“You like roses and kisses and pretty men to tell you/ All those pretty lies, pretty lies/ When you gonna realize they’re only pretty lies? — Joni Mitchell

Anyone born after the turn of the century was likely unsurprised by the news that Joni Mitchell and Neil Young (“who ‘dey?”) want Spotify to ban podcaster Joe Rogan for sins against the climate catechism. Cancel culture IS the culture to many brought up in the safe spaces of the 21st century.

But for those who grew up with Young singing “Rockin’ In The Free World” while Mitchell sang the virtues of a “Free Man In Paris” the concept of these iconic artists arguing for censorship is bracing. What happened to artistic freedom from the Laurel Canyon crowd?

Well, the Canadian (surprised?) pair are simply responding to the safe-space zeitgeist. For Neil— who fell into Darryl Hannah’s lunatic orbit— that means eliminating anyone with a differing view on the Climate Cult. As for Joni, she wrote her own epitaph. “All romantics meet the same fate someday/ Cynical and drunk and boring someone in some dark café.” The Safe Space Café.

Safe-space reality was spawned in the education system. Radicals used the schools to enforce their Woke dogma, shutting down opposing opinion under the guise of providing the indulged a place where they could escape the noise of debate or just have a good cry . In a room with only one voice singing you can quickly come to believe that everyone agrees with you.

Which brings us to Canada’s petrified PM, Justin Trudeau bunkered in his own safe space as the truckers eat his lunch on Parliament Hill. Like so many of the media he’s bribed, Trudeau was hoping for a January 6 replay when the truckers hit Ottawa. You know… rioters pushing their way into the Parliament buildings, chaos, fires and some deaths. Yes, lots of deaths.

Sadly the truckers wouldn’t comply, outside of a honking horns on Rideau Street and someone allegedly throwing a rock at an EMS crew. So it was necessary for him to scramble his media slappies and invoke Plan B. To convince Safe Spacers of the imminent threat there would now be stories— not of gunplay and coups— but of toothless KKK despoiling the Capital, a Bytown population held hostage, signs of Trumpism and white power trying to seize power.

Lord knows his lackeys tried. Host Nil Kuksal on CBC  soiled herself, suggesting it was all just a Putin ploy. . Another gormless CBC host asked if dark forces within the crowd might be grooming hapless truckers into a white power rebellion. CTV tried linking the Truckers to the anniversary of the Quebec City mosque shooting.

Reporters from all networks spotted people with swastikas and rebel flags yet strangely forgot to ask any of them who they were or what they were doing. They chortled with glee as a CPC member of Parliament was photo bombed by some plant carrying a Canadian flag with a swastika. See, they’re all Nazis, went the ledes on the six o’clock news. Great reporting

Ottawa’s Mayor Jim Watson thought condescension might work, telling the protesters that they’d made their point, now GO HOME. Apparently beer-swilling francophones hopping on the cenotaph yelling “Liberté” is an imminent threat to the security of the nation. The right to peaceful assembly exercised recently by Indigenous peoples and BLM— and approved by Trudeau— was now trumped by getting to the LCBO on Elgin Street before it closed .

The cable TV panels and double enders all agreed. Playing footsie with the rowdy protesters was going to end disastrously for the Conservatives. Brave Sir Justin in his bunker would win the day— as soon as his Covid fever broke. Irony alert: the man ordering Canadians to take the magic juice— on threat of job loss and denial of healthcare— was now testing positive after he’d been fully vaccinated with the magic potions.

The protesters did notice, demanding that Mr. Doubtfire meet with them to hear their demand for removal of vaccine mandates and passports. Now it was serious. Chairman Blackface had to move to Plan C. Emerging like Wiarton Willie from his RCMP-protected lair Trudeau told a video press event he was never going to soil his hands by going to meet the protesters. They were merchants of “antisemitism, Islamophobia, anti-Black racism, homophobia, and transphobia” primed at any moment to spread Covid and explosives. They want to overthrow the democratically elected government!

Again the press stenographers taking Trudeau’s bribes united in cheering his master stroke, demonizing the demonstrators for the umpteenth time. (Oddly, the Bloq leader disagreed. ) They ignored polls released Monday that showed the percentage of Canadians who want to abandon Trudeau’s lockdowns, mandates and punishments had zoomed from 40 percent to 54 percent— in one month. IOW, they agree with the truckers.

To Justin, it was all mob terror staging a coup. Again, Convoy leaders assured the fourth estate they didn’t want to take over government. They wanted an end to infringements on their charter rights. They wanted their elected representatives— Conservatives included— to hear the voice of the common people. They wanted Erin O’Toole to ignore the Globe & Mail and show leadership (too late to save his job BTW).

And they wanted the acquiescent media to stop acting as the Pravda wing of the PMO. (CBC: “Experts suggest containment, fines and giving protesters a deadline to leave”) Because the safe space created for the Family Compact is its last line of defence for this regime. The scribes and experts intoning mournfully about the death of civilization are actually lamenting the demise if their own class.

FOX TV’s provocateur Tucker Carlson spent 22 minutes at the top of his Monday show— the highest rated in U.S. cable TV— mocking this pretence of the comic opera on Parliament Hill, lampooning the PM’s costume changes and the failures of media such as CTV’s Paula Newton to stop writing for each other. If CBC’s 22 Minutes were still funny they’d do this piece.

Gimlet-eyed observers of the human condition, the media fail to see the ground shifting beneath them. The privilege of defining the world from downtown Ottawa— a privilege they’ve assumed for decades— is ending. Talking to your NIMBY friends is not reporting. As Carlson noted, the truckers are the messengers, but the crowds supporting them across the nation are the new reality.

If Trudeau weren’t buried in his bunker fighting manfully against Covid, he might see that, too. But that is asking him to grow a pair and leave hiding. The good news? Till the truckers leave he can listen to Joni Mitchell and Neil Young on a Russian DVD sites. Take that Spotify!

Bruce Dowbiggin @dowbboy is the editor of Not The Public Broadcaster (http://www.notthepublicbroadcaster.com). The best-selling author was nominated for the BBN Business Book award of 2020 for Personal Account with Tony Comper. A two-time winner of the Gemini Award as Canada’s top television sports broadcaster, he’s also a regular contributor to Sirius XM Canada Talks Ch. 167. His new book with his son Evan Inexact Science: The Six Most Compelling Draft Years In NHL History is now available on http://brucedowbigginbooks.ca/book-personalaccount.aspx