Protest

I was recently faced by someone who was in a camp for defending a protest that I did not.

Depending on where you stand, I either come off as someone who wants balance to the status quo, or potentially as someone who is anti-protest.

Let me make that point as clear as I can: I am very pro-protest. I love the ideas, the discussion that can come out of them, and the idea of a collection of people standing for a cause.

HOWEVER.

The point of protest is to bolster a point that you feel is being handled in the wrong fashion. In Canada, you have the right to protest (within certain parameters). That also means that I have a right to disagree with your protest.

The kind of person I am, I will not intentionally attempt to undermine a position. If I see flaws in the logic, I will point them out if I am asked about them. If I out-and-out disagree with the cause being screamed about, it is my right to state that. I choose to (mostly) in private. I do have opinions, but I will not voice them if I see no benefit.

Where I get a bit squirrely is surrounding the trucker protest we had in Canada a week or two ago. I was not even sure if I disagreed with it because everywhere I could find information about the “cause” they were fighting for, there seemed to be blatant discrepancies and contradictions.

I am afraid that it undermined real protests for important issues that we see all over this country. Especially around Native rights, the bodies of children that were found in basements of residential schools, and legitimate concerns around abuse of power. This really did come off more as a kid throwing a tantrum as opposed to an actual fight against “tyranny”, or whatever they said they were against.

Yes, I will probably get some flack about my stance, and I welcome someone to explain how the truckers were in any right. I know I made a video recently talking about how I was “done” in regards to things of this nature, but my point was that I was done explaining the same point hundreds of times just to be asked by the same person again.