Since when is hot-tubbing and cavorting with hate groups acceptable to Canadians?
Like many Canadians, I was deeply disturbed by the images of swastikas and Confederate flags in the media coverage of the Ottawa occupation and the underlying messages they convey after visiting the nation’s capital and devouring press reports about the Emergencies Act.
A February 16 Globe and Mail article on the freezing of donations to protestors, quoted a Canadian in New Zealand who contributed $4,000 to the convoy. She claimed to be donating “in good faith to a peaceful protest.”
Only there is nothing peaceful about swastikas and Confederate flags, or reports of angry men intimidating residents.
A security expert on a CBC special broadcast last weekend stated that the protests have been “free of violence.” The seizure of firearms at a “Freedom Convoy” blockade at the Canada-U.S. border crossing in Coutts, Alberta had not yet occurred. But the characterization of the protests as “peaceful” is glib.
The violence inherent in the symbols of hate displayed by the convoy protestors and elsewhere are dangerous in and of themselves – to anyone other than white men. They also convey antagonism toward “peace, order and good government.” These are precisely the democratic principles most Canadians cherish.
The danger is the narrative of the convoy becoming one of quiet acceptance of intolerance – ordinary folks just protesting.
Of course, we all have a right to protest. But Canadians from innumerable backgrounds are appalled by the flaunting of hate symbols and the history they evoke. In 1930s Germany, you did not have to be a member of the National Socialist Party to be a supporter of the regime. Many stood by and did nothing. Silence constituted consent. It still does.
As accelerationist right-wing groups try to spark chaos in Canadian society it could be argued they are succeeding. Just look at the policing situation in Ottawa. The police chief was forced to resign over the force’s handling of the protests and the board charged with oversight of police is locked in a conflict with the municipal council over who should be his replacement. This kind of destabilization creates fertile ground for a lack of confidence in our institutions and the rise of extremism.
More than one media commentator has offered that a $100 or $200 donation to the protests is really nothing. I disagree. But money spent in this way signals more than being “fed up” with vaccine mandates. It signals acceptance of discrimination against racialized people, Jews, Muslims, LGBTQ2S individuals, people with disabilities, First Nations and others.
If Canada does not want to slip into that territory we need to register our concern.
The alt-right is well organized in this country as the Canadian Anti-Hate Network and others have demonstrated. The tendrils of their organizations have been partially exposed by the coverage of the convoy by media and academics. It is now time for the rest of us in civil society to speak up and to organize to counter the extreme ideas conveyed by these disturbing events.
Miriam Edelson is an independent researcher and writer living in Toronto and a member of the Board of Directors of the Canadian Research Institute for the Advancement of Women, a think-tank that studies the alt-right in Canada among other issues.
