We documented those roots in our story, and we never implied that the information or comment came from Carney. Your choice whether to waste any more of your time on our site, but just note that our latest attribution for the pro-pipeline, pro-fossil connection is none other than Tamara Lich, who very helpfully showed up in court a couple of days ago wearing her “I ❤️ Oil and Gas” hoodie — which connects back directly to the 2019 convoy.

That’s not to say that people don’t have the right to that slogan, or didn’t have the right to hold the 2019 convoy. Of course they did, though it might have helped their cause if they’d managed to keep white supremacists off the podium. But here’s Bob Rae on the distinctions between real protest and what we’ve witnessed in Ottawa over the last month: “A truck is not a speech. A horn is not a voice. An occupation is not a protest. A blockade is not freedom, it blocks the liberty of all. A demand to overthrow a government is not a dialogue. The expression of hatred is not a difference of opinion. A lie is not the truth.”

I really wish any of that were fake news, I really do. If it were, it would be a lot easier for people in our downtown neighbourhoods to recover from.

This completely unethical and deliberately deceptive. You are intentionally misleading attempting to claim Mark Carney said the demonstration has “Roots in Pro-Pipeline, Pro-Fossil” groups to . This is your narrative not his. Utterly disgraceful that you would even try to blame the Ottawa’s crisis in the streets with Canada’s pipelines and carbon energy industry. Not worth anyone wasting a minute more on this garbage fake “news” site.

Then again, so does our mainstream print news-media. … Postmedia — which, except for The Toronto Star, owns Canada’s major print publications — is on record allying itself with not only the planet’s second most polluting forms of carbon-based “energy”, but also THE MOST polluting/dirtiest of crudes — bitumen. [“Mair on Media’s ‘Unholiest of Alliances’ With Energy Industry”, Nov.14 2017, TheTyee.ca]
https://thetyee.ca/Opinion/2017/11/14/mair-media-unholiest-alliances

During a presentation, it was stated: “Postmedia and CAPP [Canadian Association of Petroleum Producers] will bring energy to the forefront of our national conversation. Together, we will engage executives, the business community and the Canadian public to underscore the ways in which the energy sector powers Canada.”

Also, a then-publisher of Postmedia’s National Post said: “From its inception, the National Post has been one of the country’s leading voices on the importance of energy to Canada’s business competitiveness internationally and our economic well-being in general. We will work with [Canadian Association of Petroleum Producers] to amplify our energy mandate and to be a part of the solution to keep Canada competitive in the global marketplace. The National Post will undertake to leverage all means editorially, technically and creatively to further this critical conversation.”

A few years ago, Postmedia also had acquired a lobbying firm with close ties to Alberta Premier Jason Kenney in order to participate in his government’s $30 million PR “war room” in promoting the interests of the fossil fuel industry in Canada. Furthermore, in late May, Postmedia refused to run paid ads by Leadnow, a social and environmental justice organization, that expose the Royal Bank of Canada as the largest financer of fossil fuel extraction in Canada.

Really, should the promotion of massive fossil fuel extraction, even Canada’s own, be a partisan position for any newspaper giant to take, especially considering fossil fuel’s immense role in manmade global warming thus climate change? And, at least in this case, whatever happened to the honorable journalistic role of ‘afflicting the comfortable’ (which went along with ‘comforting the afflicted’), especially one of such environmental monstrosity? … The above constitutes ethically-challenged journalism.

Thanks in turn, Russ. I totally share your concern about this awful, deep polarization, and I so appreciate even the few moments we’re both taking to discuss it across the line.

We (all of us) face the same dynamic on climate action and energy transition, of course. One of the things I’ve found so frustrating about the vaccine and COVID-19 battles is that, on climate, I can trace the path to a future that is win-win-win for everyone involved, and have been arguing for a few years that it’s important to genuinely listen to people outside the climate “bubble”, rather than just lecturing or trying to shout louder. I’ve not yet learned how to do that in a situation that (**in my framing, which I know is not yours**) pits the science of how viruses are transmitted or slowed down against the immense and real pain those control measures are causing, amped up (again, **in my framing**, and I’m not trying to be adversarial here) by inaccurate or deliberately false and inflammatory content on social media.

None of which is to suggest, BTW, that the public health response has been perfect. If you search our site for the term “vaccine apartheid”, I’ll be curious about how our coverage on that topic lands with you!

Something I do know, though, is that in this kind of discussion or debate, it’s so important to be hard on policy but gentle on people. Whether it’s about climate or the convoy, there are exceptions to that rule — I feel no obligation not to harshly call out greenwashing on emission reductions, and as you’ve seen, I draw a bright red line against Nazis and white supremacists. But for the rest of us, I would far rather be disagreeing through conversation, as I hope we’re still doing here, than by shouting back and forth or shutting each other down. The temptation is always there, particularly when people are sleepless and scared, but anytime we can mutually find a way to keep talking, we should all be happy to take the win.

Um, you date yourself, Russ, but it’s Mark.

It hasn’t been “generally” peaceful, or peaceful at all, for people on the receiving end of the abuse. I had to read in on this far more deeply than I would have wanted to to get the story right, but saw no one, anywhere denying the right to free association, denying the right to peaceful protest. Taking neighbourhoods hostage for two weeks, depriving people of sleep for days on end, harassing people for wearing masks in the midst of a global pandemic, bringing hundreds or thousands of very large trucks to a confined urban area with intent to intimidate — none of that is “freedom” or free expression. It’s multiple different forms of violence, which is why I thought it important to include a section in the story on the environmental, physical, and health impacts of the insurrection.

I was careful to distinguish between the associations and links of the organizers behind the occupation and the larger group of people who’ve signed on. But the issue is neither irrelevant nor illegitimate. No one is making it up about the Nazi, Confederate, or Three Percenter flags, and the organizers have been clear (until they apparently realized it was a bad look and took down their “memorandum of understanding”) that their goal was to overthrow a duly-elected government. “Sedition” is the calm, technical term for that. If we’d wanted to be inflammatory, we would have called it treason, but rather than going there, let’s just get them shut down and send them home, shall we?

I’m grateful to friends and colleagues who’ve helped me understand over the last couple of weeks that what amounts to an attempt at a nation-wide insurrection is fuelled in part by the deep fears and frustrations we’ve all been through over the last couple of years. While I don’t see a clear path right now to opening those lines of communication — really, everyone has to go home first — I know we need to get there. But you don’t negotiate with Nazis and white supremacists. Which means that the people participating in the carnival downtown are doing themselves no favours by allowing their concerns to be hijacked by far right extremists.

Thanks. Just be sure to link to the original story when you do.

Note to readers (and future commenters): Our comments section has always been and always will be an open forum for a wide range of views, as long as they’re grounded in sound science and other forms of reality.

Except it wasn’t our choice of words. If you read into the story a bit, the quote came from the former governor of the Bank of Canada and Bank of England, Mark Carney.

I assembled the story with care, because I thought it *was* important to acknowledge that the convoy participants don’t see what they’re doing the same way the community does. That’s why I led with the split-screen reality we’ve been seeing — the people running street barbecues aren’t in the military-style encampment a few kilometres away, nor do they live in an apartment building that someone who is a part of their group tried to burn down at 4 AM.

In time — very soon, I hope — there will be an urgent need to figure out where to begin a dialogue with anyone in the group who isn’t down the rabbit hole of conspiracy theories and, yes, sedition. (There. I said it again, because I know that Mark Carney knows his stuff.) But you don’t negotiate with Nazis and white supremacists, especially not when they’ve taken years to plan a coordinated attack across the country and are now using children as human shields to keep a major border crossing and trade route closed.