Canada is getting very close to the edge. Anyway following the events around Parliament Hill this week must worry about where this country is going. More and more, it seems to be following the very sad and dangerous example of other nations around the world where political activism and protest is turning increasingly aggressive and violent. The kind of intimidation and racist comments being yelled at Members of Parliament, Hill staff, security personnel and even members of the public visiting the seat of government is completely unacceptable (to use a tired cliche), and out of keeping with what has traditionally been understood as the Canadian character.
We have, unfortunately, become accustomed to that kind of behaviour in the United States since the rise of Trump, extreme social media posts, conspiracy theories, and anti-immigration protests. But that behaviour is spreading around the world, with similar deeply concerning activities taking place in European countries in particular. My own homeland, once known as “Ireland of the Welcomes’, and a nation that understands more than most what emigration means, has seen awful examples of mobs attacking and destroying buildings set aside for use by immigrants.
The comment by one woman verbally abusing a black security guard at one of these centres is only too typical of the kind of rhetoric of hate being spewed in other countries: “You’re not welcome here. You’re a different breed!” But it is too easy to simply dismiss this as ignorant and unthinking racism. There is much more behind this unhealthy trend than that, though there is a strong element of the ignorant and uninformed about it.
The fact is that this phenomenon is not new, it has been a constant feature of our history, coming to the surface at times of social and political uncertainty and insecurity. The relative peace of the years before the end of the Cold War is the exception, not the rule. The West, as it was known, was in a period of near-complacency, comfortable in its prosperity and strength, with a clear “enemy” in the East against which unity and a shared identity was essential and easy to understand.
But things get very unstable when empires fall apart, and both the Soviet Union and the West as a block fell apart after 1989, when that common enemy disappeared, temporarily, and internal divisions re-emerged within countries and between former allies. Ironically, peace and prosperity has led to a sense of social disintegration, as the infamous 1% grew wealthy at the expense of everyone else. Oligarchs in the former Soviet Union, newly-minted billionaires in the U.S. and Europe, the rising influence of social media companies and the obscene wealth of their owners, all joined with the massive disruption of globalisation, all combined to create an atmosphere of grievance, anger, and genuine suffering for many millions of people. Older class divisions evolved into conflict based on elites versus the masses, actually, a return to socio-political separations seen in previous eras and societies.
So, the current rise in angry and even violent clashes comes, not just from the extremism encouraged by platforms on-line, where people feel free to be more nasty, racist, and negative than they might be in real life. But the example of Trump and his MAGA gang have made it acceptable to carry that over into the real world. What has to be remembered is that there are genuine grievances behind much of what has brought all this about. People do feel threatened, poorer than they were, deprived of opportunities they felt they had a right to expect. As long as those inequalities continue, and continue to grow, there will be a strong foundation for this activity. But another danger exists and has already been demonstrated in the States, where the Republican Party has really sold its soul for power and popular support. Knowing the character of Trump and his ilk, they willingly killed their ethics, threw away their integrity and history, and compromised everything they once stood for.
Can it happen here? Most definitely, and it may well have already started. Aside from the activities outside Parliament last week, the behaviour inside the House was even more worrying. The Conservatives under Poilievre seem to be taking a lesson from the Republicans in that they’re indulging in populist rhetoric, nasty personal attacks on all opposition party leaders, and appealing to the very people who are attacking people on the Hill.
Will they continue down this road of copying the worst traits of the MAGA movement? Will traditional Conservatives stand by them if they do, as Republicans have in the States? Canada is close to the edge, and if we continue in that direction, we’ll go over.
Like it or not, we have to understand that this is how things started in Germany in the 1930’s, or Italy in the 1920’s, or Russia after 1917. Bullies on the streets, personal attacks on political opponents that are designed to create anger and hatred, political leaders encouraging, openly and without shame, those who are preaching violence and hatred and attacking the rule of law: we’re starting to see these things more and more in Canada. We can’t let party loyalty get in the way of national security. Look at the U.S., the collapse of that great experiment in Democracy. They are closer to that edge than we are, but where do we go from here?
