[osigurdson]

Given that they Nazi flags were not a statistically significant component of the protest (perhaps only one person of unknown motivation) a serious person would not have mentioned it at all. Of course, today's politicians in Canada are generally not serious people it seems which is unfortunate because of their outsized impact on everyone's lives.

I'd never heard of this senator before watching this video, but he really did summarize the situation well and seems to me to be a legitimately serious person unlike many of our current politicians (all parties).

https://youtu.be/YIZO3OhqCUY

[middleclick]

One Nazi flag, many Confederate flags, and white nationalists in the group:

https://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/trudeau-conservative-swasti...

> A small number of the assembled protesters have displayed Nazi insignia, including the swastika and yellow stars of David, while others have flown the Confederate flag during these anti-government demonstrations.

> Other groups have since attached themselves to the movement, including some far-right and white nationalist elements.

What should we call these people? Your being upset at them being called Nazis says more about you than Trudeau.

Note that the protest organizers made no attempt to dissociate themselves from these and only did so in the later days of the protests.

Trudeau's criticism of his conservative colleagues was more about them not criticizing these people (which they didn't) and not calling them Nazis.

It's also telling that the protests against lockdowns criticizing Trudeau, calling for his death (https://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/trudeau-protest-racist-deat...) were not addressed towards Doug Ford, the Ontario premier responsible for the lockdowns. No politician in Canada should get any death threats but the point I am making was no criticism was directed towards Doug Ford for something he did (the longest lockdown in North America in Ontario) but towards Trudeau, who had no role in it.

That tells you everything you need to need to know, that is, if you want to know it and not be willfully obtuse.

[osigurdson]

> A small number of the assembled protesters have displayed Nazi insignia, including the swastika and yellow stars of David, while others have flown the Confederate flag during these anti-government demonstrations.

So, it sounds like there was a small number of such people. Of course, if that's not true, I'm happy to be convinced otherwise. I will not accept an argument based on guilt by association however (or in this case guilt by proximity which is even more absurd).

Finally, the truckers were protesting the federal trucker mandates (with their trucks no less) so it was not a particularly abstract demonstration. I guess these people were in the right location by your calculus but non-truckers should have disbursed to protest at their own provincial capitals. That is a reasonable argument but I think many of the protesters were also there in support of the truckers.

[middleclick]

https://globalnews.ca/news/8543281/covid-trucker-convoy-orga...

> Now, as the convoy descends on Ottawa with the stated aim of opposing all COVID-19 mandates, anti-hate experts allege those with white nationalist and Islamophobic views don’t just represent the fringes of the movement but are among the organizers of the convoy.

There is no guilt by association. These are the people themselves.

[StayTrue]

What do you call people that hang out with Nazis? It sounds like you are nitpicking that adjacent white supremacist groups with their own iconography (and merch) are somehow different.

[causality0]

That's sort of the issue with informal groups and protests. Anybody can show up, and they may or may not be rejected by the crowd at large. When the loonies are kicked out, it doesn't make the news. A left-leaning example of this is when Boogaloo Boys participate in Black Lives Matter protests. I'm not saying they're equally common, but the concept is the same.

[osigurdson]

I don't think anyone believes that these groups were a statistically significant component of the protests. Of course, if we legitimately think that Nazis and white-supremacist groups present a serious problem in Canada we should be addressing it - not using it as a kind of guilt by proximity argument to delegitimize protests of other causes.