"According to Amnesty, the heavy police presence in the city—as well as acts of vandalism and violence by some protesters—has helped to create an atmosphere of fear that has kept many people from participating in peaceful demonstrations.
"At a time when the public should be encouraged to actively engage in debate and discussion about pressing global issues, the security measures that were put in place in Toronto in the lead up to the G20 Summit held in the city instead narrowed the space for civic expression and cast a chill over citizen participation in public discourse," the organization stated."
Yes, I agree with Amnesty International's questions, reasoning and approach. But would say it's our leadership, our Prime Minister, Stephen Harper himself, who promoted a full-fledged police state for the G8 and G20 Summit meetings. And it is a very dangerous precedent.
I repeat, a very dangerous precedent.
This man must be voted out of office. Don't be wooed by so-called achievements of the Summit meetings - look at he was doing in the back room, to his own citizens, to Toronto, and, by extension, to the country.
We don't mean much to this leader of ours, and if we're troublesome, why he has 20,000 now trained riot cops at his disposal. Certainly enough of a corps to terrorize a peaceful country.
What if some of those 'perpetrators' of violence in the march were linked to the upper echelon of the Federal government? How do we know in what ways we, the Canadian public, might be manipulated to think certain factions (like the hooded, masked Black bloc mob) are dangerous trouble-makers. I'm not saying groups like the Black bloc mob are not dangerous, but do their antics (only vandalism) justify the operation of a 'police state'?
When I think of Jean Chretien, whose incredible leadership we are still benefiting from in terms of the surplus he left that cushioned this country through the recent recession, and ask, would Chretien have brought out the riot cops in full force with a $2 million budget for security if we hosted the G8 and G20 Summits?
No. Chretien, whatever else he was, was for this country. Chretien's loyalty was to the people of this country. Harper's loyalty, if he has any other than to his ambitions, is to big business, those who bank roll his power. Harper, and I say this with sadness after witnessing the last few days of violence and terror in Toronto, is definitely an heir of Mulroney, only more dangerous because smarter.
And it leaves me wondering what Harper might have acquiesced to to justify the enormous expenditure for what is clearly, after all, a police state in Toronto, if only for a week or so.
Riot police aggressively arrested peaceful protesters at Eastern Avenue yesterday. Since when is the right to dissent a violation of the law? And whose "public peace" were the quiet demonstrators disturbing? Residents in the area said they hadn't know there was a protest until the noise of the police motorcycles alerted them, and the noise the police made definitely disturbed 'public peace.'
A taste of an authoritarian police state to prepare us for what?
Out of taxpayers money rather easily gotten, Harper now has a fully trained and armed select corps of officers.
After all the money spent on this show of force, are these trained men and all their expensive equipment meant to languish? To disappear back into the sleepy Canadian milieu?
This weekend saw armoured tanks in Toronto. Isn't this an over-response to some burned police cars and broken store windows? I remind readers of this article, there was no real run on the fence surrounding the Summit, and certainly no concerted terrorist effort to threaten the world leaders gathered here.
Our right as citizens in a democratic state to dissent, to protest public policy, to offer alternative views and opinions, to gather together in numbers from a few to a march of 10,000 to publicize our protests was undermined by police tactics.
When I say dangerous precedent for Canadian society, I mean dangerous precedent. We might ask in what scenarios Harper's group might consider using this armed force again. And how soon?
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