Honk if you want Freedom?

Honk if you want freedom?

How The "Freedom Convoy" turned a protest into a circus.

By The Market Place of Ideas.

Mon., Feb, 25 2022

If anything has become crystal clear from the various levels of unrest around the country, it is that the chickens have come home to roost.

For more than 3 weeks our nation's capital was besieged by deluded Canadians confused about what freedom means and how democracy actually works.

Ottawa Mayor Jim Watson aptly stated that the unruly mob was “ living in a parallel universe that just did not make any sense”.

However to the folks that participated in this "Freedom Convoy" it made perfect sense.

Worse than their ignorance, is the number of political leaders who lent support, validation to this misguided cause.

The beginning of this convoy was originally created to protest vaccine mandates for crossing the United States border, but later de-evolved into a protest about getting rid of all COVID-19 restrictions nation wide.

The occupation of Ottawa's downtown had turned into a battlefield.

However the atmosphere within the capital was not really one of a battlefield but more akin to a weird,very large tailgate party.

There were outhouses across the street from the Priministers office, barbeques cooking food and in one area some of the proud freedom fighters had set up a hot tub.

The revelry and partying was a direct affront to every, nurse, doctor,and long term care worker that had and has been  working tirelessly to keep the general public alive and well.

Unfortunately like it or not this is the face of a tired and frustrated fringe within the fringe.

The Canadian population have seen numerous closures, re-openings and restrictions on travel and gatherings in the last two years

But rather then steel the metal of the nation and dig deep into  our collective  resolve to get through this.

The leaders of "The Freedom Convoy" yelled a resounding enough!!

Enough with science, commonsense, decency, and the rule of law.

And right alongside them were the Federal  Conservatives.

Just like children throwing a tantrum in a Wal-Mart, they want this pandemic done and they want it done now.

Taking a look on the coverage of the convoy at its height you could see the circus in all its full glory.

The signs at this rally for example looked like they were fueled by a fever dream

"Trudeau is the real virus"

"I want my country back"

"Is this Canada or Communism?"

"This how facism starts"

However the most troubling slogan  is the ever popular "F*#k Trudeau"

For someone so hated by these proud Canadians it boggles the mind why they all wish to engage in such amorous activities with him but who am I to judge.

Now some would say this has been a bad few couple of  weeks to be a conservative or anti-vaccine in this country.

But I say they would be wrong on that assumption.This party and the people that stand with this type of activity are finally living their truth.

This Freedom Convoy gave everyone with a beef against the liberal Government,

A cover to spew their hatred at Trudeau. For every "we support the truckers convoy" post on social media it was usually followed by some half baked conspiracy theory.

Rather then except that the pandemic is not a hoax Conservatives  tossed their hat in the ring with the leaders of this convoy.

There was a hope that maybe the heads of the UCP could calm the fires of hate and spearhead a resolution to this quackery.

Unfortunately that didn't seem possible once the Conservative party ousted former leader Erin O’Toole, due to his belief that moderation and maturity were what was needed  to get back to power.

So with almost all options exhausted.

OnFebruary 14, Trudeau invoked a never-before-used emergency measure to give his government sweeping powers to disperse the demonstrators, and police began arresting participants in the blockade that had paralysed downtown Ottawa.

Over 200 arrest and almost 50 towed vehicles later the protest – which Ottawa residents called an “occupation” and officials at all levels of government described as unlawful – came to an end.

The one thing for certain is the veil has been lifted, lines in the sand  have been drawn and much of resentment around covid mandates are still in place.

But just because the circus has left town doesn't mean that the misinformation over this virus sudenly disappeared.

As Ashleigh Stewart wrote in her piece written in  Global News on December 18, 2021

"I joined anti vaccine and anti-mandate groups on Telegram and Facebook, witnessing them transform from meeting places for the unvaccinated to a virtual confluence of hatred and disinformation — where I observed, for instance, calls for medical experts to be hanged and people comparing mass vaccination to genocide".

"Alongside organizing countrywide anti-vaccine rallies, tens of thousands of Canadians are sharing fake news stories around rising stillbirth numbers, deaths caused by the COVID-19 vaccine and baseless theories of an impending social credit system that begins with QR codes.

Many of the people in these groups seem to believe all of this, despite a lack of proof."

So as Ashleigh Stewart showed us there may be no way to get the horses to the water let alone get them to drink.

But like the Good book says in John chapter 8:32 "Ye shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free"

I also heard in my travels that you can also  get the truth from drunks and angry children.

So the question that we need to answer  is, how do we react to our fellow countrymen.

The ones who behaved like drunken children for 3 weeks straight and brought shame,and embarrassment to our country.

Do we just ignore the flood of misinformation or stand up to the massive collective delusion and fight the good fight.

Only time will tell.