Meow everyone. In the first installment of The Rise and Fail of Occupy Toronto, I gave a just a very short little bit of background about myself and some of what interests me. Well, it is time to set the stage now to the core of this series. I will begin with a very short but notable lead up to where we are today and how this was accomplished. Once again, the images used are a combination of both my own as well as image found online. Once again, My special thanks to my friend EnGine for her superior editing skills.
The Main Players
Several organizations had significant roles to play in many of the G20 Summit protest events but one of the main players was OCAP aka The Ontario Coalition Against Poverty.
OCAP came to fame several years earlier during the famous Queens Park riot. A general protest organized against Mike Harris’s cuts to social programs. It was attended by people of low income, the homeless and those on disabilities. During the protest, violent resistance was used by some of the members of OCAP. Concealed rocks and bricks were thrown at mounted police, innocent protesters and property. At the time the exact motivation behind these acts were not known by the general public but it was a turning point for how subsequent protests would be viewed.
OCAP were also the organizers of what was tagged the Pope Squat. This was the forced squatting by some members, of an abandoned building during the papal visit to Toronto. Both events had elements of violence in them and OCAP has earned, and rightly so, the reputation of being an organization that will resort to the use of violence and property destruction as a means of protest.
The other major player during the G20 was a fringe group called No One is Illegal. They are a group who claim that Canada’s immigration policies are inherently racist and should be completely abolished.
They profess that all immigrants should have the right to come and go from Canada without having to be subjected to any of the safety or security checks now in place. Measures created to secure the country from unwanted and dangerous elements.
OCAP and No One is Illegal were the two main groups involved in leading the Blac Bloc anarchists to riot and destroy property during the G20 summit in Toronto. However, other groups were also involved in varying degrees including the unions, environmental groups and social justice groups.
After the violent demonstrations many in the activist community were prompted to further investigate the origins of these groups. This led to the discovery that these groups are not quite what they presented themselves to be.
We were witnessing the co-option of a movement, a new and different kind of protest. A social movement that was spreading and infecting the unaware with a new kind of anarchy.
A movement, where anyone with a cause, or a grudge was welcomed and encouraged to join in the fray. Many did, much to their dismay.
Toronto never recovered from the scars and memories of this event and its future would be shaped by its effects. Along with the previous mentioned radical fringe groups we saw the entrance of others also played small but key roles. The Unions were the players with the huge purse strings. They helped to finance these groups but this will be addressed in far greater detail later on.
Several persons were finally and subsequently rounded up as being the main ring leaders, planners and main organizers of the G20 riots.
While many of these organizers had their chargers either stayed, withdrawn or dismissed, others were, I am happy to say charged, tried, convicted and are doing prison time for these acts of terrorism, because that is what it was, urban terrorism. These people destroyed the good name and reputation of real honest, legitimate, peaceful and respectful activists. These people had only one motivation and that was to destroy a system they didn’t agree with, and further, destroy anything that stood in their way. These people are nothing but thugs who are totally lacking any ambition and desire to accomplish anything meaningful, and as a result, they decided to take their anger, their underachieving ideologies and accomplishments and hold an entire city hostage. Basically they were pissed of because they didn’t have things simply handed to them. These thugs think they are somehow entitled to all the same things that everyone has to work hard for, while they sit back and sponge off of everyone else’s hard work and complain when things are not handed to them. They blame everyone else rather than take responsibility for their own actions.
In the next two articles, I will discuss, in detail, the differences between the professional protestor and the real activist. Later on in this series, I will also identify the persons directly involved with the organization and the evolution of Occupy Toronto, and beyond, and roles they played then, and the roles they play now. The next article will look at “ The Professional Protestor” . Stay tuned ……
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