Thread by @EdmontonAgainst

I've been meaning to make a list about the decline of the yellow vests in Edmonton in 2019.

In no particular order, let's begin.

@VestsCanada @ARCCollective @CCAR780 @JaneQCitizen @YYCantiracist

(1/)

1. Hate group affiliations: we realized early on that hate groups were present at these rallies and we did our best to let the organizers know. In turn, we were called a hate group.

After harassing a mosque, however, the Wolves of Odin were denounced. (2/)

There were also claims that the movement was for ALL Canadians. This seemed to mean that even bigots, whose participation would limit the participation of others, were welcome in the group. (3/)

2. Too many egotistical folks trying to be the only leader of the movement: the yellow vest movement in Edmonton went through a number of organizers. Ryan Dean and Ty Hunt claimed to be behind the first rallies. There was Jeremy Rutar, Jeff Sharpe, Stephen Garvey... (4/)

The final organizer was Martin Brousseau, who eventually hopped in his bus and headed eastward. By the time he took control, their gatherings didn't have more than a handful of people, some of whom were members of the hate group the Clann (former Wolves of Odin). (5/)

3. Anti-fascist Resistance: some of us spent every Saturday morning at the Legislature counter-protesting the yellow vests. After they refused to denounce hate groups, we stopped giving them the benefit of the doubt and started deplatforming. (6/)

We tried talking and convincing rally attendees otherwise, but the line of police and Sheriffs eventually made those conversations impossible.

There was also a strong online presence and country-wide opposition networks forming.(7/)

4. Being Joined by Literal Hate Groups: the Canadian Combat Coalition and Worldwide Coalition Against Islam planned to have a 3 day rally in Edmonton.

Their rally was quickly shutdown by counter-protesters, but members of these hate groups joined the yellow vests rally. (8/)

That rally was also shutdown. The vests moved to Whyte Ave where they were joined by more hate group members.

WCAI and C3 had a rally that afternoon in which immigrants were called trash and the 14 words were recited. Later, they marched and assaulted a counter-protester. (9/)

5. The Election of Jason Kenney and the UCP: there was a landslide victory for Kenney and the vests thought this would solve their problems, despite their problems being Trudeau and the United Nations. (10/)

6. The Convoy: the convoy to Ottawa was a waste of resources and a joke. Showing the tendency for in fighting, the organizer was accused of stealing funds. The name of the convoy was even changed to limit the association with yellow vests. (11/)

7. This Hour Has 22 Minutes: this long-running Canadian comedy/news show made fun of the yellow vests pretty hard, particularly in Alberta. Their skits about the vests did a great job of highlighting the movement was about hate -- not jobs and the economy as claimed. (12/)

8. Failure to Organize: While the initial rallies were quite large, drawing hundreds of attendees in Edmonton, organizers weren't actually organizing.

Those initial rallies may have just happened at the right time and in the right place to bring those numbers out... (13/)

But without actually putting in the effort to organize, the movement wasn't going to get past this plateau. Without knocking on doors and engaging in conversation, it was doomed.

And what kind of conversations would they be having? Their reasons for organizing became... (14/)

...increasingly incoherent. It went from the pipeline to how the Jews control Muslims and are using immigration to eliminate white Canadians.

While this worked in their own echo chambers, I have to keep hoping those conversations wouldn't work in broader society. (15/)

9. Attracting Bizarre Characters: there were some weird folks who were drawn to these rallies, from free men on the land to Q Anon cultists. There was even one person who has a YouTube show about aliens and how he travels to different plains. King bless. (16/)

10. The Unique Unlikability of Ryan Dean: Dean is a local neo-Nazi who, thankfully, ruins everything he touches. His former crew C3 came to Edmonton with the intention of hurting him, but he was nowhere to be found.

He claims to have been behind the initial vest rallies... (17/)

...but all we can say for certain is that he was involved with the split that happened with with Garvey, which, arguably, created confusion and weakened the movement.

Dean was also seen by the Edmonton yellow vests as someone who was just trying to sell merchandise. (18/)

Ok, I guess that's it. Thanks for reading and feel free to add to the list! (19/19)