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One idiot or provocateur in a sea of tens of thousands does not override the 99%. That's an absurd, lazy smear. What this episode makes clear is that many peop

One idiot or provocateur in a sea of tens of thousands does not override the 99%. That's an absurd, lazy smear. What this episode makes clear is that many people actually love authoritarianism as long as the actions of the state in the moment appear to align with their own ideology. Next time it won't, which is why it must be resisted on a principled basis. This precedent being set is a dictator's dream come true and you will have no leg to stand on as someone that cheered on the tools of oppression.

wwweston 5y ago
> One idiot or provocateur in a sea of tens of thousands does not override the 99%. When the blockade is significantly funded from outside the country the policies are supposed to be about [0], when effective mechanics of the protest aren't merely speech but crippling trade, when the stated substance is basically claiming the privilege of unrestrained motion across international borders without regard to vaccination status, even if it were true that "one idiot or provocateur in a sea of tens of thousands" were engaging in fundamentally unacceptable (e.g. nazi) performance, there's still be plenty of reasons for sensible and restrained government authorities to intervene. > This precedent being set is a dictator's dream Which precedent? That authorities might use authority to stop trade disruption? Seizure of property from people involved in that disruption? Bigger and far more routine problems in terms of civil forfeiture. Needing to be vaccinated to cross a border? You may want to look at precedents established over the last century or two and ask yourself why the totalitarian catastrophe you seem to be imagining has only crossed some kind of threshold now, almost as if it isn't coming. [0] https://talkingpointsmemo.com/edblog/where-things-stand-majority-of-anti-vax-trucker-protest-funds-were-donated-by-americans https://talkingpointsmemo.com/edblog/where-things-stand-majo...
Elinvynia 5y ago
> One idiot or provocateur in a sea of tens of thousands does not override the 99%. That's an absurd, lazy smear. Do you feel the same about the BLM protests?
- colpabar 5y ago
  This is a really lazy whataboutism. Let's assume that both the blm protests and the convoy both had "a few idiots or provocateurs in a sea of tens of thousands." Now compare the media coverage and government handling of the two things, and compare how those idiots are portrayed compared to the tens of thousands. Do you see a difference? It seems to me that all blm-related events are generally considered peaceful protests (even the ones where buildings are burned down), while the convoy is nothing but a big nazi flag waving party. Did any blm related entity have their bank accounts frozen?
  - bryanlarsen 5y ago
    What buildings were burnt by BLM in Canada? There was an attempted arson in Ottawa at the time of the trucker occupation, though.
  - throw_nbvc1234 5y ago
    And I bet people who watched fox news have a different perspective on how peaceful/violent some BLM protests were. What's even worse is that people getting their news from social media are going to be fed a single narrative and be entirely unaware of it; at least with entities like fox news/CNN or sub-reddits, someone can actively seek out multiple narratives around an event. > Did any blm related entity have their bank accounts frozen? Interesting to think about. Just imagine the headline of "Donald trump freezes bank accounts of BLM protestors" and the uproar and legal battles that would immediately follow. Different countries (laws, rights, legal precedents), different levels of public support for the underlying cause, "black bloc" obscuring the protestor identities.
  - bryanlarsen 5y ago
    > Did any blm related entity have their bank accounts frozen? Yes. https://nypost.com/2022/02/17/amazon-suspends-black-lives-matter-from-its-charity-platform/ https://nypost.com/2022/02/17/amazon-suspends-black-lives-ma...
    - therealdrag0 5y ago
colpabar 5y ago
> Next time it won't Sadly, it most likely will. The left I used to know wouldn't be caught dead cheering on the coordination between federal government and private businesses/banks to deny people the ability to organize and protest. But here we are, and there we'll be when the government decides to label whatever the next movement is as a "threat to democracy."
- bb88 5y ago
  Let's lean into this. > to organize and protest. All the sit-ins in the past 60 years of protesting, ended up in people being arrested. And fines (as well as imprisonment) were levied against the arrested protesters for disruption of government operations and services. Further these days, often protesters go in expecting to be arrested. Activists will often seek people who aren't afraid of being arrested. If you cause damage during the protest, you really can't whine about the punishment. > The left I used to know wouldn't be caught dead cheering on the coordination between federal government... Oh I think Abbie Hoffman's supporters would still hate the FBI COINTELPRO today. ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/COINTELPRO https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/COINTELPRO) Hoover's FBI more or less got away with infiltration and assassination because the enemy was "stinking hippies" or "terrorists".
  - colpabar 5y ago
    > Hoover's FBI more or less got away with infiltration and assassination because the enemy was "stinking hippies" or "terrorists". But don't you see any kind of resemblance to that and what's happening currently with the all the "nazis" and "white supremacists"? It's odd to me that you can mention COINTELPRO and think that things like that don't still happen. I guess you can rightly say that I have no proof of that. But in 50 years, if we ever get documents released explaining how COINTELPRO was expanded and used against lots of the movements of our time, you owe me a beer.
    - bb88 5y ago
      There's a lot of people that hate the CIA with good reason. The FBI has apparently never met an agent involved killing it didn't like, and sure there's lots of corruption on the local level, from cops to politicians. But COINTELPRO is the premier example of law enforcement corruption in the US, and those who were affected by it still live with it to this day. And I don't think anyone really wants justice served without due process in the US these days. And arguing that your opponents support that or are willing to look the other way when it happens is rather unfair. If the truckers staged a boycott instead of an occupation, I feel like their side might have a lot more sympathy. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Montgomery_bus_boycott https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Montgomery_bus_boycott As to your red herring about the right being labeled as "nazi"s, I think the media does a pretty good job of portraying the "Racist Right" from the "Right". It's also pretty clear whether a politician/person/group/etc is willing to openly denouce racism or not.
deeviant 5y ago
- all2 5y ago
  > 1) The people begging for the right to die a slow brutal death that resembles a month long water boarding session. This is a disingenuous interpretation of what is essentially a peaceful worker's sit-in. > 2) The people that trust that medical doctors around the entire plant earth aren't part of some super secret cabal hellbent on implanting mind-controlling microchips in them This is a disingenuous character smear of anyone who decides to question the status quo.
  - deeviant 5y ago
    > This is a disingenuous interpretation of what is essentially a peaceful worker's sit-in. That is literally what they are protesting for, so I fail to see how it is disingenuous. > This is a disingenuous character smear of anyone who decides to question the status quo. Perhaps you should "research" the difference between "status quo" and "factual". 10.6 billion people have gotten a covid vaccine, it would be pretty hard to hide any signs of deleterious effects in a sample size of 10.6 billion. On the other hand, the statistics on covid are equally clear: it's orders upon orders of magnitude more dangerous to human health that the vaccine could even "possibly" be.
    - all2 5y ago
      The current world population isn't even 8 billion yet [0]. That coupled with current vaccination rates across the world and the conflicting (and often suppressed) research about the covid vaccine efficacy, I am thoroughly confused. [0] https://www.census.gov/popclock/world https://www.census.gov/popclock/world [edit for additional thoughts]
      - deeviant 5y ago
        My apologies, the number I gave was the number of doses given, total number of fully vaccinated people is 4.32B. Each dose is a sample because each dose is a chance for something to go wrong, right? Anyways, the way I stated it was wrong, so nice catch. Looking at it either way, a sample size of 4.32 billion people or 10+ billion individual doses is more than enough to give a very clear signal if the vaccines were causing harm; harm from the vaccines would be as obvious as the sun, statistically speaking. > ...the conflicting (and often suppressed) research... What "research" regarding covid vaccine efficacy is being "suppressed", exactly? The only research that I see being suppressed, is the research that the vast majority of people that are dying of covid are unvaccinated. And it's being suppressed by the cruel FUD campaign led by the anti-vaxer crew, that, tragically, has taken so many of their own number. I don't see much "conflicting research" regarding vaccine efficacy at all, it's well below the standard level of noise you get from medical studies. For instance, have you seen any reputable studies that point to unvaccinated people dying less often than vaccinated people of covid? Me neither. We know the vaccines provide significant protection from serious complications from covid, including death, we know the protection wanes over time, and we know boosters are extremely effective. Where exactly is the uncertainly here?

wwweston 5y ago

> One idiot or provocateur in a sea of tens of thousands does not override the 99%. When the blockade is significantly funded from outside the country the policies are supposed to be about [0], when effective mechanics of the protest aren't merely speech but crippling trade, when the stated substance is basically claiming the privilege of unrestrained motion across international borders without regard to vaccination status, even if it were true that "one idiot or provocateur in a sea of tens of thousands" were engaging in fundamentally unacceptable (e.g. nazi) performance, there's still be plenty of reasons for sensible and restrained government authorities to intervene. > This precedent being set is a dictator's dream Which precedent? That authorities might use authority to stop trade disruption? Seizure of property from people involved in that disruption? Bigger and far more routine problems in terms of civil forfeiture. Needing to be vaccinated to cross a border? You may want to look at precedents established over the last century or two and ask yourself why the totalitarian catastrophe you seem to be imagining has only crossed some kind of threshold now, almost as if it isn't coming. [0] https://talkingpointsmemo.com/edblog/where-things-stand-majority-of-anti-vax-trucker-protest-funds-were-donated-by-americans https://talkingpointsmemo.com/edblog/where-things-stand-majo...

Elinvynia 5y ago

> One idiot or provocateur in a sea of tens of thousands does not override the 99%. That's an absurd, lazy smear. Do you feel the same about the BLM protests?

colpabar 5y ago
This is a really lazy whataboutism. Let's assume that both the blm protests and the convoy both had "a few idiots or provocateurs in a sea of tens of thousands." Now compare the media coverage and government handling of the two things, and compare how those idiots are portrayed compared to the tens of thousands. Do you see a difference? It seems to me that all blm-related events are generally considered peaceful protests (even the ones where buildings are burned down), while the convoy is nothing but a big nazi flag waving party. Did any blm related entity have their bank accounts frozen?
- bryanlarsen 5y ago
  What buildings were burnt by BLM in Canada? There was an attempted arson in Ottawa at the time of the trucker occupation, though.
- throw_nbvc1234 5y ago
  And I bet people who watched fox news have a different perspective on how peaceful/violent some BLM protests were. What's even worse is that people getting their news from social media are going to be fed a single narrative and be entirely unaware of it; at least with entities like fox news/CNN or sub-reddits, someone can actively seek out multiple narratives around an event. > Did any blm related entity have their bank accounts frozen? Interesting to think about. Just imagine the headline of "Donald trump freezes bank accounts of BLM protestors" and the uproar and legal battles that would immediately follow. Different countries (laws, rights, legal precedents), different levels of public support for the underlying cause, "black bloc" obscuring the protestor identities.
- bryanlarsen 5y ago
  > Did any blm related entity have their bank accounts frozen? Yes. https://nypost.com/2022/02/17/amazon-suspends-black-lives-matter-from-its-charity-platform/ https://nypost.com/2022/02/17/amazon-suspends-black-lives-ma...
  - therealdrag0 5y ago

colpabar 5y ago

> Next time it won't Sadly, it most likely will. The left I used to know wouldn't be caught dead cheering on the coordination between federal government and private businesses/banks to deny people the ability to organize and protest. But here we are, and there we'll be when the government decides to label whatever the next movement is as a "threat to democracy."

bb88 5y ago
Let's lean into this. > to organize and protest. All the sit-ins in the past 60 years of protesting, ended up in people being arrested. And fines (as well as imprisonment) were levied against the arrested protesters for disruption of government operations and services. Further these days, often protesters go in expecting to be arrested. Activists will often seek people who aren't afraid of being arrested. If you cause damage during the protest, you really can't whine about the punishment. > The left I used to know wouldn't be caught dead cheering on the coordination between federal government... Oh I think Abbie Hoffman's supporters would still hate the FBI COINTELPRO today. ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/COINTELPRO https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/COINTELPRO) Hoover's FBI more or less got away with infiltration and assassination because the enemy was "stinking hippies" or "terrorists".
- colpabar 5y ago
  > Hoover's FBI more or less got away with infiltration and assassination because the enemy was "stinking hippies" or "terrorists". But don't you see any kind of resemblance to that and what's happening currently with the all the "nazis" and "white supremacists"? It's odd to me that you can mention COINTELPRO and think that things like that don't still happen. I guess you can rightly say that I have no proof of that. But in 50 years, if we ever get documents released explaining how COINTELPRO was expanded and used against lots of the movements of our time, you owe me a beer.
  - bb88 5y ago
    There's a lot of people that hate the CIA with good reason. The FBI has apparently never met an agent involved killing it didn't like, and sure there's lots of corruption on the local level, from cops to politicians. But COINTELPRO is the premier example of law enforcement corruption in the US, and those who were affected by it still live with it to this day. And I don't think anyone really wants justice served without due process in the US these days. And arguing that your opponents support that or are willing to look the other way when it happens is rather unfair. If the truckers staged a boycott instead of an occupation, I feel like their side might have a lot more sympathy. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Montgomery_bus_boycott https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Montgomery_bus_boycott As to your red herring about the right being labeled as "nazi"s, I think the media does a pretty good job of portraying the "Racist Right" from the "Right". It's also pretty clear whether a politician/person/group/etc is willing to openly denouce racism or not.

deeviant 5y ago

all2 5y ago
> 1) The people begging for the right to die a slow brutal death that resembles a month long water boarding session. This is a disingenuous interpretation of what is essentially a peaceful worker's sit-in. > 2) The people that trust that medical doctors around the entire plant earth aren't part of some super secret cabal hellbent on implanting mind-controlling microchips in them This is a disingenuous character smear of anyone who decides to question the status quo.
- deeviant 5y ago
  > This is a disingenuous interpretation of what is essentially a peaceful worker's sit-in. That is literally what they are protesting for, so I fail to see how it is disingenuous. > This is a disingenuous character smear of anyone who decides to question the status quo. Perhaps you should "research" the difference between "status quo" and "factual". 10.6 billion people have gotten a covid vaccine, it would be pretty hard to hide any signs of deleterious effects in a sample size of 10.6 billion. On the other hand, the statistics on covid are equally clear: it's orders upon orders of magnitude more dangerous to human health that the vaccine could even "possibly" be.
  - all2 5y ago
    The current world population isn't even 8 billion yet [0]. That coupled with current vaccination rates across the world and the conflicting (and often suppressed) research about the covid vaccine efficacy, I am thoroughly confused. [0] https://www.census.gov/popclock/world https://www.census.gov/popclock/world [edit for additional thoughts]
    - deeviant 5y ago
      My apologies, the number I gave was the number of doses given, total number of fully vaccinated people is 4.32B. Each dose is a sample because each dose is a chance for something to go wrong, right? Anyways, the way I stated it was wrong, so nice catch. Looking at it either way, a sample size of 4.32 billion people or 10+ billion individual doses is more than enough to give a very clear signal if the vaccines were causing harm; harm from the vaccines would be as obvious as the sun, statistically speaking. > ...the conflicting (and often suppressed) research... What "research" regarding covid vaccine efficacy is being "suppressed", exactly? The only research that I see being suppressed, is the research that the vast majority of people that are dying of covid are unvaccinated. And it's being suppressed by the cruel FUD campaign led by the anti-vaxer crew, that, tragically, has taken so many of their own number. I don't see much "conflicting research" regarding vaccine efficacy at all, it's well below the standard level of noise you get from medical studies. For instance, have you seen any reputable studies that point to unvaccinated people dying less often than vaccinated people of covid? Me neither. We know the vaccines provide significant protection from serious complications from covid, including death, we know the protection wanes over time, and we know boosters are extremely effective. Where exactly is the uncertainly here?