli, An Evil Swamp Creature, Speaks Her Mind

Anika Navaroli claims to be an American but clearly doesn’t believe in the most fundamental American principle of free speech for all. In a recent diatribe, she demands that Twitter remove its newly found free speech policy:

At this moment, when we reflect on one year of Musk’s social media reign, we must reevaluate how we consume information and our complex relationships with social media platforms. It’s time to stop using X and participating in Musk’s immoral and dangerous failing free speech experiment. We must also make waves in developing better information ecosystems and sources of information to replace social media companies, like reinvesting in local news. Most importantly, we must make these changes quickly, because the future of our democracy depends on it.

Some beg to disagree.

Dreary old England

The Twitter post doesn’t mention penalties, but a hate crime is, well, a hate crime. The city of London is watching you….

Ban all the things!

The fact that we are now living in a world in which innovation in social media has fostered an asymmetric system with zero barriers to entry is something to be celebrated, not decried. That won’t stop media dinosaurs like Andrew Coyne, however, from pining for the “good old days” when authority figures with sufficient financial resources could just prevent people from seeing information they didn’t like.

I have a suggestion for Andrew: instead of labelling ideas you disagree with as disinformation and branding their proponents as lunatics, get busy and offer some counter arguments. Maybe the reason you feel defeated is because your arguments are ineffective, non-existent or just plain wrong. It is also possible to offer a bad argument in favor of a good idea. Let that sink in.

https://twitter.com/acoyne/status/1710461278957760892

He Admires Their Basic Dictatorship

Dan Knight;

In an era where information flows as swiftly as a river’s current, Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau seems eager to dam the waters. Many have suggested that Trudeau and his administration are determined to dictate the narrative, controlling the free flow of information in the digital realm. This, critics argue, is not only a threat to the democratic principles of free expression and access to information but also a misdirection from more pressing issues plaguing Canadians.

With a nation grappling with skyrocketing inflation, rising interest rates, exorbitant fuel prices, and grocery bills that pinch harder each day, Trudeau’s apparent focus on controlling the digital narrative seems out of touch. For a generation that grapples with the disheartening reality that homeownership might remain an unattainable dream, their frustration and resentment grow. Yet, every time their voices rise in criticism, they are quickly dismissed or labeled.[…]

In a world burgeoning with diverse digital content, a world where the power of voice is no longer the monopoly of a select few, we witness a potentially perilous encroachment by the CRTC, wielding legislative control over the once-free realm of podcasts. The unregulated charm of podcasting, its organic and unfiltered essence, stands at risk of being suppressed by the looming spectre of the CRTC’s regulatory machinations, seemingly imbued with the motives of the Trudeau government to infiltrate and manipulate the narratives within social media platforms.

The Trudeau government’s subtle quest for control within the social media realm, under the guise of the revamped Broadcasting Act and the nuanced ordinances of the CRTC, is indicative of a larger, ominous agenda. The alleged oversight and regulation, cloaked in terminologies of caution and prudence, are not mere protective measures but perhaps are intricate designs of an overarching governmental grip on the digital information landscape.

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