The "official" end of the Freedom Convoy protests in Ottawa was Wednesday February 23, but it was a long road to get there, and it wasn't really the end. Although the COVID-19 mandates that sparked the convoy have long since lifted, the anger and disinformation generated by the movement are still with us, and so is the fallout the Federal government's call to use the Emergencies Act. Let's look back at how it started...
On this week's first of two repeat episodes of the podcast, we revisit the February 9 episode...
The "official" end of the Freedom Convoy protests in Ottawa was Wednesday February 23, but it was a long road to get there, and it wasn't really the end. Although the COVID-19 mandates that sparked the convoy have long since lifted, the anger and disinformation generated by the movement are still with us, and so is the fallout the Federal government's call to use the Emergencies Act. Let's look back at how it started...
On this week's first of two repeat episodes of the podcast, we revisit the February 9 episode with Kurt Phillips. He's been hunting Nazis online since before it was cool as the founder and former lead writer for Anti-Racism Canada and as one of the current board members of the Canadian Anti-Hate Network. This conversation took place shortly after the convoy arrived in Ottawa at the end of January.
Of course, the convoy is still making news. Last week, the Toronto Star published a report about how Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and his cabinet were told about a "potential breakthrough" with the convoy the night before the Emergencies Act was invoked. Sounds bad, but you only need to look at last weekend's events in Peterborough where followers of the so-called “Queen of Canada” Romana Didulo were arrested in the course of trying to do a citizen's arrest on the local police.
For now though, let's flashback to February when Phillips joined us to offer his analysis of what happened in Ottawa. He talked about how we got here, some of the marquee players in the movement, and how you can tell the grifters from the true believers. He also discussed how he thought the convoy was going to end, where the movement is going next, and whether the mainstream media is up to the task of understanding what the convoy is really about and who’s driving it (pun intended).
So let's revisit the halcyon days of the Freedom Convoy on this week's repeat of the Guelph Politicast!
You can follow Kurt Phillips @ARCCollective on Twitter to get coverage of Canada's far right from his unique perspective. You can also see insight and analysis from the Canadian Anti-Hate Network, and another good resource is Friend of the Politicast Dan Collen, and you can find his reporting @SpinelessL on Twitter.
The host for the Guelph Politicast is Podbean. Find more episodes of the Politicast here, or download them on your favourite podcast app at Apple, Stitcher, Google, TuneIn and Spotify .
Also, when you subscribe to the Guelph Politicast channel and you will also get an episode of Open Sources Guelph every Monday, and an episode of End Credits every Friday.
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