Freedom Convoy Perspective, One Year Later
The Freedom Convoy was chosen by multiple Canadian news agencies as 2022’s ‘New Story/Newsmaker of the Year.’ This distinction is justly deserved. Our neighbor to the south has a deep history of memorable events that captured the world’s stage and held its attention. By comparison, Canada has a relatively passive history, and our world stage moments usually involve hockey.
This past year, we experienced a highly active civic demonstration within our borders. As Canadians we witnessed, something most of us didn’t think would happen, protests that shut down border crossings and our nation’s capital. At the end of January 2022, the Freedom Convoy rolled into Ottawa and commanded the attention of Canadians citizens and politicians. The contentious, although generally peaceful, demonstration captivated the nation and enthralled US Network television news, which featured the story in segments longer than a commercial break.
Resentments Fuel a Protest
The protest began with two truck drivers angry about proposed vaccine mandates for cross-border trucking companies. Disgruntled supporters connected on TikTok and began gathering for a cross-country truck convoy to Ottawa. Protestors drove from east and west, meeting in Toronto, Edmonton, Winnipeg, and Quebec City, making their way to the nation’s capital. Border blockades formed in Coutts, Alberta, Emerson, Manitoba, along BC’s Pacific Highway and at the Ambassador Bridge in Windsor, Ontario.
Trucks draped in Canadian flags carried messages about freedom and unity, peppered with expletives about Trudeau. In Western towns like Regina, people expressed their support for the peaceful right to protest with some Conservative MPs posing for photo-ops. The convoy gathered momentum, quickly fueled by crowd funding donations. Evenly split with people in the US and Canada, coming together to express community with other essential workers and aligned around values of family, democratic rights, and a concern over the direction the country is taking.
Bigger Than Vaccine Mandates
What began with truckers aggrieved over vaccine mandates became a rallying call for increasing public acrimony with pandemic restrictions and Liberal government policies. Loud and vocal criticism was growing. The Freedom Convoy laid bare an untypically divisive debate over pandemic restrictions and business shut-downs. It nearly evenly split the country with 46% of Canadians supporting an end to Pandemic Restrictions and 54% wanting to keep them in place.
On February 11th, Ontario Premier Ford invoked a State of Emergency to end the seizure of Ottawa and clear the blockade at the Ambassador Bridge, causing the disruption of $ 380 million of cross-border trade per day. As the protest was dissolving, the federal Liberal government invoked the Emergencies Act on February 14th, to bring the Freedom Convoy to an end, although to many it appeared it already had.
Organizations including the Canadian Constitutional Foundation and Canadian Civil Liberties Association filed legal challenges and the act was repealed shortly thereafter. The federal government suspended mandatory vaccinations for federal employees, travelers, and transportation workers in June 2022, after most provinces had released their Pandemic restrictions.
Lasting Shift in Perspective
There’s been talk of a Freedom Convoy 2.0, which would need to happen in another city. Some of the organizers from the first protest still face charges and bail conditions prevent them from reentering Ottawa. The city’s leadership is still processing how easily a group of protestors were able to occupy the streets around Parliament and effectively shut down the city.
Canada is not the same country as it was before Covid (BC). It’s uncovered the faults in our ailing health-care system. A generation of children have lost years of in-person schooling and we’re only discovering those affects now, as standardized test scores come in. Many small businesses closed over circumstances they had no control over. Canadians are asking questions about the legitimacy of pandemic restrictions, economic interruption and if the long-term cost was worth it.
One clear outcome of the Freedom Convoy. It ignited a righteous flame of Canadian nationalism and sustained support for the essential services sector. People are coming together and actively demonstrating their support for collective well-being values. Citizens will increasingly engage in civic action to promote their beliefs and attract followers to worthy causes.
The Freedom Convoy may end up being another unwanted and unexpected gift, which usually comes late. Another Covid wake-up call and the collective realization that we’re deciding the future we want to build together. Belated Happy New Year to our family in service. We live and work with you, every day in the real world. Wishing you a safe winter driving season. The worst thing about this wobbly polar vortex, the damn variability in the weather.
Photo Credit: iStock
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