Protecting Public and Personal Rights

Across Canada, the truckers protest is picking up steam.
Please take some time to see who is funding this protest, a fund that now holds $7,000,000. That’ll buy a lot of gas. Also, check which radical group is supporting those truckers and I bet the majority of the truckers have no idea how they are being used.

First, on the subject of vaccines

 In a recent FB Post (an edited copy posted below), I spoke to the issue of the Ottawa-bound truckers who refer to themselves as “Freedom Fighters”. In effect, they want the vaccine mandates dropped because it interferes with their “right” to be free. Before I launch into that subject, I will first clarify my position on vaccine mandates. To be clear, I do not support mandatory vaccinations. There are many folks who have valid medical reasons for not doing so. We have members among our extended family and friends who fall into that category. But, I do not stop there. 

Some folks have deeply held beliefs that cause them to shy away from getting a vaccine (e.g. phobia, fear, religion, family pressure, etc.). If they are being honest, I consider their reasons to be valid. They are no different from conscientious objectors who refused to go to war. The vaccine-hesitant in Canada can most certainly skip the vaccination. Still, they must then live with the restrictions applied to protect our fellow citizens, particularly the unvaccinated who are vulnerable because of a medical condition, and the elderly. However, in order to skip that vaccination, they will face restrictions, some of which will be significant (e.g. loss of work, inability to travel, restrictions on entering many establishments – restaurants, gyms, theatres – and the list goes on).

Some years back, I wrote a longer post on vaccines.
(Vaccines and the good old days) 

Now to the subject of “Freedom Fighters”

These Freedom Fighters, be they those in a trucker-convoy or those protesting in front of hospitals, at other public locations, or who force their way into businesses and attack the staff, you get not one ounce of sympathy from me or the majority of Canadians. There may well be a small cost with disrupted supply lines; however, those will be small costs compared to the costs we inflict because of prolonging this pandemic. Take a few minutes find out who is funding this protest? (Truckers Protest)

Tamara Lick and B.J. Dichter of Wexit (Link) fame, are running the GoFundMe page.  There are many other links about how they latch onto the activities of others as a means to raise funds that get filtered through their organization. I’m  pleased to see GoFundMe has at least temporarily frozen the trucking funds. Yet, at the end of the line the WEXIT folks and others who support them, get what they want – discontent.

For the truckers, what is happening appears to be confusion about what ‘rights’ and ‘personal freedoms’ mean. Within a democracy, we certainly have many ‘rights and freedoms as defined in our Charter, but those rights and freedoms are constrained in many ways. Our statute books, along with case law (civil and criminal), could fill a library with books that define those constraints, and they are significant. Without applying many limitations, we could not come close to maintaining a civil society (our democracy).

Part of those constraints revolves around a government (federal, provincial and local) right to help protect people from spreading contagious diseases into which Covid falls. That same thing happened many times in the past when our society faced killer outbreaks of highly infectious viruses. We all have family members in the past (perhaps in the present) who died or suffered lifelong disabilities because of no vaccine or effective treatment. 

No one has a legal “right” to disregard the constraints, and if they do, they may very well suffer consequences beyond a threat to their health. I cannot imagine anyone, other than a select few religious sects, who would deny themselves an invasive treatment if it could save their life or help to give them or someone they love, relief from a debilitating disease.

I appreciate these truckers may think they are fighting for their “rights” and their “freedom” to choose; however, they are doing the opposite. They are no different than anarchists who maintain “a political philosophy and movement that is sceptical of authority and rejects all involuntary, coercive forms of hierarchy.”

 What happens when folks carry their protests beyond reasonable limits is that the building blocks of our democracy are slowly chipped away. One only needs to look south of the border to see how that “beacon of democracy” in the world is teetering on the brink of self-destruction. That country need not be overly worried about what is happening on the Ukrainian border as much as they need to worry about what is happening within their own. We have not yet reached that brink in Canada; however, these truckers and publicly active ‘anti-vaxxers’ are not protecting our democracy. They are damaging it by thinking only about themselves and their interests. I wonder how many people understand the fragile line that divides public and personal rights and freedoms. 

 You may disagree however, don’t think for a minute that it is because the majority of those who are riding on the backs to those truckers are protecting our ‘rights.’ They’re not, and I don’t want them pretending they are protecting mine.

Harold McNeill
Victoria, January 26, 2022

Update: January 27, 2022 @ 3:51pm

I just received this email from the Honourable Leader of the Opposition, Erin O’Toole, along with the following video Link attached.
His flip-flop in this video by now pandering to the extremes of his party, many of whom have more or less taken over the truck convoy, makes it abundantly clear why so many in the party are calling for him to step down.  If everything in Ottawa goes sideways over the week-end and it becomes a Canadian edition of the US January 6 riots (as many in the video’s I’v have watched are calling for), I wonder if the Honourable Leader will follow the lead of another by calling for them to “Stand Down and Standby”.

Considering Mr. O’Toole’s current position on the truckers protest, I appreciated this cartoon.

Update January 28, 2022

Full article on above link to CBC News

This from the Truckers Association

“The vast majority of the Canadian trucking industry is vaccinated with the overall industry vaccination rate among truck drivers closely mirroring that of the general public. Accordingly, most of our nation’s hard-working truck drivers are continuing to move cross-border and domestic freight to ensure our economy continues to function.

The Canadian Trucking Alliance (CTA) does not support and strongly disapproves of any protests on public roadways, highways, and bridges. CTA believes such actions – especially those that interfere with public safety – are not how disagreements with government policies should be expressed. Members of the trucking industry who want to publicly express displeasure over government policies can choose to hold an organized, lawful event on Parliament Hill or contact their local MP. What is not acceptable is disrupting the motoring public on highways and commerce at the border.

“The Government of Canada and the United States have now made being vaccinated a requirement to cross the border. This regulation is not changing so, as an industry, we must adapt and comply with this mandate,” said CTA president Stephen Laskowski. “The only way to cross the border, in a commercial truck or any other vehicle, is to get vaccinated.”