The official line from government and mainstream media was that donations to FreedomConvoy were illicit and malicious. Some even called it terrorist financing. But @FINTRAC_Canada shreds these claims to pieces according to this.
When you keep fixating on a bit player like Pat King and ignore the main organizers who've been clear about their objectives:"end the mandates, not here to overthrow the government",it can only be for mischievous reasons. Clearly an agenda to tar everyone with the same brush.
A handful of journalists managed to drive a narrative that the FreedomConvoy protestors were would be terrorists. The evidence of people on the ground pointed to the contrary. So they kept doubling down on Pat King.
FINTRAC: "We do not consider crowdfunding platforms to be tools that could be used to launder money or finance terrorist activities...There are..many other ways that are probably easier to use to launder money or to finance terrorist activities.”
Indian students fleeing Ukraine have alleged they were harassed, beaten by Ukrainian guards at the Polish border and were not allowed to cross over.
"Women are being harassed. They are being pulled by their hair and hit with rods.Some women have suffered fractures and injuries".
SA's News 24 quoting Crisis Evacuation Committee member: "The Ukrainians have decided to set up international territory in the middle where they are separating Indians and Africans...students were beaten because they didn't stand in the 'black line'". news24.com/news24/southaf…
"Ottawa Hate Free Zone" came up in response to FreedomConvoy protests because residents of Centretown were petrified of peaceful protestors.Its founder holds a poster calling for "Defund Police,Fund Real Safety" when it was the cops who cleared the protestors. Can't make this up.
should read *one of its organizers*, instead of "its founder".
"Being Jewish, Hurtig said she didn't feel safe in Ottawa during the three-week occupation". I wonder how @BJdichter one of the main organizers of FreedomConvoy who happens to be Jewish managed to stay safe with all of the frightening hate around him. 🙄
Canada is not under attack from a neighbouring country and if it were, it's the working men and women like the folks who showed up to protest, not the Zoom and Peloton class, who will be on the front lines defending this nation's freedom.
Seen so many tendentious and insidious comparisons of the Freedom Convoy protestors to what is happening in Ukraine, as if to imply that full scale invasion is the only benchmark for peaceful protests and civil disobedience.
It's a bit like saying women shouldn't continue to fight for their rights in country X, Y, Z because they have no rights in Saudi Arabia. Appalling.
"Younger BIPOC female reporters experience significantly more vitriol than their white male journalist counterparts do." Huh?I'm not younger BIPOC female?!The only unpleasant experience I had at the protest was from a masked Karen who rudely accosted me invading my personal space
On the day Trudeau invoked emergency powers, a masked Karen aggressively accosted me last week outside the Chateau, invading my personal space, and asked me if I was the one who dissed Ottawa. She was more worried about her city being dissed than Trudeau's emergency powers.
This really was the most unpleasant part of the protest for me. I could have come home and made a song and dance about it on Twitter but chose not to till I saw this story about how younger BIPOC female reporters are most at risk. LMAO.
Look at the number of folks gathered in downtown Ottawa. This is streaming live.
Cops seem to be pretty laid back from the looks of it. I believe this is happeneing at the corner of Sparks and Bank, close to Trois Brasseur. Definitely seems less tense.
Ok folks headed to Sparks in a bit. No idea how I'm going to get there but have to check this out for myself. It looks like the cops have eased off a bit.
This live stream is from a Sikh Canadian trucker, Palminder, originally from India, someone I interviewed a couple of weeks ago. A photo follows. instagram.com/palminder1990/…
This is Palminder and his friend Khushwinder on the far left. This dad and his kids walking by, stopped and hugged them, and wanted me to take a photo of them.
Palminder is hilarious. When a female cop was replaced by her male colleague in the line formation, he says: "She was about to hug me. That's why".