Saturday, June 25, 2011

The Star Phoenix gets it


via

Its taken a long time, but the meaning of Canada's G20 tragedy finally seem to be sinking in.
Here's today's Star Phoenix editorial:
But as embarrassing as Vancouver was to the nation, what happened in Toronto is much more serious and frightening.
Although the internally prepared report by the Toronto police service, which was released late Thursday, owned up to errors, it is a long way from accepting responsibility for the mayhem that overtook Canada's largest city during the G-20 meeting last year.
It wasn't just the downtown businesses and the burned police cars that hurt Canada's reputation. It wasn't even that the police willfully pulled back during the worst of the riots, presumably so they could corral, 'kettle,' arrest and beat nonviolent demonstrators who were a safe distance away.
What hurt Canada the most that weekend a year ago is the blow that was dealt to our constitutionally protected rights to assembly and speech.
Yes. That's what we were complaining about a year ago.
Of course, the editorial goes on to blame "poorly trained police" who "lacked the fundamental understanding of Canada's tradition of human rights", so they still don't understand that this attitude emanated from the top, not the bottom.

No comments: