Crowd protests police G20 actions

[StraitTalk]

This is what I'm talking about! I was just recently complaining that the police treated these violent criminals all too fairly, arresting over a thousand and charging only a few as well as standing idly by as police cruisers and shops were destroyed.

And now they "protest" that the police were too harsh? Can someone please explain to me what they might be responding to? I'm starting to think I'm dreaming, didn't know so many people were this stupid.

[Captain Awesome]

I'm starting to think I'm dreaming, didn't know so many people were this stupid.

... and then some.

[flamingfingers]

I'm starting to think I'm dreaming, didn't know so many people were this stupid.

... and then some.

And then there was this chickie stumbling over trite phrases like, '...people taking back the streets.." and "...it was the police that were being violent..." Barf!

[Mutha]

I saw some black clad, 20 odd year old girl complaining about how smashing windows and setting cars on fire is not violence against people and shouldn't be met by police in riot gear.

It's absolutely amazing how naive and stupid most 20 year olds are (I know I was when I was a 20 year old university student and thought I knew everything about everything). Most of the black clad idiots probably don't even know what they issues are - they just want to go out and destroy something - anything. Pathetic.

[steven lloyd]

And then there was this chickie stumbling over trite phrases like, '...people taking back the streets.." and "...it was the police that were being violent..." Barf!

That really is quite funny in a very sad and pathetic way.

[Al Czervic]

Part of the problem is that these types of scum like to pretend to have a so called “cause” to justify their actions. As if destroying public property is OK because you think some 11 year old kid in a third world country was beaten near death to build a $ 200 pair of Nike’s so somehow your torching $ 100,000 worth of police cruisers is going to fix those perceived social injustices in the world. Of course the CBC will be there to cover and try to legitimatize your cause because it is really all in the name of social justice right?

[steven lloyd]

Of course the CBC will be there to cover and try to legitimatize your cause because it is really all in the name of social justice right?

How did CBC make it to this thread ?

(it's a conspiracy)

[mtnman1]

Of course the CBC will be there to cover and try to legitimatize your cause because it is really all in the name of social justice right?

How did CBC make it to this thread ?

[size=85](it's a conspiracy)[/size]

You are taunting me......

[Al Czervic]

Of course the CBC will be there to cover and try to legitimatize your cause because it is really all in the name of social justice right?

How did CBC make it to this thread ?

(it's a conspiracy)

Simple...

check out CTV News

http://www.ctv.ca/gallery/html/g8-g20-t ... ndex_.html



and the check out the CBC

http://www.cbc.ca/canada/story/2010/05/ ... ronto.html

[steven lloyd]

You are taunting me......

Behave. Remember the moderators are but a keystroke away

[mtnman1]

You are taunting me......

Behave. Remember the moderators are but a keystroke away

I should be a reporter for the CBC.

[steven lloyd]

How did CBC make it to this thread ?

Simple...

check out CTV News

http://www.ctv.ca/gallery/html/g8-g20-t ... ndex_.html

Did you note the pic of the protestors beating on the CBC News van ?

Didn't they know CBC is on their side ?

[quietlywatching84]

I guessed I missed the action (too busy to catch any TV this weekend), but I read some interesting stuff today...

http://www.castanet.net/edition/news-story-55438-1-.htm#55438

So are elected officials (student government) allowed to commit crimes and do they get financial assistance from student fees to defend their actions in a courtroom (the Student Union employee is quoted as saying that they are ascertained a lawyer for them)?

But even more odd, it appears they were arrested in their sleep at a venue a good distance from the riot were the criminal offences took place. Do the police have evidence to justify the arrests? Do we get to see the evidence? The implications for these two elected officials who may (unconfirmed) have been protesting on behalf of an official group are of a serious nature and this information will be important for us to see.

On the other hand, these two may have done nothing wrong. If so, on what grounds were they arrested. The word on the street (again, I haven't confirmed this) is that an old out-dated law from 1939 that was used to protect public infrastructure from Nazi saboteurs was the tool used to arrest these people. If this is the case, then really there is much more to the story. It is also rumored that this law may not be up to the standard of the CCRF (Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms) which is a more recent piece of law (and of course trumps all other laws). In that event, the arrests may not meet the standard that we usually enjoy.

http://www.ottawacitizen.com/news/Secret+lets+police+arrest+failing+show+near+summit/3201082/story.html

Interesting questions (and many of them), I'm waiting for the dust to settle before I cast my opinion. It should be interesting.

Oh, and mtnman, I always keep you close in mind and heart. So I got some right of center commentary here for you from our good friends at the National Post regarding police conduct:

http://news.nationalpost.com/2010/06/28/posted-toronto-political-panel-did-police-go-overboard-on-g20-security/

Oh hell yes. I fail to understand the necessity of mobilizing the entire might of the state in order to deal with what is effectively a few dozen jackasses. And the police even did a terrible job at that, while at the same time enthusiastically provoking and arresting countless peaceful demonstrators. It’s actually more comforting to believe that certain unfortunate things were deliberately allowed to take place than it is to assume the existence of such stunning organizational incompetence. This entire exercise has been a clusterf–k of epic proportions, virtually unprecedented in Canadian history (or at least within the last century).

[Urbane]

People can protest how the police handled the situation but Jonathan Kay puts things into perspective:

Toronto, city of wimps

Jonathan Kay June 28, 2010 – 1:30 pm

When I was covering the riots at the Summit of The Americas in Quebec City eight years ago, the most useful data came through my nose: If I smelled tear gas in the air, I would follow the scent — Toucan Sam-style — to wherever in the city police happened to be raining tear gas canisters on protestors. Like other reporters and riot tourists, I even took one of the spent canisters home with me — you could find the things all over the city — to put on my desk and show my colleagues what a bad-ass I was.

The Quebec City protests of 2001 were about 10 times the size of the protests at Toronto’s G20 Summit this past weekend. And they were more violent, too — featuring not only tear gas, but also frequent use of rubber bullets and water cannon. Some protestors even got through the security perimeter — which never happened in Toronto. At one point in Quebec City, there was so much tear gas in the air that the official summit delegates couldn’t even leave their building.

All of this violence was rightly denounced. And yet, somehow, the country didn’t descend into hand-wringing about how Quebec City’s image had been irreparably damaged in the eyes of the world. There was no talk of the historic city receiving a “black eye” on the world stage. The city simply cleaned itself up and got on with things. Within a day or two, it was back to the usual business of provincial governance and tourism.

Here in Toronto, on the other hand, we are in the midst of a spasm of civic mortification. Over the weekend, I listened to radio reporters breathlessly tell listeners that tear gas actually had been used on the streets of “Toronto the Good” — as proof that the city was enduring some Cormac McCarthy-esque apocalypse. Egged on by thousands of media images of the same three cop cars burning, my Twitter and Facebook correspondents filled their postings with hysterical dispatches: One particularly breathless Rosedale denizen compared the violence to “Soweto ’76.” A Toronto Sun columnist compared a brief detention of some protesters at Queen Street and Spadina Avenue to “martial law.” The normally sensible Don Martin wrote that the scenes have “bought Toronto an international black eye.” Naturally, this being Canada, everyone is now demanding a public inquiry.

As a Torontonian myself, I am naturally not happy about what happened over the weekend. But neighbours, get a grip please: Thanks to a strong police presence, not a single person got seriously hurt, let alone killed. Even the property damage was minimal: As I wrote in Monday’s Post, when I biked around the protest-affected areas of downtown Toronto on Saturday evening, I was surprised to see how few businesses actually had been attacked — and in most cases, the damage was confined to a single plate glass window. That very evening, the downtown core was thronged with the usual crowd of well-dressed restaurant-goers and tacky club-hoppers. I guess none of them got the news about Toronto being transformed into Soweto.

I love living in Toronto. But in times of strain, the city takes on the character of an overprivileged wimp, shrieking and sobbing at the merest civic pin-pricks. We saw this in 1999, when the mayor asked for army troops to help battle the sort of snowstorms that Edmonton and Winnipeg seem to get every other week. We saw it again in 2005, when a series of local gangland shootings caused the media to present the city as a sort of Escape from New York wasteland of nihilistic violence — even though we have one of the lowest per-capita rates of violence in the world. And now, a weekend of scattered protests, featuring even more scattered criminal vandalism, has had the same brain-scrambling effect.

In many parts of the world, including large parts of Europe, a protest featuring no deaths or major injuries would barely make the daily news. And indeed, it is telling how feebly Toronto’s violence registered in the global media. I have in front of me print editions of three world-leading newspapers, The New York Times, the Financial Times and the Wall Street Journal. All three front the G20 Summit. And not a single one of those A1 stories even mentions the protests (though separate stories on the protests were included, in the back pages).

Is it any wonder the rest of Canada dislikes Toronto? We say we want to be a world-class city. But then, when the price tag comes — in this case, in the form of the cliques of idiots who show up at each and very “world-class” G8, G20, WTO, IMF and World Bank conference — we fall to the ground and weep.

It’s almost as if someone tear-gassed us or something.

National Post
[email protected]


Read more: http://fullcomment.nationalpost.com/201 ... z0sDcwxA5f

[StraitTalk]

And the above proves exactly what is wrong with media today. Glad to hear it wasn't as bad as they made it out to be. Regardless, I still don't feel over 1000 arrests is anything to ignore.