Canadian President Justin Trudeau has called the “freedom convoy” of truckers “fringe” and has called their vaccines skepticism “unacceptable” because it goes against the government narrative.

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Here’s a transcript of our conversation:

Emma: Hi, Brittany.

Brittany: Hi, Emma.

Emma: So today I wanted to talk about something very fascinating that is happening in Canada, and I’m not sure if we have any Canadian listeners on this podcast. If so, would be very curious to hear your thoughts on all of this as we’re just observing from one country over. But Canada has since the beginning of COVID taken a very, very strict authoritarian stance on COVID, and the United States has done that too. But I will say at least in my opinion, Canada’s has been a lot worse. Yeah. And I think a big part of that is because the United States still does have this undercurrent of individual liberty and really respecting individual rights. Like it’s such an important part of our laws and our system. And even though bureaucrats like to ignore that and politicians love to ignore that, the foundation is still there and in Canada, it’s just not quite the same. I couldn’t tell you much about their constitution, but I do know that they don’t have as much when it comes to their individual liberties, it’s not as important to their lawmakers and their government. And we can really see that stark difference, right now with COVID where Canada has a very, very strict vaccine mandate where, you know, if you, right now, for example, there was just a new law passed. If you’re unvaccinated and you want to go to the grocery store, you’re not allowed to go in without a health, basically government health official following you around making sure that you’re only buying quote unquote essential products. My goodness. Which is just insane to think about. And because of that, there has been a lot of pushback from Canadian citizens who want their independence and their freedom and to not have to take a certain medication that they may or may not believe is worth taking. And that’s a very basic right that we have to choose what goes into our bodies, but we’re seeing it happen in Canada, which to me is a really big warning sign, of what happens when we don’t, when we don’t respect our individual liberties and when our government forgets that we are free and that we don’t answer to them, with every little detail of our lives. And so, a bit of background there. Now this week there has been a freedom convoy of Canadian truckers who are protesting against these vaccine mandates. And I believe that this originally actually came from a certain mandate that was imposed on truckers. And I know that there’s something going on where our border between the United States and Canada is going to be closed off to unvaccinated truckers, which that is going to be an extreme disaster. Yes. We’ve already had chain problems. I cannot imagine how much worse those are gonna get when, you know, you take this large portion of people out of the supply chain. It’s just crazy to think that they would think that would be a good idea. But now these truckers have formed this long convoy, and I think it’s like hundreds of miles long. There are 50,000 people participating and it’s truck after truck after truck, and they’ve been driving all over Canada and protesting. And all along the way, there have been people on the side of the road wherever they pass through waving signs. And basically what they’re calling for is a complete end to the COVID rules that Canada has enacted, including the vaccine mandate. And something very interesting has happened. They decided to go to Ottawa. I, believe that’s how that’s pronounced, right? Ottawa? Yeah, yeah, Ottawa. It’s the Canadian capital. And that is where Justin Trudeau lives. And as this convoy has gotten bigger and bigger, it’s been harder and harder for people to ignore. At first they were like, oh, it’s just a few random people, then they were like, oh, this is a dangerous minority of crazy people, basically. And Justin Trudeau actually had a statement, Brittany, I have the quote here in the notes. Do you wanna read the exact quote of what he said?

Brittany: So it says, the small fringe minority of people who are on their way to Ottawa who are holding unacceptable views that they’re expressing do not represent the views of Canadians who have been there for each other, who know that the following that, oh, sorry, excuse me. Who know that the following of the science and stepping up to protect each other is the best way to continue to ensure our freedoms are rights and our values as a country.

Emma: We should unpack that. There’s a lot, in there. It’s, gosh, what a crazy quote. So let’s start by talking about this small fringe minority. That to me is a very interesting tactic that he’s trying to do to basically discount these people that are protesting him and say, well, it’s not that many people, in reality, this convoy is set to be, to break the world record by 10 times over for the largest truck parade slash really convoy ever by 10 times. Wow. That’s how big it is. So this is not a small French minority. It’s at least 50,000 people. Also, the part that he says that scares me the most out of all of this is that they are holding unacceptable views like Brittany. What do you think qualifies as an unacceptable view to Justin Trudeau?

Brittany: Oh, I was gonna say, I think he and I have very different perspectives of that, but I would imagine Trudeau doesn’t like anything that’s going against his narrative of, what, you know, what COVID is and what it’s doing. Yeah. And also just all this great reset narrative stuff, right? So anything that goes against the government’s story or the government’s approved views, that’s gonna be fringe, it’s gonna be unacceptable.

Emma: Yep, exactly. And, that’s the interesting thing he’s saying. They don’t represent the views of Canadians who have been there for each other. And he’s basically saying, these people are not good people. They don’t represent what we want them to represent, so we don’t like them. And then he says, you know, following the science and stepping up to protect each other is the best way to ensure our freedoms and our rights. That is so scary. Basically what he’s saying is that you only get freedom if you follow the rules, which that’s not freedom, that’s not rights. That’s basically the government bargaining with you and bargaining with your individual liberties to get you to be compliant. And the real irony with saying something like that is that when you cooperate and you do what they want, you’re actually giving your freedoms away, and no, they’re not going to give them back to you. That’s, what’s been happening in Canada and in the United States for a long time. So, it’s pretty crazy to me to see that. And the funny thing that has also happened through this is Brittany, I don’t know if you saw this, but as the truckers, like the same day that they said, we’re gonna go to Ottawa and we’re going to protest and cause basically a bunch of gridlock, they’re gonna drive the trucks into the city and cause really bad traffic. Which is to me a very fascinating form of protest. Yeah. I haven’t really heard of that before, but I love that it’s peaceful and it, they’re getting their government’s attention. And the day that they announced that they were going to go to the Capitol City where Justin Trudeau lives and do that, Justin Trudeau says, I was recently exposed to someone with COVID, I tested negative, but I’m still going to work from home out of an abundance of caution. So he basically says, I’m not going in to work. I don’t wanna deal with this. These people are, you know, they’re these crazy people. I don’t wanna hear from them. And now actually, he has evacuated the city.

Brittany: Yeah, I was gonna say, I heard this morning that he’s left, I think he’s in the US or something now, right?

Emma: I have no idea. But they, basically whisked him away to a quote-unquote like a secret location where he’s safe, him and his family, which to me is just like hilarious because there has been no violence at these protests, but there are all of these media interviews now saying like, oh, the police say that they’re scared of violence and, you know, all of this stuff. And it’s so much fear-mongering and it’s like these people aren’t even, or at the time they weren’t even there yet and they’re already saying, this is so toxic, this is so bad. And the funny thing to me too is that you know, these protests, the protestors call themselves the freedom convoy or the freedom truckers, and the media refers to them constantly as the anti-vaccine truckers. They’re like, these are the anti-vaxxer truckers. And the funny thing is, a lot of the people p participating in this protest have been vaccinated, but they understand the danger of forcing everyone to take part in something that they may or may not agree with, or they may or may not be okay with or maybe they’ve waived the risks and the benefits and it doesn’t quite make sense to them. So, that’s actually something that’s really encouraging to me, is seeing the amount of people recently that have stepped up and said, I have gotten the vaccine, but I do not support making everyone else take it. And that’s, that’s pretty awesome to me to see. But it’s gonna be very fascinating to see what the Canadian government does about this. And there was even one thing, I actually heard about this because Jordan Peterson was tweeting angrily about this Nova Scotia, which is a part of Canada, actually outlawed people lining up on the sides of the road to support the freedom truckers. So now there’s a law there where you cannot stand on the side of the road and wave a sign. And they basically did it to punish people who were being a part of this convoy. So not only are they trying to say, yes, you have to take this vaccine, or you can’t go to the grocery store without a babysitter. They’re saying, we aren’t even going to let you protest against these laws. Which that is like, that’s very, very scary. And we, we’ve seen all sorts of examples through history where that does not go well. It does not take us to a good place.

Brittany: I think most times in history, it hasn’t taken us to a good place. And I don’t know if you’ve listened to a lot of these truckers’ stories, but like there was one trucker who’s supporting his whole family and he just, he doesn’t wanna get the vaccine for many reasons, and he’s allowed to have those reasons and he’s, yeah. Basically telling Trudeau, you know, like, I shouldn’t have to lose my livelihood because of this, and to make matters worse. And you said something like this, earlier, is like, the supply chain issues are already so bad. Yeah. Do you really want to alienate truck drivers bringing supplies back and forth, you know, from US and Canada, it is nuts to me that we would rather,  fall on the sword, so to speak. Yeah. To, say that we believe these views about COVID or that people must comply and risk the economy tanking more than already is. Right. And they would, yeah. They, what they prefer to do because they’d rather say like, we’re in charge, blah, blah, blah, then do it is Right. And so, like, as we face economic uncertainty and I think it’s only gonna get worse. You have to ask yourself, who’s doing this? Whose fault is this? Yeah. And I think you’ll find that its governments.

Emma: It is government. And unfortunately, there are a lot of, you know, half government, half business places that are supporting it too. Like we talk all the time about big tech shutting people down in the media. And I, once again, I am all for businesses doing whatever they want with their business. I think that’s very important that we protect their rights to, you know, run their business the way they want to. But it does concern me when I see businesses in bed with the government, basically, you know, working together, scheming together. That is extremely concerning. So, like we always say, you know, ask questions, read into things, and don’t always just listen when the government tells you someone is a crazy person with an unacceptable view. Cuz a lot of the times they are just trying to play defense for their own teams. So we are gonna wrap it up here, guys. Thank you so much for listening and we will talk to you all again soon.

Brittany: Talk to you soon.