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Smearing an Entire Protest Movement as Fascistic Will Come Back to Haunt My Fellow Leftists
http://quillette.com/2022/02/02/smearing-a-whole-protest-movement-as-fascistic-will-come-back-to-haunt-the-grass-roots-canadian-left/Date Written: 2022-02-02 Publisher: Quillette Year Published: 2022 Resource Type: Article Cx Number: CX24476 Canadians as a whole, and especially centre-left voters, have come to believe that the legitimacy of a movement inheres not in its size or the diversity of people and views it represents, but rather in its ability to discipline and control its supporters. Abstract: - Excerpt: Canadians as a whole, and especially centre-left voters, have come to believe that the legitimacy of a movement inheres not in its size or the diversity of people and views it represents, but rather in its ability to discipline and control its supporters. By that lens, this protest looked illegitimate and frightening. Trucks were parked everywhere. Many people partied and got drunk. Some carelessly disrespected a military monument and other public landmarks. One driver was pictured driving by with a Confederate flag. Not only were the speech and signage of protesters not being controlled by any central authority; but some participants even celebrated the presence of heterodox opinions. This kind of move, akin to covering a peace march by profiling the views of pro-North Korea activists and nudists who’d tagged along, went over shockingly well, signifying to urban media consumers that, at worst, the truckers were all homophobic Klansmen; or, at best, the protest leaders were unable or unwilling to tell everyone what to do—which, as noted above, is now considered to be a damning indictment. In attacking Justin Trudeau and vaccine mandates, some protesters made false and unreasonable comparisons between present-day Canada and the early days of Nazi Germany, even using a swastika to make the point. Like most Canadians, I find these comparisons deeply offensive. But that is what they are: deeply offensive comparisons, born largely of ignorance and a persecution complex. They aren’t attestations of fascistic political belief. Subject Headings |