1. Hate to say it (not really) but I told you so. Don’t believe me? Read my blog post Yes, Virginia, there will be G20 riots in Toronto from two weeks ago.
2. What a useless exercise. What a waste of money and resources. Those self-indulgent, adolescently rebellious little Black Blocheads with their destructive street theatre accomplished absolutely nothing except to enhance their own pathetic sense of self-worth. And why on earth would any G8 or G20 host ever again be so stupid as to put this giant target on the middle of the host country’s biggest city?
3. The organizers of the main march on Saturday afternoon knew there were anarchist elements attached to the march who would engage in violence and destruction at some point. The mainstream organizers are being disingenuous when they wash their hands of the violence and say their own messages were lost in the mayhem. There have been so many messages spouted by protesters in the past week that no one was going to pay attention anyway. The main march was just a gullible host for the violent parasites attached to it.
4. Stephen Harper and the entire $1.1-billion summit security boondoggle (worse than anything Jean Chretien ever got away with) wriggled completely off the hook the moment the first images of burning police cars hit the airwaves. Suddenly, all the security precautions were ironclad justified. No more awkward questions — except maybe “Why didn’t you spend more to protect the city?” What a crock this summit fiasco has been from beginning to end. Nobody involved — from the black-clad peanut brains smashing store windows to the Ottawa geniuses who visited this botched PR nightmare on us — deserves the slightest degree of credit.
5. A vignette: As armoured police blocked off King Street at Yonge and Church, a wedding party swirled around in the street outside the nearby Le Maquette high-end French restaurant where the wedding reception was happening. A burly policeman sauntered over to the fancy folks and suggested: “You all should probably go back inside. There could be teargas out here any minute.”
6. Another vignette: In the main bar of King Eddy hotel, even closer to the standoff between cops and blackheads, one television set was turned to TV coverage of the rioting outside. But two other sets were tuned to the World Cup.
7. Time after time I would come up to standoffs between police and violent protesters. But then, behind the police line, there would be a third, thick line of gawkers, most with cameras and picture-taking cellphones waving in the air. Cheap thrills that cost $1.1 billion. What a pathetic waste.
8. One final point: Every time I had dealings with a cop on Saturday — even in some pretty tense situations — every one of them was calm, cool and collected, and a couple even had smiles. I hope nothing happens to taint the very professional and civil way in which most of our cops have been handling themselves. Let’s all just get out of this madness and take our city back from Harper and the Blackheads on Monday.
I only hope, that our courts will finally apply a full law against those vandals. Make them to pay for
all damages they caused. And what about those bed wetting sniveling brats? Have a strong questions to their parents where is their parental control and responsibility. They also have to pay for their children.
At the outset, i thought that the security forces had went way overboard in spending. The fringe elements have totally justified this expense with their ridiculous behaviour. They are nothing but thugs. My hat is off to the Police and how they have handled the situation. My hope is that those that were arrested will be punished to the full extent of the law and made to pay for the damages that they have done.
These terrorists should be shot on sight if they are caught smashing windows and burning police cars and throwing bags of urine at the police. They only do this because we appear weak and turn the other cheek and let them destroy the rights of the real citizens. They have no right to destroy people’s property and commit crimes. Anarchy for the sake of anarchy. Never an intended purpose other than staged media coverage and for what, to prove to the world that they are idiots.
They are terrorists for sure. Maybe if there was no press or news coverage of the thugs they wouldn’t be so quick to putthemselves in this position. They should be treated as the terrorists that they are and dealt with accordingly.
By Sunday, the men in black have won, the massive police overesponse has proven their cause.
There should have been a lighter police presence & undercover snatch squads for the 75 men in black. This way, with police phlanxes banging their shields, it has become a scenario that communist China would be proud of.
Why did we have this conference to start with? All the billions could have gone into health & education and the G20 could have met via video conference.
Congratulations we now live in a police state.
Why weren’t the G8 and G20 held in the middle of the Pacific on an aircraft carrier, amongst a flotilla of other warships. Let the idiot anarchists see if they can get out there and cause anarchy. Everything would have been far more secure and far more peaceful if this were to have been done!
As it is, why don’t we ship any anarchists who participated in the Toronto rioting to Afghanistan and have them do something much more worthwhile, if they like violence. perhaps they could take the place of some of our heros who are being killed and mained there; or at least these pansy anarchists could be made to walk ahead of our troops and test for IEDs. Our jails are for too good for them. Let them inherit what they practice and Afghanistan seems like a good place for these idiot anarchists.
My own random thoughts :
1. Democracy? Seriously?
2. Anarchists are not for chaos. If you believe that anything outside capitalism and hierarchy is chaos, your existence is miserable.
3. Journalists like yourself are only doing your job: justifying status quo, throwing up pieces of dominant ideology. You work hand in hand with the police. Never question anything.
4. Think about the flaming police cars. Think about the world leaders, barricaded in their ivory tower, making decisions to reinforce a system based on exploitation of the majority, protected by their police and their laws. Where’s the real violence? Where’s the legitimity?
Which side are you?
“What a useless exercise. What a waste of money and resources.”
This is a ture description. It isn’t a true description of the correct group.
This exercise is a waste of time and money by the world leaders. They have no control of or plan too address what is taking place around our world. If there was one leader willing to state, This money could be better spent and our time could be better used, then we would have heard some value to the foolish exercise we are seeing today.
Actually, M, if you bothered to read what I wrote you would have understood that I WAS talking about the whole G8-G20 fiasco — and its attendant security — being the “useless exercise … waste of money and resources.” If they want to hold these things, have them in the Seychelles Islands or Madagascar or somewhere like that, someplace defencesible (defencesible? I think I meant defensible) that will get a huge boost from the money injection (and that will collectively whump ass on any Black Bloc nimwit that tries to crash the party)— not Toronto. That still doesn’t justify the bonehead blackheads getting their anger-mismanagement rocks off on OUR STREETS. I don’t need some pimply anusi from Pittsburgh and Montreal claiming Queen Street West as OUR STREET. It’s MY STREET, child, not theirs.
Philou, you know absolutely nothing about me so you just wildly throw around elitist, self-satisfying bullshit about me being a stooge of capitalism without anything other than your misguided self-delusions to support your thesis. Which side am I on? I’m not on Stephen Harper’s side and I’m certainly not on yours. The side I’m on is the side that REALLY believes in truth and justice — and knows that it doesn’t come from behind masks or with rocks through windows and fires in the street. That’s Ku Klux Klan territory. That’s lynch mob territory. That’s not democracy. That’s not majority rule (with minority protection). That’s not legitimate. That’s chaos (by any name) and that’s exploitation of opportunity that much of the world doesn’t have (but is desperate to emulate). How can you throw projectiles at other human beings (cops) and then whine they aren’t playing fair when they end up being tougher than you are? By the way, I don’t “believe that anything outside capitalism and hierarchy is chaos.” I was kicked out of Cubs for insubordination, by jimminy. So there must be some other reason why my life is miserable. Oh, right, I’M NOT MISERABLE even though I’m an unemployed starving artist who gets accused of being a capitalist by some self-indulgent nitwit who’s probably (and here I’m doing the kind of uninformed typecasting you did) back at his high-paying job as a computer programmer on Monday. I’m just one of the vast majority of Torontonians who think Stephen Harper was wrong to bring the G20 circus to our town and think the Blackheads were even more wrong to trash our town.
Peter,
Do a little travelling. See how the rest of the world lives. You don’t have the faintest idea what a police state is. It sure isn’t what we went through this weekend. The cops are just as glad to get out of their stormtrooper gear as the rest of us are to have this foolishness over with.
A.
P.S. How come nobody has brought up how the cops hauled scores of innocent people away at the last couple of Queen’s Park Marijuana Day smoke-ins? Oh, that’s right — THEY DIDN’T! They were calm and reasonable and protective of society like Toronto cops generally are. I’m surprised someone isn’t accusing them of being wimps for not upholding the law then.
Why don’t we allow the ;police and army to simply shoot the protesters causing disruption. 50-60 dead ones at each conference would like weed out the problem after a few years as well as allow police and special forces to know who these people conspire with.
Look, all of you people who cavalierly talk about shooting “50-60″ protesters are just as bad — probably worse — than the blackheads. I really hope you don’t mean that and I hope you tell yourselves you were just going overboard rhetorically. Nobody’s shooting anybody, especially not Toronto cops who really have been serving and protecting OUR city — not their city — this weekend. So get your heads out of your anusi (I’ve learned to love a new word I think I created) and stop talking about shooting anybody. Peace, baby.
I wrote an entry last night that sums up my thoughts:
http://adoseofbuckley.wordpress.com/2010/06/27/the-g20-aftermath-anarchist-is-just-another-word-for-coward/
While I agree you can’t outright shoot these guys , I believe the cops should have been able to at least detain them. Rubber bullets or beanbag guns to knock them off the roof of the car they’re jumping up and down on, or even paint guns to just mark their skin for later detainment. Allowing them to get away what they got away with is a terrible mistake.
I think Harper was a fool to think that there was going to be no violent protesters. But then again he don’t care with the citizens of the largest city in Canada have to say. I’m appalled at what transpired here in Downtown Toronto. Peaceful protesters getting arrested, beaten, rights violated. The Black bloc terrorizing downtown Toronto. The cops using excessive force and abusing their authority. The cost of the summits were so not worth it, what did Toronto get??? Nothing but destruction and mayhem. I WANT MY MONEY BACK AND THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD TAKE PAYS CUTS TO PAY FOR THE DAMAGES!!!! Up your’s HARPER YOU NO GOOD PIECE OF CRAP!!!!!!
i agree what a total waste of money , and the loosers causing the damage were just looking for a place to vent there anger or to just act up more likely, they are just loosers and should have been stopped with whatever force needed by police , and the courts should enforce fines to the VERY max , to deter this behavier in our city by the same type of loosers in the future
i was hoping this G20 would be over by now but after reading a few of these posts and watching the news it looks like it won’t be over for awhile,
but i have a few comments towards the protesters,
like the ones outside the detention center chanting “the world is watching ” yes the world is watching and what did we show the world ?
then you have the bicyclists wanting more bike lanes…that confused me but what the hell does it have to do with the G20 most of them did’nt even know where they was going they followed the cops
heres a hint buy a map book if you know what that is but i doubt you do because you think protesting the summit will get you more bike lanes
now to the idiots who decided that beating up police cars was a good idea well you dumbasses don’t know we pay for those cars with our taxes but then again you would’nt know that because you probably had an idea why you was protesting like the bicyclists,
the ones who ended up in the detention center crying about how the accomodations was well maybe you should blame the dumbasses who beat up the police cars because now us tax payers have to buy new cars sorry but we can’t afford to give you 5 star treaments in a posh hotel,
maybe you can get into a jail next time with hard core criminals who would probaly make you want to run home to your mommies but at least you will have beds to sleep on if your not too afraid to close your eyes.
i’m glad to see how the cops treated some of the protesters because the ones who chose to do nothing but disobey and cause problems got exactly what they derserve..
just my few cents worth but the summit is over now can we all get back too what it was like before the summit a civilized city well most of the time
Protesters should be charged for what damage they have caused.As for the summit it was a waste of time & money,should have held it in one place from prying eyes of the trouble makers.I wonder after all that meeting with the world leaders is it going to make life better and money in our pockets as it is people are suffering financially.Hope that this will be a lesson politicians will learn from. Every time we turn around world leaders are telling us that this will be good for the country and it will improve our living standards. Ha! May we go forward in our daily lives and fork out tax dollars to the governments so they will have enough money for their next summit-if there will be another.
My solution is to hold the next G20 in a Federal Prison. Just leave the gates open and let them walk in.
It’s so hard to believe that the Canadian press are using this example of rioting to project Canada’s image to the world. We only project negative images. This time it was 50 rioters and The Sun compared them to the San Francisco riots in the 60′s when there were 100′s of rioters. In Montreal, they burnt down George Williams (University). The last time journalism wanted to make a mountain out of a mole hill was the SARS scare. Every new case was added to the previous cases and then released through the press as today’s new infections. Canada probably had about 50 cases of SARS, and those mostly in the Scarborough/Toronto region. By the time each new case was added to the previous day’s cases, we had over 200 cases of SARS (it was the CDC who exposed this mockery)
Why is the Canadian press so anxious to present such a bad image of Canada? Nobody except Torontonians care. I immigrated as a British subject. We can’t even spell Canada. I lived in the U.S. and a lot of them think Canada is somewhere in Western Europe. Not only that, but “Dubya” called Canada a 3rd world country (even though he came here to get his ‘flu shot a month later). Bob Geldorf of Live Aid fame thought Canada didn’t support any charity and told the Canadian delegation that they weren’t welcome at either the G8 or G20
If we want Toronto to be recognised as a major cosmopolitain centre, we need an identifying landmark. San Francisco has the Golden Gate bridge. The New York skyline is instantly recognisable anywhere in the world. In London, there’s Big Ben, Buckingham Palace, Nelson’s Column. In Paris, the Eiffel Tower. No matter where you are from, these images are instantly recognisable. Even India has the Taj Mahal
In Toronto, we have a giant needle known as the CN Tower. Big Deal! So does Seattle, Calgary, Niagara Falls, etc. We need something that identifies to the world that we are Toronto. Not 50 rioters against 20,000 police, not a fake SARS epidemic, but something positive
how about this they all could of went to camp petawawa easy to fly into, has its own security,the army ,has accomadations for all and best off all ,wouldnt have cost near as much,wouldnt have displaced or inconvienced so many in the largest city in the country ,also screwup huntsville for peace and quite and vacationing.all because of 1 egomanic,his puppet mcguinty who wanted to show all how important he is to himself.and heres something to think about if they where in camp how could demonstrators effect them ,answer they couldnt have! camp surrounded by 10ft fences and army no black whatever ?would of dared so again.remember this goverment has a way of making a crisis and it wouldnt surprise me if agent provacures were police officers set to justify,and pay for all this wasted money and get harper off the hook.where were all officers on saturday,there very lack of presence allowed the destruction and burning dont you think.a little self serving dont you think .just my op.thx
I agree with Jay; however these bed wetter’s wouldn’t last a second in Afghanistan. They love the fact they live in a country that protects their rights, and gives them a place to hide once they have finished with their criminal acts. You place these children in a country where war is as common as Tim Horton’s is in Canada, they would lose that bravado very quickly and hide behind the real men and women.
The Black Bloc’s courage is only as thick as the masks that they hide behind. Once unmasked you will see the true cowered that lies behind it.
Unfortunately they will be prosecuted, and if found guilty will only get a light punishment. That is the Canadian way.