When Government Gets More Authoritarian, We Get More libertarian
Yesterday was a busy day in Canada, with government moving in on Ottawa protestors with pepper spray and gas in order to get them to exit the ‘illegal protest’ area. Later, the government assured the public they would track down and prosecute the protestors. Today in a Biden-esque move, fences are going up around Ottawa.
These moves did not work as planned, as protests are spreading across Canada. The Canadian government can fence off Ottawa’s ‘illegal’ protest area and arrest those who remain thanks to Trudeau’s invocation of the Emergency Act last week. But such powers would have to be massively expanded to include protests in other cities.
Then again, I certainly wouldn’t put it past the people who did this:
Edit 11:47 am 2/20: Apparently the police are going after business owners who dared stay open and serve the protestors. Talk about tyrannical overreach!
The lack of critical thinking skills amongst Canada's ruling elites is stunning, to say the least. If you threaten to take everything away from people, and completely disenfranchise them from society, you have left them with nothing to lose. This makes the elites feel powerful, but what they don't realize is that it actually strips them of any long-term power that they ever possessed. People with nothing to lose get bolder and braver, not more cowed and cowardly. People with nothing to lose created the French Revolution, the American Revolution, and the Underground Railroad.
Is it really libertarian or more simply a matter of demanding our human rights be respected? And I understand there’s a crossover but I feel like this is far too nuanced for traditional labels.