Letter to the Editor
Aug. 25th, 2007 09:33 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
velvetpageI still write them occasionally. I don't know if it will be printed, because there are several similar letters in the paper at the moment, but most of them were written before Stockwell Day chimed in to support the SQ's bald-faced lie about the incident, so that might mean I get published.
I’m incensed at the provocateur incident at the Montebello protest earlier this week. Entrapment is an ugly thing, especially when it could easily have gotten somebody badly hurt or killed, which is always a possibility when we’re talking about violent police reactions to protests.
I’m even more upset, though, at Stockwell Day’s echoing of the Sureté de Québec’s flat-out lie in their press release. I saw the video on Youtube before the SQ came out with their statement. The legitimate protesters had no rocks. The only people with rocks were the police, and they were being asked to put them down. They were exposed when they failed to comply, that is, when they continued to heft their rocks. Yet the SQ and Mr. Day insist it was the other way around, that the police officers were exposed because they refused to throw the rocks.
The whole incident reveals this government’s lack of respect for peaceful protest as a part of the democratic process, and for the individual protesters. At best, it indicates that Mr. Day didn’t bother to watch the video, but just took the SQ’s word on what happened. At worst, they are colluding to confuse the public and sway the tide of public opinion that is fast rising against them.
How many other protests have there been in recent years where violence broke out? How many times have the police started something so that they could then put it down? How can we trust that our law-enforcement officials are out to enforce the laws, rather than create situations where there is a broken law to be enforced? A police department’s work is much easier when the public trusts them to be operating in the public’s best interest, in an honest manner. The SQ has just made their job much harder by eroding public trust, and they have only themselves to blame.
As for Mr. Day, is it any wonder the public believes all politicians to be crooks when they do things like this?
I’m incensed at the provocateur incident at the Montebello protest earlier this week. Entrapment is an ugly thing, especially when it could easily have gotten somebody badly hurt or killed, which is always a possibility when we’re talking about violent police reactions to protests.
I’m even more upset, though, at Stockwell Day’s echoing of the Sureté de Québec’s flat-out lie in their press release. I saw the video on Youtube before the SQ came out with their statement. The legitimate protesters had no rocks. The only people with rocks were the police, and they were being asked to put them down. They were exposed when they failed to comply, that is, when they continued to heft their rocks. Yet the SQ and Mr. Day insist it was the other way around, that the police officers were exposed because they refused to throw the rocks.
The whole incident reveals this government’s lack of respect for peaceful protest as a part of the democratic process, and for the individual protesters. At best, it indicates that Mr. Day didn’t bother to watch the video, but just took the SQ’s word on what happened. At worst, they are colluding to confuse the public and sway the tide of public opinion that is fast rising against them.
How many other protests have there been in recent years where violence broke out? How many times have the police started something so that they could then put it down? How can we trust that our law-enforcement officials are out to enforce the laws, rather than create situations where there is a broken law to be enforced? A police department’s work is much easier when the public trusts them to be operating in the public’s best interest, in an honest manner. The SQ has just made their job much harder by eroding public trust, and they have only themselves to blame.
As for Mr. Day, is it any wonder the public believes all politicians to be crooks when they do things like this?
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(no subject)
Date: 2007-08-27 06:04 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2007-08-28 10:34 pm (UTC)I wish this weren't such a universal question. Some places are worse than others.