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1 Million March 4 Children announces second event Saturday, Oct 21 – How should we feel about this?

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Emboldened by their first Canada-wide protest, the people behind 1 Million March 4 Children are planning a second event on Saturday, October 21.  That means Canadians will have another opportunity to decide how they feel about this protest and these protestors.
This might be a good time to take a look back on the 1 Million March 4 Children event held September 20 in towns and cities from coast to coast. Here’s what it looked like in Red Deer.
Protests can be prickly and sometimes even violent. Surely that’s what a lot of Canadians were expecting from the 1 Million March 4 Children. In the days leading up to September 20, there were no shortage of ‘warnings’ about the protestors.  This was the warning put out by “AntiHate.ca”
  • These protests are supported by a big tent of far-right and conspiratorial groups, including Christian Nationalists, COVID-19 conspiracy theorists, sovereign citizens, and anti-public education activists.

Sounds dangerous. Far-right and conspiratorial groups, Christian Nationalists, COVID-19 conspiracy theorists, sovereign citizens, all mixing it up with anti-public education activists.  No wonder I was afraid to go at first! Good thing I don’t depend on the AntiHate.ca website to plan my outings.

Come to think of it I’ve got a couple of questions for AntiHate.ca.

1) Are Christian Nationalists ‘far-right’ or ‘conspiratorial’?  Can they be just Christians who like their country a lot? If not, what do we call Christians who like Canada?  Just wondering.

2) Are the COVID-19 ‘conspiracy theorists’ the ones who correctly (if annoyingly) warned the lock downs / masks / 1, 2, 3, 4 doses of vaccine would not stop the pandemic? or were they the ones who incorrectly believed all those things would bring that pandemic to an end?  Can you see how that could be confusing in 2o23?

3) I didn’t know I had to be afraid of sovereign citizens and anti-public education activists. Can I let my children out of the house while they still exist in Canada?

It’s important there are groups like AntiHate.ca. It’s important Canadians always remember that no matter how much we disagree, almost every single person wants to live their lives in freedom and simply enjoy opportunities. When we descend into hatred, we take society down with us. So thank you AntiHate.ca for watching out for us.

Were there incidents at hate at the 1 Million March 4 Children?  AntiHate.ca found some examples. I did not see or hear of any incidents at the Red Deer event.  Part of the credit goes to the police.  They did a wonderful job of patrolling between the opposing sides in a very relaxed and friendly manner that certainly calmed the tension people would otherwise have felt.

Standing on the sidewalk as protestors streamed past me, I was struck by how different the 1 Million March 4 Children felt compared to other protests I’ve attended.

This was a protest of families. There were pregnant women, new mothers and fathers with their young children, and lots of grandparents. It also featured an intriguing and beautiful mixture of cultures. As protestors strolled past I was reminded of that feeling you get from the multi-cultural festivals that mark so many Canada Day Celebrations.

Fact: On September 20, 2023 a vast array of Canadians representing many cultures and beliefs united at Red Deer’s City Hall Park for the 1 Million March 4 Children.

But: Unlike Canada Day, it felt a little bit like we were going to get in trouble just for being here. Maybe that’s why very few politicians dared to come out in support of this group. I did see Red Deer South MLA Jason Stephan and Red Deer Catholic School Board Member Monique LaGrange. Jason has never been frightened of zagging where other politicians are zigging.  As for Monique, she’s been disciplined for expressing her opinion recently and probably felt she had nothing more to lose by being associated with the people AntiHate.ca is warning us about.

Canada’s Prime Minister is convinced the people streaming past me were “phobs”… Transphobs, homophobs, and biphobs (I think he may have invented the last one just as he was writing the post below).  According to our Prime Minister hundreds of Central Albertans and the tens or hundreds of thousands of Canadians who gathered on September 20 were there to ‘manifest their hatred’ of 2SLGBTQI+ people.  Here’s Trudeau’s post on X.

The Muslim Association of Canada strongly condemned Trudeau’s remarks and called for an apology that has yet to make it’s way into the line up of apologies PM Trudeau seems to make on a daily basis. Here’s part of their statement.

  • By characterizing the peaceful protests of thousands of concerned parents as hateful, Canadian leaders and school boards are setting a dangerous precedent of using their position of influence to unjustly demonize families, and alienate countless students.
  • On Wednesday September 20th, thousands of Muslims, joined by other faith-based groups, protested to raise their concerns, calling for their rights as parents in relation to their children’s education. Their intent was to be heard, not to sow division. Parents should have the absolute right to advocate for the wellbeing of their children.

As I streamed through my social media feeds last week I could see some of my friends (who I did not see at the protest or counter protest) apparently agree with Trudeau.  The most common post was the “no space for hate” meme which is really a beautiful message even if it might be a bit too sarcastic when aimed at the vast majority of those who marched. (I’m OK with sarcasm. I think my family may have invented it.)

By using the word ‘hate’ they seem to be implying the protestors are hateful. Maybe they can come to the next march in October to see for themselves.  I did not see messages of hate from the protestors OR from the counter protestors in Red Deer. You can see excellent examples of the signage from both sides in the photos below which show the signs on opposite sides of the street (and the debate).

On top of the signs there were also competing slogans. Chants of “Leave our kids alone” from the protestors were so loud it was a bit difficult to hear the opposing chant. I thought I heard “I was born like this” from the counter protestors.

I heard another chant from the protest organizer on his megaphone. “Don’t interact with the counter protestors. They have a right to be here too.” All in all the Red Deer protest was a bit loud, but far more civilized than advertised. I guess it felt a little bit like democracy is supposed to feel like.

As the protest ended I even witnessed one protestor walk up to a group of 5 or 6 counter protestors. He said (I’m paraphrasing) “I may not agree with you about much, but I respect your right to be here and I just wanted to say thank you for expressing your opinions peacefully.” That was quite a moment for the counter protestors who all looked relieved as they were likely expecting a confrontation. I admit I was stunned. It caught me by surprise and I was unable to get a photo or video in time.

As I looked through the protest signs and briefly chatted with people streaming past me it was clear there was one overwhelming message. The protestors clearly want to be the ones to teach their children about gender ideology. Others are far more concerned about the idea that schools would be keeping secrets with students from their parents who pay the taxes that support the whole system.

I leave the final words to Tim Hoven. Tim is a politically active Central Albertan who tried to take on his local UCP MLA Jason Nixon in a nomination and then ran unsuccessfully as an Independent candidate against him when his nomination was disqualified. Hoven was the local organizer and the main speaker at the Red Deer version of 1 Million March 4 Children.

After 15 years as a TV reporter with Global and CBC and as news director of RDTV in Red Deer, Duane set out on his own 2008 as a visual storyteller. During this period, he became fascinated with a burgeoning online world and how it could better serve local communities. This fascination led to Todayville, launched in 2016.

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Ted Cruz, Jim Jordan Ramp Up Pressure On Google Parent Company To Deal With ‘Censorship’

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From the Daily Caller News Foundation

By Andi Shae Napier

Republican Texas Sen. Ted Cruz and Republican Ohio Rep. Jim Jordan are turning their attention to Google over concerns that the tech giant is censoring users and infringing on Americans’ free speech rights.

Google’s parent company Alphabet, which also owns YouTube, appears to be the GOP’s next Big Tech target. Lawmakers seem to be turning their attention to Alphabet after Mark Zuckerberg’s Meta ended its controversial fact-checking program in favor of a Community Notes system similar to the one used by Elon Musk’s X.

Cruz recently informed reporters of his and fellow senators’ plans to protect free speech. 

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“Stopping online censorship is a major priority for the Commerce Committee,” Cruz said, as reported by Politico. “And we are going to utilize every point of leverage we have to protect free speech online.”

Following his meeting with Alphabet CEO Sundar Pichai last month, Cruz told the outlet, “Big Tech censorship was the single most important topic.”

Jordan, Chairman of the House Judiciary Committee, sent subpoenas to Alphabet and other tech giants such as RumbleTikTok and Apple in February regarding “compliance with foreign censorship laws, regulations, judicial orders, or other government-initiated efforts” with the intent to discover how foreign governments, or the Biden administration, have limited Americans’ access to free speech.

“Throughout the previous Congress, the Committee expressed concern over YouTube’s censorship of conservatives and political speech,” Jordan wrote in a letter to Pichai in March. “To develop effective legislation, such as the possible enactment of new statutory limits on the executive branch’s ability to work with Big Tech to restrict the circulation of content and deplatform users, the Committee must first understand how and to what extent the executive branch coerced and colluded with companies and other intermediaries to censor speech.”

Jordan subpoenaed tech CEOs in 2023 as well, including Satya Nadella of Microsoft, Tim Cook of Apple and Pichai, among others.

Despite the recent action against the tech giant, the battle stretches back to President Donald Trump’s first administration. Cruz began his investigation of Google in 2019 when he questioned Karan Bhatia, the company’s Vice President for Government Affairs & Public Policy at the time, in a Senate Judiciary Committee hearing. Cruz brought forth a presentation suggesting tech companies, including Google, were straying from free speech and leaning towards censorship.

Even during Congress’ recess, pressure on Google continues to mount as a federal court ruled Thursday that Google’s ad-tech unit violates U.S. antitrust laws and creates an illegal monopoly. This marks the second antitrust ruling against the tech giant as a different court ruled in 2024 that Google abused its dominance of the online search market.

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2025 Federal Election

PRC-Linked Disinformation Claims Conservatives Threaten Chinese Diaspora Interests, Take Aim at PM Carney’s Debate Remark

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As polls tighten in Canada’s pivotal federal election, a Chinese-language website has published multiple editorials suggesting that a Pierre Poilievre government could threaten Chinese Canadian interests with so-called “anti-China” policy clauses—claiming it could bring “inconvenience to the lives of Chinese people, such as restrictions on the use of social media, reductions in return air tickets, etc.”

During the 2021 federal election, then-Conservative leader Erin O’Toole and MP Kenny Chiu were widely attacked with similar arguments across Chinese-language news and social media. CSIS reporting from 2022, cited exclusively by The Bureau, warned that Chinese-language media in Canada is effectively controlled by Beijing and weaponized during election periods to spread Chinese Communist Party-aligned narratives.

One of the new articles also criticizes Prime Minister Mark Carney’s debate remark that Beijing poses the greatest threat to Canada’s national security—a comment that prompted the Chinese-language editorial to question whether Carney’s statement was “a gimmick to attract attention.”

The articles, published Thursday and Friday by 51.ca, have raised deep concern among some community members. One longtime Chinese Canadian journalist, who requested anonymity due to fear of retaliation, told The Bureau they were alarmed by the messaging and suspected the coverage was driven by election-interference motives.

One of the pieces claimed that “the Conservative Party has written anti-China clauses into the party platform,” referencing a prior story that quickly circulated on Chinese-language social media and triggered fearful discussion.

Citing WeChat commentary on the same article, the journalist pointed specifically to a politically connected figure previously associated with CSIS investigations into election interference networks in the Greater Toronto Area—allegedly tied to clandestine funding channels linked to the Chinese Consulate in Toronto.

Sharing a WeChat forum screen-picture, the diaspora journalist noted:

“The writer said, according to the Conservative’s campaign platform, China’s definition is ‘enemy.’ So what is the impact on Chinese Canadians’ daily life? Facing more discrimination? Fewer flights going back to China? How about using social media? If there is a war, what will happen to Chinese Canadians—like Japanese people were sent to the concentration camps or deported?”

The journalist said the messaging is not only inflammatory, but dangerously manipulative—casting the Conservative Party as a threat to the civil rights and safety of Chinese Canadians, while exploiting historical trauma to provoke fear.

The same 51.ca article—while quoting from the Conservative Party’s platform documents—shifts sharply into misleading commentary. It contrasts the party’s current positions with historical discrimination enacted by the Liberal government of the 1920s.

One of the recent 51.ca articles warns that the Conservative Party’s stance “can easily cause ethnic tensions and even exacerbate anti-China sentiment.”

A second article delivers a similar critique of Conservative policy while also taking aim at Prime Minister Mark Carney, who, in last night’s nationally televised debate, stated:

“I think the biggest security threat to Canada is China.”

That comment, consistent with assessments from Canadian intelligence services and allied Five Eyes partners, was immediately seized upon by 51.ca’s editorial board.

“Carney blurted out that China is Canada’s biggest threat. Is this a deep-rooted idea or a gimmick to attract attention? It is not known yet. But what is certain is that when other party leaders are talking about how to deal with the problems facing Canada itself, Carney is talking about China being the enemy. I really don’t know what’s going on in his mind.”

Both 51.ca articles strategically focus their sharpest criticism on the Conservative Party, portraying its platform as existentially dangerous, while the second treats Carney’s one-line debate comment as a moment of rhetorical overreach.

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