Desmond Cole, journalist, organizer, activist and author of The Skin We're In, provides a thoughtful analysis on where the Defund the Police movement is right now. It is hard to hear at times, but incredibly constructive. It is more of a discussion of where we need to go than lamenting on past political choices.

Although, we do start off by asking Desmond how he feels about Toronto Mayor Olivia Chow's decision to aware the Toronto Police Services every penny they asked for. Considering the article he wrote for Ricochet right after the election, we weren't all that surprised by his answer.

Find out if he thinks enough was done between Chow's victory and the first budget, and what needs to be done next.

We also discuss the harm police do, both with their violence and the suppression of tactics used to keep power in check. It specifically includes just some the stories of the many young men in Canada harmed at the hand of Police, like Devon Fowlin and Sammy Yatim.

All of our content is free - made possible by the generous sponsorships of our Patrons. If you would like to support us: Patreon

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Resources:

• CBC: Police Shootings Spectacularly Increasing
• With Olivia Chow, Toronto might be worth fighting for | Ricochet
• Journalist Desmond Cole Asks: Do Black Lives Matter in Canada?
• Fundraiser by Desmond Cole : Help Devon Fowlin continue his recovery

Greetings friends. My name is Jess McLean and I'm here to provide you with some blueprints

of disruption. This weekly podcast is dedicated to amplifying the work of activists, examining

power structures and sharing the success stories from the grassroots. Through these discussions,

we hope to provide folks with the tools and the inspiration they need to start to dismantle

capitalism, decolonize our spaces and bring about the political revolution that we know

we need. Who keeps us safe? Is it the police? No. We know that's not true. We know the harm

that the police constantly cause to our communities and we're used to seeing lines of cops at our

demonstrations, evicting encampments, supporting illegal evictions and generally opposing our

every effort to bring change and support to the most vulnerable members of our communities.

Those same communities are often the most victimized by police. We keep us safe. However, there's

a lot of work to do before we see any genuine defunding of the police in our municipalities

or better yet, abolishment. Look no further than Toronto City Hall who recently caved against

Toronto Police lobbying efforts to increase their budget even further than what was already

being increased. In this episode, Jess and I talked to Desmond Cole and learned so much

about exactly what work needs to be done. Desmond has so much knowledge to share and he challenges

us in exactly the way we need to be challenged in order to bring effective change. I cannot

emphasize enough how much I took away from this episode and I'm sure you will agree. Let's

listen in. Hello there, Desmond. Can you introduce yourself to the audience, please? Thank you.

My name is Desmond Nicole. I'm a journalist, author, and activist based here in Toronto.

We're really excited to have you on the show for a bunch of reasons. We often lean on your

work to do some of the stuff that we do, but we know that you are very versed in Toronto

politics, in particular the efforts to defund the police and hold politicians accountable.

We especially kind of went over your article that you wrote immediately following Olivia

Chow's Merrill victory last year. And we can safely say you went in eyes wide open. I think

there's a lot of people that have seen developments happen and they are heartbroken and shocked.

But rereading that article again today, you know, you mentioned police 15 times. I did

a search of crime just to see. You were pretty critical of where she might land in terms of

police. And I think I had forgotten about that because I was surprised when Olivia Chow capitulated.

the complete funding request for Toronto Police, even though I think I've spent the last few

months complaining about everything she does. I'm often pretty biased there. How do you look

back at that article now? Do you feel vindicated, or do you feel like perhaps she even fell short

of your expectations? Well, first of all, Jessa and Santiago, thank you so much for having

me. That's a pleasure to be with both of you. No, I don't feel vindicated. I think vindication

comes maybe with like a sense of relief that something turned out the way that you hoped

or thought that it would. And there isn't really any of that here. It's always really important

to set our expectations in a fair way. And I did talk in that piece a lot about Olivia Chow's

record coming into, you know, becoming the mayor of Toronto earlier this year. And I think her

record... Let me say first of all that there probably isn't a politician that I can think

of off the top of my head. There isn't a person that I can think of who would have a chance

of leading the city of Toronto, who wouldn't do most of the things that Olivia Chow is doing

right now. I expected her to do these things not only because of her record and her past,

but because of the climate of the city of Toronto and because of the kind of horizon. for what

I think is possible for somebody leading our city right now. And so in that regard, maybe

I would attribute less of this to Olivia Chow individually, and more of it to the trajectory

of the city, and more importantly, our council. So there are 26 people, including Olivia Chow

on city council. And from what I saw, 21 of them, I believe, voted in favor of a $20 million

increase for the police, rather than I think the $7.5 million that was put on the table

by Chow at the beginning of February. So if she had voted against the increase, the full

$20 million versus $7.5, it would have still passed easily. And what would have happened

is you have a mayor who looks on her first budget— like on a major issue, she's out of sync with

the rest of the city. Now, that is not to excuse Olivia Chow, one inch. That's not what I'm

saying. What I'm saying is that asking her to sweep in and turn on its head the city that

we've existed in for a very long time now was never realistic. So I didn't expect Olivia

Chow to come in and immediately challenge the police. I did think that her offering 7.5 million

versus 20. was better. A smaller increase to the police is better than a larger one. I would

prefer a reduction of police budgets, of course. I wonder if she proposed the 7.5 million to

appease some of her critics, knowing that she was always going to vote for the full amount,

or if really the complete full court press by the police association in Toronto changed her

mind and made her feel like it wouldn't be a politically safe move. to give them less than

they asked for. I don't really know. It doesn't matter though, because the Council of Toronto

wanted that increase. The increase was moved by Amber Morley, who a lot of people were telling

me anyway was going to be a progressive breath of fresh air. And I mean, I- We maybe you guys

caught Amber Morley earlier this year inviting people to come skating with her and the cops

This is the city that we live in like progressives Are nevertheless terrified of any real challenge

To police power or I say terrified as if I know what's in their hearts I don't know if they're

terrified or if they just believe in it Maybe they believe that the police are going to solve

all of our issues Maybe they believe that there's no alternative in toronto policing Olivia Chow,

and it would have been unrealistic for people to think that she could somehow strong arm

what would she have needed. Nine more votes or so that she didn't get of people who just

because the mayor told them so would automatically change their vote on. the most contentious

issue in Toronto politics, that was never going to happen. So this is a loss for everybody.

It's a loss for people who believed in Olivia Chow. It's a loss for those of us who didn't

believe she was gonna do anything, but still want dramatic changes in policing. It's a loss

for the city of Toronto that has capitulated another huge chunk of its budget to the cops.

It's a loss for black and indigenous and racialized and poor people, because this gives the cops

more resources and an emboldened kind of spirit to harm us. No one has won here except the

police lobby and the police mob itself. And they've been lining up wins, haven't they Desmond?

I mean, not just a budget, but it feels like they have become the go-to solution for everything

in the city. And now that you mention it, it did enter my mind that this was always the

planned because we go back to it often, but that first tweet that she sent out following

October 7th was... direct call to Toronto police and she's kind of continued that need for policing

in response to protest, right? There was the other motion that Toronto council passed recently

that they're going to earmark money to surveil and monitor protests as though it's a criminal

element. And your article is full of, yeah, like you say, her history of using police as

a community solution. And to be honest, we've never really heard her talk about defunding

the police, but... No, and so sorry to cut you, but why anybody would have thought that when

it's never been part of her past or any mainstream politicians past? That's what I'm kind of wondering.

I think it was the last capitulation that really pissed me off because it meant like all of

that shit. Like they spent some of their budget trying to get more money and going in the face

of a lot of the efforts of the people that we call on the show and... that we believe in.

And so it was really frustrating to give them that extra W. And I don't know what that $12.5

million actually does for police. It almost seemed like a matter of principle that they

had to win that. And then she gave it to them, just like she gave Ford Ontario Place. And

I know like we're not opening that because we could go on about that forever. But I feel

like there's no fight. there. So I want to ask you in your article, you make it clear that,

you know, it should be business as usual for organizers. There should be no relenting. There

should be no softball playing, because obviously we can't rely on single politicians to change

what I'd like to get into later in that, that Toronto mentality that seems impervious to

the defund the police movement. It's, I think it's still a little bit surprising. Do you

think enough pressure was put on her in the few months between her victory and the first

big budget? Do you feel like people took your advice? Or were some folks maybe sitting back

and giving her the space and she didn't feel enough pressure? It's a good question. I mean,

how do we answer, right? Toronto is a very big place with a lot of different interests. I

think... that there was a lot of pressure brought to bear on Olivia Chow by a lot of people who

have been saying for years that policing is not going to solve our problems, policing is

going to exacerbate our problems, policing is itself a harm. Those, I think, voices have

become more educated, more numerous, more vocal in the last several years, and I think that's

good. The police union put up a very serious counter-campaign to scare everyone. Yeah, they

tried really hard to scare people. And, you know, just imagine your worst nightmare if

you don't give us any every penny that we asked for. And let's remember what we would have

been, I don't know, grateful for if Olivia Chow had stuck to what she said in the beginning

and if Consul had somehow gone along with her, which I don't think was ever going to happen,

is still an increase to the police budget. we were always looking at an increase in 2024. Let's start there. I think you're right, Jess,

that it bring up what's been happening with the massive organizing and mobilizing for Palestine. And that happened very early on into Olivia Chastainer.

And so for those who were still holding on to hope that she was somehow gonna be different on many of these issues,

I think she dispelled that right away by kind of doing the, you know, je téléphone à la police meme and... literally

being like, you all are in the streets, we're gonna have to see what the police think about

this. And she's kind of stuck to that. She tried to backtrack a little bit when she got the

biggest backlash probably of her political career for doing that. But this is how institutional

forces work. My question is this, I live downtown in Toronto. Were people in neighborhoods outside

of downtown, were they calling? for the defunding of the police as loudly as some of the people

around the neighborhoods that I'm in. Were they doing that? If not, why not? Were we a united

city making this call? Or was this coming from a lot of the pockets that actually were a big

part of Olivia Chow's base of support? Whereas she thought, yeah, maybe some of you loud downtown

people are angry about a police increase, but generally people aren't going to be too fussed

about this. A lot of people voted for her in other parts of the city. Maybe she thought

they're just not going to they're not going to push back on me too much if I don't do this.

I think where organizing continues to fail in the city is having that citywide response,

mobilization, coordination, talking to one another. acting together. If you have the ability to

go downtown on a Wednesday morning and afternoon to disrupt what's happening on budget day and

make yourself visible, that's good. I'm not dissing that. I've been that person. I am that

person many times over the years. Not everybody can do that. Not everybody who, say, lives

in Malvern can come downtown for nine in the morning on a weekday. and make their presence

felt. And I think that sometimes because a lot of the people who do that see and know and

work together, they forget about the entire rest of the city that isn't going to voice

its displeasure in the ways that we are, or is not. part of this conversation in the same

way. I saw people putting out petitions, I shared even some of them, to do things like freeze

the police budget. I think the police budget should be massively slashed, but I still supported

people who called for a freeze. I don't agree with a freeze ideologically, but because I'm

like, a freeze to what end? We have to say what the purpose of freezing the police budget is,

and if we believe that the police are causing as much harm as they are, a freeze is nowhere

near the correct response, right? but I still support those things when they're out there

because I want to see us moving in the right direction. But like how many of the thousands

of people who signed that petition live outside of the downtown core and are not on social

media every 10 minutes? Again, I'm not critiquing that. Who would I be to critique that? I'm

on social media a lot myself. I live downtown, but. Is there a mass mobilization of people?

Or is there a really loud, visible cadre of people? And we think that should be enough

and we're surprised when it isn't. I guess that's kind of what I would ask. I think Olivia Chow

was always gonna go this way. Council was definitely always gonna go this way. And certainly the

police repression since October 7th made it probably more likely that Olivia Chow was too

afraid and others too afraid to stand up to the police. What you're talking about there

reminds me a lot of... a conversation we had during the election with Chloe Brown, right,

about the importance of connecting outside of the downtown core, outside of, you know, what

we typically see on social media. And I admit that I haven't been thinking about that as

much as of late. And so I don't really... I guess the question is, how do we begin that

process of connecting our movements more with the different areas of Toronto? I think of...

because there's a lot to be done, especially in places like Scarborough, for example, right?

There's a lot that needs to be done and Scarborough issues are just not anyone's priority right

now when they really should be. And I guess, how do we go about... that change? Well, we

certainly don't do it by waking up a month before the budget happens and being like, oh my God,

we've got to stop this increase from happening. We could be working on that for the next many

years before we saw any more fruit. But it is, the word connecting Santiago is I think correct

because there are already people out there who are doing this work in Scarborough, in North

York, in North Etobicoke, right? There are already people who are doing this. And I just think

that there's like a deep disconnect and a lack of coordination. So I don't know, like. Where's

the canvassing? Where are the door knocking campaigns where we actually go into communities,

not during an election to support a candidate, and knock on people's doors and say, we're

really concerned about the cops? Where are the events at councilors public events where we

go not just to disrupt, but to... challenge their own supporters to be like, why do you

support a police increase? Why don't you care? Or why aren't you more concerned? Why aren't

you doing something about all the harm that the police are causing? The critique that I

think I'm making here is that a lot of what I see happening, which ends up being visible,

is initiated online and it stays there. And I think we're not gonna get to level two until...

We are more out publicly in those ways, challenging, having conversations, building trust with people,

and asking people to join us. Because again, you can make visibility online. You can gather.

a few thousand people who are quite active in this city, again, many of whom are active in

a very particular way downtown. And when there's something going on, like a budget, you can

get them to make a lot of noise and they can even get some media attention. Because the

media also loves to stay downtown and doesn't actually want to go and ask people in North

Etobicoke how they feel about the police budget, if it doesn't have to. That's what I want to

see. I want to see canvassing. I want to see relationship building and signing people up

in different membership organizations. so that they are actually working on these things.

The way that Jane Finch actually against poverty has been doing for like 20 years. The way that

groups in Scarborough who were fighting against a closed circuit television cameras have been

doing. Like I want us to be able to expand and connect and... Think about this less as a one-off,

we need to stop this thing from happening, and a long, slow grind of building up public capacity.

Yeah, I remember that was something, a lot of memories are coming back now of things from

the election cycle. We were talking about how this perhaps could be the opportunity to stop

being reactive and start actually... planning moves, like instead of having to constantly

be responding to all the horrible things that are happening around us, we can actually try

and, you know, change something as opposed to stop something. And I feel like that feeling

has dissipated quite a bit. Well, it's so frustrating to hear, you're right, but it's frustrating

to hear slow grind when it feels like an emergency. I totally get what you're talking about, making

those connections. Some movements have been around longer and have built networks. The

climate change movement seems particularly well at going local, deep canvassing, the Workers

Action Center and whatnot. But I guess when it's an issue that's just so pressing, I mean,

you shared that CBC article not that long ago. And what does it say? spectacularly unrelenting

rise in fatal police shootings. I mean, I think Alberta was the most shocking there. It was

the increases were abominable. I mean, not every province experienced it, but it was right across

the country. And that was just the fatal shootings. The records there were awful. The article,

I'll link it in the show notes, it tries to downplay it a lot. I wish perhaps Desmond,

they had called you for this one. because, you know, they're, oh, but 70% of them were armed,

but that means 30% of those folks were unarmed, 30%. And there's no records on the race of

most of the people shot by police because they just don't make the news. And, you know, people

are dying after wellness checks and calls for just, you know, unwanted people on properties

and whatnot. And it just seems like so much as... There's so much evidence out there, so

much bad press for police. Even the article mentions like it's a disdain for police. And

that's why these, there's confrontations between civilians and police is because we have no

more respect for them. Um, that's a bit of circular logic, but you know, everybody seems to be.

Aware of the defund the police movement, but they're also aware of the harms police cause.

I know there's a lot of people out there that still have the law and order. goggles on, but

I feel like there's been a lot of movement there. And I'm just wondering how, other than the

deep canvassing, like what, what do you think is stopping most people from looking at defunding

the police as a serious issue? Or some people, or as a possibility even, like that's a hurdle

we have to cross with a lot of people. Like they just cannot fathom a world without. police

like it's just not in their realm of imagination. And they laugh it up, but you present these

numbers like that article or the amount of funds. Like, I don't think people realize, we did

an episode on it a while ago, but like some municipalities are spending like 50% of their

money on cops. And what are they resistant to? Why is there no appetite for this yet? despite

all of the evidence before people. Right, so first of all, there is a huge appetite for

it and it isn't organized. That's what I'm trying to say. There's a huge, huge appetite for this.

So for example, don't you think it's weird that even though spaces like Toronto Community Housing

are among the most policed spaces in the city of Toronto, that there aren't all of these

housing organized groups or tenants groups who are speaking up about policing? Like, isn't

that odd? Wouldn't they be the most likely people to speak out since they're experiencing some

of the harshest outcomes? It is out there. These sentiments are, but they're not organized.

And I think even among people who are experiencing things like this, there might sometimes be

a sentiment that what we wish we could have out of change for policing is not really possible

and achievable. Let me go back. This issue of... the kind of expanding fatal police activity

in Canada in the last couple of years, right? So I brought up that CBC article as well so

I could look at it again while we were talking. And it's 85 people, at the time that the article

was written, 85 people in Canada last year shot by the police, 41 of them fatally shot. It's

really hard to get complete numbers. And remember, shot does not mean beaten to death, does not

mean died in custody of unknown causes. I didn't even think of that. Well, the kind of breadth

of police violence is so expansive that sometimes it's actually hard to conceive of it. So I

wanna say first off that these numbers give us an indication of how bad things are, but

the vast, vast majority of people who are harmed by the police are not shot and are not killed.

And I think part of why we're not where we would like to be is because we live in a country

whose biggest reaction ever against the police came after a police killing of a black person

in a different country. The George Floyd era is over, y'all. It's over. But we thought when

it was happening... that something was changing in this country. Something was changing. Our

awareness was changing. A certain level of outrage and urgency was definitely growing and has

been growing in this country. I am happy that has happened and I don't want to discredit

it. I think Robin Maynard said it really well when she said we went from Black Lives Matter

as a slogan, as a rallying cry, to defund the police, a specific policy demand. And that's

when the police were like, ah, shit, we gotta do something about this because Black Lives

Matter is bad enough, but now they're actually calling for something that we absolutely cannot

afford to see. And you see how across Canada, the police have been actually lying and saying

that they have been defunded, which none of them have. And they say, well, we need more

money because you see they defunded us and then now there's all these bad things happening.

Now, it's not true, but they've used that rhetoric. But let me go back to George Floyd. People

in Canada know George Floyd's name, they know George Floyd's story. Many of them watched

the last 10 minutes of George Floyd's life. I can't watch that video, I will never watch

that video. I don't need to watch it. But how many people in Canada who know what happened

to George Floyd can name anyone in their own country who's been killed by the police in

recent years? A lot of them can't name a single person. Yet we were led to believe that the

outrage over what happened to George Floyd was somehow gonna translate into us completely

overhauling our local policing systems. That is not realistic. The amount of, so there was

like an awakening and it was a big step forward and maybe. we have taken for granted that was

going to get us a lot further ahead than it has. And maybe we also didn't calculate the

extreme backlash, which I'm describing now. which the police have engaged in since all

of this Black Lives Matter, defund the police, abolish the police stuff has been going on.

Maybe we didn't calculate that the police were not going to sit there and allow us to dismantle

them. They worked very hard to build their fucking paramilitary empire, and they're not just going

to give it up because some civilians are angry with them. So I think that's part of it, Jessa,

is that the sensationalism of watching George Floyd be murdered. The grotesqueness of thinking

that watching a person die is like an educational awakening experience when what it actually

is, is it's just titillation. It doesn't actually inform the mind. It doesn't honor all of the

people around you who have had things happen to them who you're ignoring because you watched

George Floyd die and think it's horrible. And so that was only going to get us so far. And

it's gotten us as far now as I think that it can. And we have to be at a place in our country

when we know the names of people who have been killed here, but also that we can appreciate

the broader scope of policing that isn't just about murdering somebody. I mean, if you go

to the Special Investigation Unit website for Ontario, it's almost daily that there's a report.

an update, a decision about police harming someone in the province of Ontario. Sometimes there

are multiple reports and releases in a day about police brutality. Almost none of those ever

even make it to court, let alone the news. let alone the news, but let me go a level deeper

now, because I said, you don't have to get shot, right? And you're like, ah, I'm not thinking

about that. Okay, so you don't have to get shot to have an SIU report. You do have to get shot,

killed, severely injured by the SIU's definition, which is like very narrow definition. So like

the police have to break a bone in your body, or you have to lose a limb. The definition

of serious injury under the SIU is very narrow. And there's been a lot of cases of people who

have been hurt real bad by the police, and it never even warranted an SIU investigation.

So not only do the vast majority of people not get killed by the police to be hurt by them,

the vast majority of people who get hurt by the police, the vast, vast majority, don't

even have their situation investigated because it's not deemed to be serious enough. Let me

give you an example. I know I'm talking a lot here. You just put a lot on the table for me,

Jessa. The story of a 15-year-old boy, okay, in Jane and Finch recently, who was punched

repeatedly in the face by a Toronto police officer. This one did go to the Special Investigations

Unit. And after reviewing it, the SIU decided that they were going to clear the police officer

who punched a 15-year-old boy six times in his face and head. Offhand, do you know what the

clear rate is? Oh, in my book, which came out in 2020, I did a tabulation over several years.

I think the number was 94. percent, but I would have to look. It is well above 90 percent.

It's well above 90 percent. The police will tell you, well, just looking at the percentage

of police who are cleared doesn't tell you anything. Like, there isn't an expected number of cops

who should be getting charged. I would argue that any civilian who punches someone six times

in the face is going to be charged. It doesn't mean that they're going to be convicted of

a crime. It just means that it's going to be tried in court. going down to this 15 year

old boy, if you read... The SIU report on this, or you read a news article about it, I've got

one up right here. Let me describe how the SIU justifies not charging a police officer who

punched a 15-year-old six times in his face. SIU Director Joseph Martino looked into whether

the six punches the officer landed on the boy during the arrest were legally justified. He

found the officer was within his rights when he punched the boy the first three times. As

for the three additional punches, Martino said, strictly speaking, I do not think it was objectively

necessary to strike those additional blows. Unquote. However, he noted that while he accepts

that one or more of the punches were the cause to the serious injuries the boy suffered, quote,

I am unable to conclude with any confidence that the officer comported himself other than

within the limits of the criminal law throughout their engagement. As such, there is no basis

for proceeding with charges in this case. What a farce. That reminds me of when Sammy Ateem

got shot, I think, nine times by James Forsillo, and a court said, the first few shots that

you shot at this boy alone on a streetcar were fine. It's the second volley of shots that

we had a problem with. And they ended up convicting James Forsillo of attempted murder, even though

he actually killed Sammy Ateem by shooting him. There is always an out for the police. We have

to figure out a way to engage people in conversations that say this kind of violence is never going

to stop. It's not going to stop as long as there are police existing the way that they do today,

and that we have the right to say no more of this. We have the right to ask for and demand

something else. And I think we need to leave behind the sensationalism. And the energy,

not the energy, the energy of the George Floyd time was good. But we need to leave behind

that kind of like, oh my God, something's about to happen right now. Like, this is the change.

Like we are seeing it right now because the whole world's talking about this. That's where

the slow grind stuff we have to get back to. That was an awakening and it set us a lot further

forward than we've been. for many years as a country in general. But until we are naming

the people in our own communities who this is happening to, until we're getting as angry

about it happening locally as we did for one person safely far away in another country,

until we're willing. Do you know that when we ask people to just do a basic thing, like call

their counselor. You know how afraid people are, guys, to sometimes pick up the phone and

have to have a conversation just like with a staff member in a counselor that they represent

because challenging authority in general is so hard. And that's what I wanted to say ultimately,

Jessa, is that the reason we're not there yet is because challenging authority is like, for

a reason, one of the most difficult things you can ask people to do, even if it's making a

phone call. And a phone call ain't gonna get us defunding of the police. And that's why

there's so much more work to be done. Yeah, no, even with a script, some folks, it's a

hard barrier to get past. I wanna go back to something you said, though, and explore a possibility.

We spoke of the physical harms that police do and that a lot of people are aware of. But

I think perhaps one of the keys to Connecting the movements towards this end lies in the,

maybe not so much now, but less obvious harms that police do, that are slowly becoming more

obvious, I think, to organizers. In particular, the examples that we can provide for the pro-Palestinian

movement and the use of police at York University, showing up for lectures. And you know, we posted

video from Anna Lippmann. showing just walls of police being used to direct marches to block

people. Just what most, the Avenue Road example, those folks described like 50 cop cars showing

up to push them off of an overpass. And people can go back and listen to the details of just

how many police resources were used for. Although people were physically harmed there, it's—

that infringement on our democratic rights, right, and our ability to organize these other

movements. So perhaps if we emphasize those harms as well, so it goes beyond the violence

that we've already been exposed to, that we've already kind of reacted to and somewhat mobilized

around, but that it doesn't become like that kind of niche issue, that it becomes intrinsically

tied with the needs of all of the movements, because surely... Like overall, that we talk

about the political revolution that we need, and the police will not let that happen either.

Right? So they're there to protect not just capital, but power. The same power structures

were desperate to dismantle themselves. So I think having movements understand that better,

even if it's a selfish reason, you know, because my movement can't succeed with overfunded police,

right, with a military police force here. We're never going to. be able to disrupt the way

that we need to and can understand the urgency there that it becomes part of that really important

need before we can really do a lot of other things that we need to do. I think that coming

at this from any angle that relates to people's daily lives is valuable. I've been interested,

for example, to see people who cycle through High Park start to get really mobilized against

police in the last couple of years because the police started going into High Park and ignoring

the cars speeding through the park and stopping cyclists to try and ticket them. And then kind

of upping their presence in that neighborhood when the cyclists started organizing and being

like, hey, you see how these guys are wasting our resources? The police got spiteful and

just did it twice as hard, right? And this has actually like awakened a lot of people who

I don't think were really paying attention when a lot of us have been talking about this for

years. Now again. They are downtown, there's a specific demographic. I still want them to

organize and mobilize and agitate, but that's one entry point. I'll give you another one.

I was in Mississauga today, different city, same shit. On here Ontario street, there's

a lot of construction going on. And as this construction's happening, I'm there early this

morning, there's an area that's really torn up and a lot of machinery driving through.

I counted six police cruisers in the stretch of three or four blocks. Police cruisers sitting

in the middle of the median area with their lights on and flashing. Not an officer to be

seen because they're just chilling in the car on their phones. They're not outside. They're

not engaging with anyone. They're probably filming TikToks. Who knows what they're doing, man.

This also is part of like... the mob, just giving people work because you control an entity that

people in power cannot say no to. And I'm not saying the revolution's gonna happen when people

get mad at cops in construction sites. I'm just saying that there's a thousand different avenues

through which I think we can start to have these conversations. I will say though, the most

important avenue and the one that I think takes the longest amount of time to start working

on people on, even if they have some reservations about the police, is that these issues are

always personalized. So what about you when you have a problem? How are you going to feel

if the police don't come to your house and deal with your issue? And as trite as that is, it

works. People might see 50 cops coming to Avenue Road to go after some pro-Palestinian demonstrators

and say, what a waste of resources, that's so wrong. But they're not gonna get all the way

to therefore take away their budgets without something more personal, something more internalized

and reflective and thoughtful. That's not again, reaction to something so sensational. And I

think where we have to start to go with all of these conversations is, why are the people

sitting in those cars on Here Ontario? with their lights flashing, why are they armed?

Why do they have a license to kill someone? What does that have to do with their presence

in a construction area? Because do you know what? If they're there for visibility, I support

that. And I would like someone who is not armed with a license to kill to provide visibility

for traffic in a construction site. I want someone to do that work, just not them. Why are they

in our schools? with our children as they are all over the greater Toronto area and all across

this country. Why are they in our schools? If there is an issue with dangerous behaviour

in our schools, I want someone to deal with it. But you know who it should be? A teacher,

a principal, somebody who is there to work with and build relationships with kids. We successfully

made that argument in Toronto. And of all of the big campaigns in Canada against police

in recent years. I'd say that the campaign to get cops out of schools has been one of the

more successful ones. We've seen it in Hamilton, we've seen it in Waterloo region, we've seen

it in a lot of places where now the police are trying to get back in, but the fact is that

we've gotten them out in many places and that's not because There was some sensational single

event that the whole country started talking about. It's because people went into individual

schools and talked to people who have had negative experiences with the police. They talked to

undocumented people who are like, I actually can't go to school if that cop's there. And

they formed alliances and relationships and campaigns that were local to a specific place.

Right? And this is why I bring up George Floyd, because something that happens in Minneapolis

isn't going to create local organizing in Ottawa or Hamilton or anywhere else. So challenging

why people in our society need to have lethal force, why they need to have the weapons that

allow them to use that lethal force. and why they should be in our midst in all of these

places where someone else should be doing the job that they're doing. That's where I feel

like that's maybe like the level that we need to move towards now. And for me, there's a

level of frustration there in how much more difficult it is when... There's so many examples,

right, that we can pull of police, whether it's... the Avenue Road, whether it's all of these

recent protests, we can pull a million examples of police working against the movement. And

then I think back to last year when there was the sensationalization around the quote unquote

violence on the TTC, right? When there was several high profile incidents and then the police,

there was an increased police presence as a result of that and... A lot of people were

justifying that, right? A lot of people... That was not a moment where we were succeeding in

making the arguments, even though it wasn't making it... It never made anybody safer. And

there was... The whole thing, the whole supposed wave of violence was really just media spotlighting

high profile incidents and failing to show that transit still remains pretty much the safest

way to get around the city. Right. So I think, yeah, when it comes to those narratives, we

often don't do a really good job there. And I guess I guess my concern is, like, how do

we respond in those moments when there is something like, you know, the whole wave of the TTC thing?

Like, how do we prepare people to be able to talk about this better? I think, though, it's

hard in those sensational moments, though, I think. going back to what Desmond's talking

about, that slow grind, is doing the work when people aren't being whipped up into a frenzy

about crime. Because it is really hard to provide an alternative in those circumstances. Other

ones are a little bit easier to make that transition. You know, the traffic in schools, lots of examples

where police are definitely used when they shouldn't be. And I think providing those alternatives

constantly, like Anna Jessup was on and she paired, you know, It's not just defund the

police, it's also reinvesting in the community. And I think back to the 12.5 million extra

that the police ended up getting from a reserve fund and wondering where that money would have

gone anyway. Do people even have faith that the alternative will be done? That if we draw

money from the police budget, we won't just give it to landlords as a tax rebate or that

it will be invested in the necessary community supports to replace? policing services. And

I don't see a lot of that because that's like the refuting that Desmond was talking about

where what are you gonna do when a man tries to rob your house, right? Like that's the scenario

they put you in and everyone's going, uh, I don't even know. I do wanna add then one maybe

more difficult scenario. That was for Desmond. This is one that I feel that set us back quite

a bit, which was, you know, the freedom convoy. And, you know, uh. We were very critical at

the time of people who were on our side who were in support of the use of the police then.

That was a moment, you know. People still kind of haven't let that one go. I guess, yeah,

I don't want to not frame my question there, but... No, I mean, you're laying a lot of stuff

out here. I think what you're both pointing to, first of all, is the idea that... The sensationalism

works both ways. The sensationalism can capture people's attention in a moment and draw sympathy

and concern and demands for change. But as with the spate of violent incidents reported on

the TTC, it can also make people so afraid that they say, well, we need more police right now.

How do you combat that? Well, I mean, you don't in the moment because if the entire media apparatus...

You know, there was a story, okay, when those whole spate of incidents were being reported

on, there was a story that a group of boys, young men, had swarmed, that was the word that

was used in the media, swarmed a TTC driver. And I heard that story and I was really interested

in it. And there was some follow-up reporting and some videos that came out because what

these boys said happened. was that a TTC driver actually got out of the little booth that the

driver has at the front of the bus, and he grabbed one of them. And it was when he grabbed one

of them that the rest of them responded and went after him. So this idea of a bunch of

boys just because they were having a ball, just swarming a driver, it sounds so scary to people,

but it's not even what happened. But I would add that the level of education that it takes

to get people to a point and the level of resolve, because it's not just a matter of information,

the level of resolve and compassion and conviction to doing things in a different way that it

takes to have people hear a story like that if it were true. Let's just say for no reason

that they felt like, other than that they felt like it, a bunch of boys just swarm a TTC officer.

It takes a lot of conviction of your principles to be able to say, I still don't want more

police after hearing such an awful story. because I know that the police won't do anything in

that situation to keep that driver safe. I do want that driver to be safe, but police aren't

going to do it. That's a level of nuance and thoughtfulness that you don't just get by seeing

a news story on television that makes you upset. So I think the urge to respond when things

like these things, like this reporting happens, I understand it and I'm not saying we shouldn't

respond. But we should maybe expect that that's gonna be a really hard time to have a conversation.

And that's why doing this on the everyday is more important than just trying to ride a media

cycle. But, oh gosh, I also wanted to say, well, you brought up the whole Emergencies Act, Ottawa

stuff, which we... Let me just add a personal antidote before we go there, because it's that

knee-jerk reaction to policing. for violence, for theft, for every crime that is committed.

And I don't know where it starts because this is an anti-police household. Like my kids know

I will not play police officer. I don't want to play. I will try to redirect all the time.

They know, you know, but still, if my son does anything wrong, my daughter's first reaction

is to go put him in prison. She does not hear this from me. I do not know where they get

this from, but it's taught from obviously a very early age, like that there's a response

to like isolate and the police will come in and take away bad people, strangers. This is

not coming from me. She's not even in school yet. So it's coming from like some really basic

television, kids' television. And it's just how we're taught from such a young age that

this is the proper response to... conflicts is to use a police force, use an army response,

use this violent authoritative response that usually requires someone building a jail somewhere.

And that's really frustrating for me because I'm trying to undo that before she's even gone

out into the world. And I'm falling behind already. So I can only imagine how then, you know, once

you're at voting age, how long this has been. repeated and reinforced in your mind as the

only way forward. So, sorry. Back to the emergency, Zach, but... Just a quick anecdote too. I can

make it worse because I, you know, I have a brother who's six years younger than me, who

I have... like, he knows how I think. He's listened to me all of this. And his fascination with

guns makes him... like the police and like the military and now he's doing cadet stuff and

he knows all the arguments. He's heard every argument of it. I know some socialist gun clubs.

And I know I'm convincing, but like, it's like he will not hear it. Anyway, sorry. No, no,

don't be sorry. Yeah, I find myself thinking about a woman whose son was actually killed

in a subway stabbing. in March of last year. I was thinking of her too. And the boy who

was killed in that attack was Gabriel Magalhaes, I hope I'm saying that correctly. And it was

his mother who came out after he was stabbed fatally on the TTC and did this unbelievable

interview on CBC, Andrea Magalhaes, where she said, you know, that it's so horrible to have

to live with the loss of my child. And at the same time, I don't wanna see this being used

to cause more harm in our communities. And I wanna read part of what she said. I am partly

doing this for Gabriel. But really I'm doing it for change, for the one word change. What

is it that you need from a conversation? We need to start talking about violence, the root

causes of violence. I know it comes down to the social determinants of health. It's not

an easy solution. We're not talking about adding more police force. I'm not talking about locking

people up. We're talking about what are the root causes? Why is this happening? Why is

a person homeless? Why is a person not being able to access care, access supports? This

is a first world country. I came from a third world country, a very violent country, Brazil.

Why did I move away? I wanted a better life. I'm a nurse. I had a clinical placement in

mental health hospitals. Like as a society, I find we love to blame one person. We blame

the individual. Sometimes we even say you blame the victim. And we like to put all the responsibility

on one person and say it is your fault. You picked up the knife. Could this have been prevented

somehow from the beginning? How was this person? Were they going to school? Did they have supports?

Did they have a home? I don't know. I don't know anything. I cannot speak for this person.

I can't even imagine. And as you say that, I think about the politicians who offer their

support. That, okay, that is the time that I get angry. I'm going through phases, but that

makes me angry, so angry because when they want votes, they promise everything. How about action?

How about what really needs to be done? So empty words make me mad. Don't live with fear. I

don't want to hide in my house. I don't want my kids to hide at home. But can't we please

get people to listen? Can we make effective change so we can all be? We can all go outside

and be able to breathe and be and feel safe. I feel like this is still an amazing city.

We can do better. I wanna stay here where my baby was born. I wanna stay here for Lucas,

but I would love to feel safer. That broke me. I cannot imagine how someone in that scenario,

days after losing her child. found the ability to say these things publicly. That was very

powerful for me. And I hold it in my heart, and I want to honor that she did that. And

yet, even that kind of an appeal from a woman who went through it, who lived the thing that

other people are afraid of, it is not enough. It is not enough. We have... People in our

own families, as you say, Santiago, who know what the harm is, who have experienced it themselves,

but who for their own reasons just might wanna see that harm visited on somebody else. This

is a long struggle. It's a lifelong struggle, and no amount of one-off attention grabbing

can, you know... It can't change the daily pace of life where we all have our own things that

we're dealing with. We all have other things to attend to. We get taken out of the moment

and when these things happen and we go, oh my God, but they themselves don't make lasting

change. When it comes to what happened in Ottawa, we need to keep talking about what happened

in Ottawa. for a very long time and studying it and thinking about it. And you know, some

people will say like, okay, the left failed. I'm all for like, you know, having conversations

about how shitty we all are. I think it's a little more complicated than sometimes just

being like the left failed. I think we had bad analysis though. And I think if we want to

start asking ourselves why it's so hard to defund and abolish the police, we need look no further

than Ottawa. during the convoy when so many people who in other circumstances would say

that they understand the need to get rid of the police. Like I said, what about when the

bad people come to your neighborhood? This is a perfect example of that and seeing people

who were like, yeah, get the police and get these people out of here. And I'll say too,

some people said a lot of people said that the problem with the Emergencies Act, which the

courts was used illegitimately by the Trudeau government. The problem with using those powers

against the convoy, which was like a right-wing populist movement, is that that'll open the

door for it to be used against all of us progressives in our organizing. I heard that over and over

again. I take a perhaps slightly different view of it. I think that that's possible. It's possible

that in the future the police could use, or sorry, the federal government could use the

Emergencies Act against left-wing movements and demonstrators. But they don't seem to need

it when they want to go into what's so-called territory. They don't seem to need it when

black people demonstrating police brutality on the streets of Ottawa go and camp on the

street as they did and were. uh, just mobbed and arrested en masse by the police in 2021.

They haven't needed any emergency powers to clear the encampments in Toronto and Vancouver

and Edmonton and Halifax. So I think we need a little bit deeper of an analysis there, because

just the simple idea that they're coming for X now, so then they'll come for us one day,

that is another example of a kind of sensationalist analysis that I don't think lends itself to

kind of broader and deeper thinking about what's really wrong. What's really wrong is that When

people come into your city and are demonstrating and setting off firecrackers and being incredibly

disruptive, shitting in public parks and things like that, the impetus that maybe the cops

are on our side now so we should use them to get rid of these people is really strong. So

I keep going back to that. Was. lethal force required to deal with the convoy demonstrators

in Ottawa, as annoying as some people felt that they were, was lethal force the correct response?

Look, there were reports that people in that convoy demonstration had weapons. I don't doubt

that that's likely. There were reports of people who kept their children in really deplorable

conditions inside like trailers for days on end, because they just wanted to stay in Ottawa

and see this thing out. They had tanks of propane, which they would not normally allow angry people

to accumulate. But, so what, send in the Marines? Like this is my really difficult question for

everybody. Does that mean that you can use any force necessary? to get rid of them. And when

you justify that, good luck. Because what you have now done is, I don't think it's like,

oh, you know, the Emergencies Act paves the way. It's more of a thing where you have to

kind of ask the other, like the average person, what's a reasonable response to this? What's

a reasonable non-lethal response to social disorder? to people disrupting and even maybe sometimes

threatening other people. A lot of people were really quick to say, this isn't a demonstration.

These aren't demonstrators. They shouldn't be called protesters. Well, are they? What are

they, terrorists? What are they? Well, we hear that now, don't we? Like, I don't think it's

so much sensationalist, though, to remind people that one day we will hopefully be in a position

that we have mass movements in the street that are disruptive, that are working towards a

certain end. And we absolutely can't feed into the narrative that police should just be able,

or the army should just be able to remove us. Well, let me say something though, because

Jessa, when that day comes, the law's not going to matter. That is... But you're still feeding

into that narrative. I agree with you. I totally, totally agree with you. But when that day does

come, no one's going to say, well, we can't crush them guys, because the last time we used

those laws, people got really mad at us. You know what I mean? It's kind of a constant.

I guess what I think about is when the police did come in full force, what did they

saved a lot of the video from that day, from different, you know, far right live streamers

who were making a big buck. live streaming every day, getting thousands of people around the

world, some of them tens of thousands of people around the world to watch what was going on

in Ottawa, and then they were there to witness the whole thing kind of get busted up when

the huge mobilization of police came. So what did the police do? How did the police keep

us all safe from these folks? Did they go in surgically and say, we heard that there are

weapons here, we're confiscating them, we heard that there were people who committed violence,

were arresting and charging them. No, they didn't do that. They did what the police, they did

what police always do. They lined up and like the bullies that they are, they started using

batons and hitting people in the legs, hitting people in the chest, hitting people in the

face, pushing people to the ground, using their horses to brush into people and knock them

to the ground. What did that do? Do you know what it did? It moved. people a few blocks

away from the thing that they were worried about, the parliament building and the other government

buildings in the area. And the night that they did that huge police surge, a big show of force

to the public to say, see, we're getting rid of them. there were people in the streets a

few blocks away from that same area doing the exact same thing that everybody had been complaining

about. Setting off fireworks in the middle of the night and the fireworks falling on their

sides and like shooting out and almost hitting people. You know, like pissing all over the

streets, keeping people up way into the night. They did those things anyway, even after the

huge police mobilization. Now, did that demoralize a bunch of people and make them go home? It

did. Absolutely. But I think that they were validated too, by the way that the police responded,

just to push them a few blocks down the road. And I'm not going to sit here and say that

I know what the better response was, but that wasn't it. And a creative set of solutions

needs to be proposed. And I think that those solutions have to come from the communities

of people who were really being harmed by all of this disruptive activity. I think of what

happened at Billings Bridge, I think it was called, right? The Battle of Billings Bridge,

yes. There you go. Because, you know, they were trying to, the convoy folks were trying to

establish another little kind of outpost. And think what, couple thousand people in the neighborhood,

they kind of created a blockade. And they were like, y'all are not coming to set up in this

neighborhood, get lost. And. This brings us to another fundamental problem of why things

move so slowly, to your point, Jessa. And that is that people had to do that shit themselves.

There's no one to call upon. This whole client customer service model of public safety where

someone else is going to make your neighborhood safe so that you can turn your back on your

community and not worry, that's not working. And so only when people showed up of their

own accord were they actually able to stop this from happening. And I'll always remember...

When I was watching the news one evening, an older woman was trying to give an interview

to I think the CBC about all of the noise and the horns blaring in her neighborhood in Ottawa

and how disruptive this was. And a guy from the convoy demonstration saw her talking to

the camera and he came up behind her and he started disrupting her talking and being like,

ah, the Trudeau government and the CBC, they're all screwing us. And she turned to the guy

and she was like, The only people who are disrupting me are you. And she was probably like in her

60s at least I would say. And you know, this man was younger than her. And I just thought

it was such an interesting moment because he didn't know what to say to her. It's all cool

to talk tough against the politicians, to shout at the media cameras and tell them that they're

all fascists and all these things. But when a woman who lives in the community and has

nothing to do with it except wanting to be left alone tells you you're ruining her day, this

guy had nothing for her. And I thought, what if there were 10 of those women? What if there

were 100 of them? Like, how would people respond differently if it was people in their own?

kind of social circle coming up to them and being like, you know, you're really fucking

this up by doing what you're doing, and you're really harming a lot of people around you by

doing your demonstration in this way. And by the way, we all have to deal with that. A friend

of mine told a story online recently, which I shared, where she talked about one of the

pro-Palestine solidarity demonstrations being in the way of a vehicle where somebody was

having a medical emergency. And luckily, that vehicle was near the front of where the demonstrators

were. And The person was really agitated and one of the marshals went over them to them

and was like, what's up? And they were like, look, somebody in this car is having a medical

emergency. I need to get through here right now. And they were like, boom, into action,

cleared everybody out of the way, got that person through. Let's not waste time talking about

how lots of people think that they have an emergency and won't be let through. I get that public

demonstration is what it is. It's always going to be what it is. And I don't take the argument

that can always happen, so we shouldn't ever demonstrate or whatever. But the flexibility

of people responding and being like, we don't want you having this emergency to have to sit

here. We can do our demonstration and accommodate you. These kinds of things matter. And we should

be thinking about them. And we should be looking at them from the other side as well. I almost

don't even know what to say other than who keeps us safe, we keep us safe. We know we do. We

do. And to Desmond's point there, because he, I know like some people will cringe when you

said it, called it a populist movement. And I agree with you, but there's some contention

there. Either way, it sells itself as a populist movement, right? There's no disputing that.

And so that's really hard to maintain when you are then faced with the rest of your community

telling like... like the lady being interviewed, this is not cool. We do not like it. And then

it doesn't necessarily have to be a show of force, but this mobilization that disproves

your populism. And for the same reason, and because they're decent people, you let through

a car with a medical emergency because you need to bring everybody along with you in the end,

right? And creating an atmosphere where you're turning on one another and setting the cops

on one another in the end is not productive, but... Yeah, it's impossible for you to build

or claim to be a populist movement when you spend your time harming the community. And

I'll say too, populist in the sense that the messaging is populist. Obviously there was

like huge American money coming into Canada and making sure that those people had every

resource they needed to stay in the street for as long as they wanted. And so I'm not maybe

saying popular, right? They claimed to represent a trucking community, 90% of which was vaccinated.

Like these people had no frigging clue what they were talking about. They didn't represent

anywhere near the majority of people that they claimed to be. But populist in the messaging,

populist in in saying there's a problem and it can be very easily solved if we could only

get this annoying one thing or one pesky element out of the way, creating very simplistic solutions,

right, for actually what's a complex problem. And I'll go in another direction with this

as well, okay? I was just invited to a presentation today for Black History Month, and I talked

about policing measures during the pandemic, which... disproportionately harmed Black people.

There's an amazing study out there by Canadian Civil Liberties Association called Stay Off

the Grass, which I highly recommend that people look at. And, you know, governments were not

keeping a lot of records about who was getting ticketed under these COVID emergency orders,

these public health orders. So CCLA did... some data gathering on their own. And not surprisingly,

what they found was that, you know, two SLGBTQ folks, Black folks, Indigenous folks, unhoused

folks, were all reporting like, yeah, I'm getting targeted by these COVID enforcement measures.

Who the hell could be surprised by that? Of course they were, because that is the general

trend in surveillance and policing. And those are the groups that are the easiest to target

society will turn the other way or blame them and say it's their own fault. But this is where

I think we had a common cause with people who were. actually in the streets of Ottawa. Because

I also, in 2020, when it was announced that you would not be able to go to a public park,

you could be stopped walking in the streets if you were outside of your house and questioned

by the police about why you were outdoors. I freaked the fuck out when this happened and

so did a lot of black people and black organizations because we're like, this is way too familiar

to what we've been fighting for so many years. And so people who were making the argument

there was overreach in COVID enforcement had many valid points. I don't agree with them

when they just want to do anything that they want to when they say that, for example, a

gym where people can't social distance needing to be closed for a while is a human rights

violation. I don't agree with that, okay? But there were absolutely... dangerous and harmful

overreaches of policing and enforcement, and we were not able to split that difference.

effectively push back against the measures that were unnecessary. Because you know, for example,

people do need to go out into the public even when there's a pandemic and in many cases being

outdoors in a park, for example, is way safer than being inside. And for your own mental

health and physical well-being, it's also still important to go outside. We ceded a lot of

that ground and this is again like this theme of crisis. So how did we do when the government

scared everybody and said, now you will all stay indoors? Most people were like, yes, sir.

Yes, master. But then what happened? A year later in 2021, after CCLA had reported that

all these marginalized groups were being targeted and harmed. There was another wave of COVID

and the police said, we're doing it again, but now you can't go to the park. The parks are

actually closed. We're gonna go and put emergency yellow tape around the park and you won't be

able to go to the park with little Johnny and you'll be stopped in your car. And middle-class

white people were like, what the fuck? Like, what? You can't do that to me. And they were

outraged. They didn't say anything. I was mad about that caution tape on my playground though.

Sure, sure. But you see, my point is that it's not good enough for us to wait for these sensational

moments. When they said it the first time, that's when the pushback should have happened. But

I didn't see anyone other than Black... organizations, indigenous organizations, homeless serving

organizations and individuals. Those were the people who spoke up and our struggle has something

to do with being consistent about these issues when the stakes aren't like middle-class white

people are going to get hurt. Right? We have to be able to be consistent about these things,

even when it's our political enemies who might benefit from our consistency. I'm dying to

bring up the example of the journalists. Oh, sorry, sorry. Don't forget what you're going

to say. I don't want anybody to interpret from what I just said that middle-class white people

are our political enemies. That's not, I didn't mean that. I was referring back to the convoy

folks. So I just want to be, just want to be clear about that. I'm sure that a lot of people

think that I think that, but whatever. Well, I appreciate the clarification, Desmond. But,

yeah, no, as Desmond's saying this, I'm thinking of the case of the rebel news journalist. You

know, we can argue whether he is or isn't a journalist, but. I was so disappointed. I was

like looking around going, what are you guys doing? Why are you fucking celebrating this?

Right. Like Desmond, tell me you were also. I never say his name. Did you didn't you see

my tweets? I was free. I'm sure I did. I was also tweeting myself. Oh, my God. I was so

mad. So, yeah, for people who didn't see it, David Menzies, like a ghoul, certified ghoul

from Rebel News and a man who has harassed me a lot. And he's just awful. But he saw Christa

Freeland outside of an event that she was going to or somewhere that she was going. He was

waiting for her. He obviously knew she was gonna be there. And what did he do? He did what journalists

do all the time. He saw her coming. He came and walked up beside her with his microphone.

He had a camera person in tow and he walked alongside Christa Freeland and tried to ask

her a question. He asks questions that are so dumb that I can bear. I actually do remember

he was asking whether the Iranian Revolutionary Guard should be classified as a terrorist organization.

And, yeah, he did that. And so Christa Freeland wasn't answering him. I don't think she spoke

the entire interaction actually. She just ignored him and kept walking forward a staff member

beside her. A police officer who was not dressed as a police officer saw this happening and

he set a pick, as we say in basketball. He went and stood in the path of where he knew David

Menzies was going to be walking and David Menzies couldn't see him because he was too busy looking

at Chris Jeffreeland while he was trying to speak to her. And so he ran flush into this

police officer's chest, whereupon the cop said, you're under arrest for assault. And boy was

so-called left-wing internet-sharing. It's a celebration that David Menzies has finally

gotten his comeuppance. He's not a real journalist, they say. He's not even a real journalist.

Cops can do that to us, then. Well, let's talk about that part first, because I'm fucking

so tired of this elitist professionalism of journalism garbage. Anyone should be able...

Listen, have you guys seen people going up to Trudeau? in a restaurant and being like, why

are you supporting genocide? Yeah, we had them on our show. OK, guess what? They're not journalists.

So what? There should be a circle of cops around them because they are not journalists. And

what about all of us freelance journalists? What about all of us journalists who aren't

accredited with one of the three major mega corps that do media in Canada? I worked at

City Hall for Torontoist for a lot of years. And the rule at Toronto City Hall was, if you

didn't have physical space in the building, if you were not leasing physical space inside

the press gallery at City Hall, you were not part of the accredited City Hall media, and

therefore you could not get a pass. And if you can't get a pass, that means that when the

mayor, for example, does oppressor in his office... they have the right to deny you because you're

not technically part of the press gallery. That is what happens when we professionalize media

to the nth degree and say that only the state-sanctioned questioners are allowed to talk to our politicians.

It's such trash. I am so tired of it. Anyone who wants to ask a politician a question in

public should have the right to do so. She wasn't being threatened by David Menzies. He was not

touching her. And whether you consider him a journalist or not, he doesn't really do the

things that I would say a lot of journalists do. That's not the point. I will say that a

journalist would be trained, not... to stand in front of somebody who is walking and block

their path, but to do exactly what David Menzies did, which is to walk alongside the person,

allow them a path to continue if they don't wanna talk to you. and let them go on their

way if they don't answer. He did all of those things. And this annoys me so badly because

I saw people in the Queens Park Press Gallery only a few months ago physically block the

path of Sarah Jama who uses a motorized chair, physically stand in front of her so that she

could not leave in a narrow hallway. And Colin DeMello, the head of the press gallery, was

leading the charge, standing right in front of Sarah and screaming at a bunch of people

around her, which I was one of them, that we were somehow impeding his freedom of expression

because we were like, can you move please? She wants to leave. You can walk beside somebody

and ask them questions and if they don't want to respond to you, then they can just keep

going. You can't block their path though. David Menzies didn't do that and he still got arrested.

And we're friggin' celebrating. And again, it's not that I'm like, oh, you shouldn't celebrate

when it happens to him, because then one day it's gonna happen to us. Guys, I've been arrested

so many fucking times while trying to cover something. I've been harassed and intimidated

by police so many times, called names, just like said the most disgusting things to me.

It's already happening to so many of us, but then what happened? I think 24 hours after

everyone was celebrating David Menzies getting arrested. Brandy Morin covering the encampment,

police dismantling of the encampment in Ottawa. Brandy Morin gets arrested and charged, I think,

with obstruction. And boy, were people singing a different tune. But... I'm gonna say it again.

So many people responded for Brandy, which they should do, but they did it for the wrong reason,

because she's a professional, because she was doing her job. Well, she was just in there

doing her job. I wanna ask people something. When you say that the press have freedom of

expression and freedom to do whatever you think they're allowed to do in Canada, does that

translate into the press? having the right to be on city property in an encampment area,

and they have the right to be there, to watch people whose home that is, whose living space

that is, to be evicted. When they went into what's Siloatan territory and they got Bracken

and Toledano who were in there as journalists and pulled them out, people were angry. But

I am like, so what are you saying though? Are you saying that when there's an injunction

on Indigenous territory, that the journalists should be allowed to stand there and watch

while the cops remove the people who are like, this is my land? And they should be allowed

to film, unmolested by the police, while other people get dispossessed and arrested and beaten

down? No, that's not right. So everybody who was standing up for Brandi, cool. But what

about all of the people who lost their home that day? Who lost the community that they

had created together that day? Where they were keeping each other safe. What about them? We

can't give in to this professionalization of journalism because then we forget all the other

people who are being targeted by the same practices. I feel like that is what kind of came out of

that particular. I think it was Edmonton encampment that the focus then was almost entirely on

Brandi's situation and still is rather than the eviction itself. Like it would definitely

became the greater evil that day, even though it's arguably not. And might be separate issues

that peak at separate times, people's interests. But yeah, that was a hard time because Sante,

you know, now that I think about it, we even mentioned your tweet, I believe in that episode

where you made the point that civilians should also, because it's blueprints of disruption.

We're constantly encouraging people to go and challenge folks to be more disruptive, not

as journalists, not in any kind of official capacity, but because it's part of democracy.

I think it's about public space, because when the cops come to an encampment in Toronto and

they build a fence in a public park, what they are telling you, even though I don't think

that this is lawful, is that this public space is now made private by our building a fence

around it, a makeshift fence. And so now everybody who is inside the makeshift fence is technically

on private property and can be forced out. Journalists should be speaking out against that thing.

They shouldn't only be speaking out when one of their people inside the fence gets dragged

out and arrested or beaten down or whatever the case may be. But you're not going to see

the Canadian Association of Journalists taking up the broader issue of the capture of public

space through injunctions and through these kinds of police actions. I wish that they would,

but I think that this idea of the professionalism of journalism means that they won't do that.

But you see how up in arms that they get and how like rights-based and everything that they

get when it happens to a journalist who's seen as a professional, then it's wrong, then it's

terrible. Then we can be advocates because if we lose our ability journalists to have access

will then, I guess the world's going to end. But if other people lose the place that they

were living, well, we're just going to go report on that and go home. Right. And it's not enough.

It's not enough. There is a line there, though, where because journalists are usually excellent

at being in solidarity with other journalists, except for apparently journalists covering

things in Palestine. And then maybe that solidarity doesn't get extended quite as much. Oh, boy.

You said it now. You said it. I was really enthused. I'm gonna have to end shortly. But I do thank

you for saying that, Santiago, because it was a bright spot for me when I'd say somewhere

between 150 and 200 journalists got together a couple weeks ago. And we did honor all the

journalists who've been killed. in Gaza, in Lebanon, and in Israel. We said their names,

we told stories, people shared wonderful, wonderful testimonies. I am so grateful to Fatima Saeed

and Pasent Matar and the organizers of that event for giving a space for those of us who...

are concerned as journalists about what's been going on. To mourn. and to be together. And

it was like, there was a little after gathering that happened. And just being in the same place

with a whole bunch of other people who were sharing that together, it was actually one

of the more uplifting things that I've experienced in the last few months since the carnage in

Gaza has been ongoing. And so I was actually really

and warmongering. There are still many of us who know what time it is and who are trying

to strike a different message and I was like really, really grateful to see that. Desmond,

we've kept you longer than... We said we would, but we also did warn you that we could keep

you here forever if you let us. But I could stay if I didn't have to make dinner. No, we

saw you stress eating jello. So we will let you. Don't tell people. All right, fine. We'll

edit that one out. No, it's fine. Leave it. Leave it. Leave it. The people need to know

the truth. We appreciate your time and your advocacy so much, but is there anything we

didn't let you spout on that you would like to? talk about before? Yeah, just one thing.

Because we were talking about policing and the harms that are done every day to people that

don't rise to the level of death, which we might not be paying attention to. I have been very

fortunate to make friends with a man by the name of Devon Fowlin, who was... almost exactly

a year ago now, shot by a Toronto police officer in a park. Devon was alone at the time. He

was homeless at the time. He was living out of his car and somebody reported him for having

a knife. He did have a knife. He was alone in a park. He kept that knife on his waist because

he used to use it for like cutting food and things like that. It was a kitchen knife that

had a sheath. Somebody called the police on him and several officers responded. And we

know now that when they responded, they immediately drew handguns and tasers on Devon. And one

of the officers shot him multiple times. Devon survived and I'm so glad that he did. The reality

though is that in surviving, life continues to be really, really difficult for him. And

I would love for you guys to share with your audience in the notes to this show, a GoFundMe.

It's called help Devon Fallon continue his recovery. If you just type in his name into a Google

search or an anything search.

uh, D-E- you will find his, uh, GoFundMe. It has been really hard to raise funds for Devon.

He should be on disability because he still has bullet fragments in his body and he's lost

the use of fingers on his right arm. They think he will never recover the use of those fingers

on his right hand. He cannot work. and he really needs support right now. And it's these kinds

of things that I'm talking about, where are we for people in our own communities? in the

aftermath of George Floyd and awareness raising, where are we when this happens in our own communities

for people who really, really need us? So I would ask anyone who's listening, who's able

to do so, I know things are tough for a lot of people right now. If you can throw five

or 10 bucks even to Devon, I know he would really, really appreciate that. And for those who are

curious, the officer, who shot Devon has actually been charged. And that very, very rarely happens

in the province of Ontario or in Canada for that matter. I don't count on the idea that

the officer who was charged is going to be convicted. And I don't really care. And when I talk to

Devon, he also tells me he doesn't really care. Um, he just wants to be able to carry on his

life and be compensated for what has happened to him. But I want people to know that the

officer's name is Constable Andrew Davis. And I believe in the practice of naming those people

who harm us and in holding them accountable. And, um, Whether or not this officer is convicted

of a crime, it's not going to change what happened to Devon. And we need to stop this from happening

again. I'm sure that when he does go to court, Constable Davis's lawyers... are going to frame

this in some kind of mental health capacity. It's false. DeVon wasn't in crisis until the

police came and drew their weapons on him. But even if it was a mental health crisis, are

these the people we want responding? Was lethal force necessary to engage a person who was

alone in a park, walking his dog in the early morning hours in Toronto, who was talking to

and bothering no one? Was lethal force necessary? And how many more times for so-called mental

health calls are we going to justify the use of lethal force when if an intervention is

needed, if it's needed, any number of non-lethal interventions are also possible? That's what

I wanna leave you with. And please support De'Vonne Fallon because he would appreciate it. We will

be sure to link that in the show notes. And we very much appreciate you adding that onto

the end, Your time here, I've learned a lot. You've challenged me on some of the lines of

thought that I had, and I do very much appreciate that. And... I appreciate both of you for what

you're doing. I hope you keep it up, and maybe we can do this again sometime. We're going

to hold you to that. Yeah. Let's do it. Literally whenever you want to come on us now. Take it

over your show. Yeah, no problem. It's mine now. Be careful what you wish for. I'll change

the banner head now. That is a wrap on another episode of Blueprints of Disruption. Thank

you for joining us. Also, a very big thank you to the producer of our show, Santiago Helu-Quintero.

Blueprints of Disruption is an independent production operated cooperatively. You can follow us on

Twitter at BPofDisruption. If you'd like to help us continue disrupting the status quo,

please share our content and if you have the means, consider becoming a patron. Not only

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let us know what or who we should be amplifying. So until next time, keep disrupting.