Ottawa – Years ago, I knew a guy who owned a few sports bars in suburban Toronto. One of his places was my much-beloved local. They were friendly bars with friendly staff, local community hubs, and as good for a bite as for a night of hard drinking. On a slow day, the owner and I got to talking, and I asked him what he’d learned about people. He thought about it for a minute and said the main thing that jumped out at him was that he himself had gotten way better at spotting the people — the “hard men,” he called them — who come in to break things and hurt others. When he started pouring pints, long before he bought his first location, he said he could normally have someone figured out by their second drink. After years of tending bar and then owning a few, he told me, he could spot a hard man coming in the door.
Over the last 11 days, as a large protest has settled in — “occupied,” as some local leaders are saying — parts of Ottawa, I’ve been fascinated to see the wildly differing reports coming out from people at the scene. Some are seasoned professional reporters, others are just locals with a social media account. Depending on which person you’re using as your explainer of the local vibe, you could reasonably walk away convinced that most of what was happening in Ottawa was a pretty big party, or a hostile invasion by thugs and harassers. I wanted to find out which one it was, so on Sunday, I drove in from Toronto, arriving early Monday morning. I spent hours wandering the city, particularly the area immediately around Parliament Hill, trying to answer that question. Is this a huge group of friendly people? Is this a mob of unruly, dangerous types?
The answer is yes.
The following is my view of the situation in Ottawa, and should be seen entirely in that light. I should also note that I’m a tall, unsmiling white dude with a buzzed head who wandered the area in a gigantic and delightfully warm NFL hoodie, and it’s very possible that my experience was skewed by the fact that I blended in. There are other protest sites at other parts of the city, as well, and I’ll be heading out to some of them later. The observations below are what I saw around Parliament, and within perhaps a 10-minute walk of it.
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See Also:
(1) Where is Justin Trudeau? NDP Leader Jagmeet Singh says PM has ‘not been visible’
(2) Ottawa police, the mayor and Justin Trudeau to blame for convoy occupation
(3) No evidence truckers involved with arson, but mayor blames convoy anyway
(4) Ottawa teacher suggests ‘taking up arms’ against Freedom Convoy truckers
(5) Trudeau Establishes Elite Class As Canada Moves Toward Communism
Watch:
Where is Justin Trudeau? NDP Leader Jagmeet Singh says PM has ‘not been visible’.
What’s Singh worried about, that the ink will dry up on his rubber stamp?
Regarding mr. muirhead. I wonder if he has a firearms permit? Violence is the usual recourse of the left. That is after they call you a racist. I dont know, that guy looks kind of pink to me. A pinko, perhaps. Doesnt look like a duck hunter so no risk there. He deleted his comment, hmmmm. I know there is a collect to purchase jt some gonads maybe gofundme can make room for this failed castrato.
And the point is? Except for the large mass of friendly types he has just described any protest in any large city. The”hard men” you mean the shit disturbers? A lot of that is a professonial group. Usually known as useful idiots they are a subset of a much larger group of useful idiots made up of everything from house wives, incels, all the way up to phd types. In this instant they gather in small groups and just stare, not because of the police, but because of the other security force.