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Syndicate
TORONTO, May 24, 2012 /CNW/ - A press conference will be held tomorrow morning to announce the outcome of a mass assembly to build a movement of solidarity with Québec students who are on strike. The Student Solidarity Network will bring together a broad-based network of activists to not only outline a plan to support Québec students, but to also build Ontario's movement in the fight to reduce tuition fees and for accessible post-secondary education.
The assembly will release a statement of solidarity and planned actions at Friday morning's press conference. Representatives of students and academic staff will also denounce the Québec government's response to student demonstrations and Law 78.
WHAT: Press conference to oppose Law 78 and outline Ontario's course of action to oppose tuition fees
WHERE: Queen's Park Media Studio
WHEN: May 25, 2012 at 9:00 AM
WHO: Labour and student activists from Ontario and Québec.
The Canadian Federation of Students-Ontario unites more than 300,000 college and university undergraduate and graduate students in all regions of the province. The Québec Student Strike reached day 100 on Tuesday, May 22.
http://www.newswire.ca/en/story/980157/media-advisory-students-staff-and...
The Saskatoon Star Phoenix did not have kind words for Jean Charest:
While the world watches in amazement as Quebec Premier Jean Charest snatches defeat from the jaws of victory, it's a reminder of the need to develop solid public policy before the streets start to burn..
While governments are focused on austerity measures and worried about inflation, the needs of this enormous amount of humanity has slipped off the table. As Nobel laureate Amartya Sen wrote in a recent New York Times op-ed: "The worthy but narrow intentions of the European Union's policy-makers have been inadequate for a sound European economy and have produced instead a world of misery, chaos and confusion."
It is important that governments don't lose sight of the needs of all citizens - including the already disenfranchised youth.
http://www.thestarphoenix.com/news/Protests+hold+lessons/6669894/story.h...
Where's Unionist? He usually chimes in once a day or so on these threads.
He was here this morning.
Okay, thanks - I missed him, then.
Fourth.
Tactical FM
http://www.ustream.tv/channel/tacticalfm-live-broadcasts
another live feed
Hi Boom Boom - I'm here, I'm safe and sound (more or less), been very busy and a tiny bit under the weather, but thanks for asking about me! The beautiful students keep me going through all adversity.
ETA: By the way, the useless mayor of Montréal Gérald Tremblay, who loves the rich and hates the youth, had asked people to bang pots on their balconies rather than doing so in the street. So, about a thousand pot-bangers have decided to visit the Mayor's home in Outremont, bang their pots outside his home, just to see if they're doing it right. We're awaiting the Mayor's response.
La loi spéciale [bang, bang, bang bang bang], on s'en câlisse! [bang, bang, bang bang bang]
Mainstream media coverage, reported at http://montreal.mediacoop.ca/story/ten-points-everyone-should-know-about... has been irresponsible, biased and false, if not simply ignorant.
The onslaught of bank, government, academic, media, 'think tank', police, and other forces has been hypcritical, full of lies, and destructive -not only through increasing fees, leaving students in debt, physically damaged for standing up for their rights, but destructive to our social fabric, And Our Economy.
Government deficits are OUR SURPLUSES- 'our' being households and businesses according to MMTP.
In the current Recession/Depression there is nothing 'progressive' about austerity, nothing 'worthy' about trying to sit on an austerity fence. http://neweconomicperspectives.org/2012/05/why-progressive-austerians-do... :
"Most public expenditures provide income to private merchants (suppliers), so the cuts in governmental spending further reduce already inadequate private sector demand. The cuts in governmental spending can cause a recession that will simultaneously reduce tax revenues and increase the cost of governmental services for the unemployed. As more people become unemployed other workers will fear losing their jobs and may reduce their expenditures (and businesses will tend to delay refilling inventory). This can exacerbate the recession, as can deflation. All of these things can cause austerity efforts to increase the budgetary deficit rather than reducing it. "
Mass Arrests: Over 700 Canadian Protesters Detained in Police Crackdown (and vid)
http://www.rt.com/news/canada-police-arrest-students-tuition-110
On Tuesday, the movement marked the 100th day of demonstrations..."
It's just never the same without you.
ETA: Are these demonstrations anywhere near the F1 race location? I wonder if that's the reason the riot cops decided to act?
31st Night Protest in Montreal (and vid)
http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/montreal/story/2012/05/24/montreal-protest...
"The 31st night protest over as a growing number of Montrealers join a neighbourhood-wide cazeroleazo - casserole protest.."
Quebec Faces Mounting Pressure Amid Student Crisis (and vid)
http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/montreal/story/2012/05/24/montreal-arrests...
"The pressure is mounting on Quebec to resolve the student crisis and end nightly protests across the province that have netted hundreds of arrests in recent days. Quebec Education Minister Michelle Courchesne acknowledged Thursday, 'the situation is really quite serious,' and student conflict must be resolved.
A third round of talks with the province's three main student federations will happen soon Courchesne said - likely in the next few days. Federations representing CEGEP college and university students as well as the more militant CLASSE group have all agreed to resume negotiations with the Liberal government.
The groups say they're ready to talk even if Quebec's hardline emergency protest law - Bill 78 - isn't on the table. But student leaders maintain the crisis would be defused if the contentious legislation was scrapped. So far the Liberal government has refused to discuss Bill 78, which was adopted last week to widespread criticism.."
the cacerolazo in the mile end was enormous, this is just the tail end of it: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tAa99OjBd_4
Pot-banging demonstrations were reported in many neighbourhoods of Montréal, as well as other towns (Sherbrooke, Trois-Rivières, Gatineau, Granby, Québec, Saguenay, Saint-Jérôme, La Prairie, Saint-Basile-le-Grand, and Saint-Eustache).
A demonstration of 500 in Granby!?
Something is happening here, and you don't know what it is. Do you, Mr. Charest?
Thank you to everyone here for all of the updates!
It is nice to get first-hand reports to counter the MSM. One thing I find most interesting is Mulcair's position on all of this - as a former Charest cabinet minister. I realize he is a federal politician, but it would be nice if he made a statement of support.
What is wrong with Charest? And Marois doesn't really seem to be much of an effective opposition. I am so clueless quebec politics - when is your next election?
unionist, that picture is just too cute!
I'm going to be in Montreal this weekend (on the train right now, actually) so maybe I'll see some folks out there marching.
Heh. I wonder if E. May is reading this thread. The Greens show Mulcair how to do it.
Provincial and Federal Greens Condemn the Denial of Democracy
MONTREAL - The Green Party of Quebec and the Green Party of Canada stood united today to condemn the Charest government's high-handed approach chosen to resolve the student crisis through the adoption of Bill 78, the special law announced Wednesday night.
"The Charest government just added insult to injury," said Claude Sabourin, Leader of the Quebec Greens, who slammed the adoption of Bill 78 by the Quebec National Assembly. "Denying the right to protest is undemocratic not the best way to go about stopping them," said Sabourin, who strongly condemned the unilateral move by the Charest government.
"I worry a lot when I see Canadian governments, federal and provincial, interfering with our rights and liberties," said Elizabeth May, Leader of the Green Party of Canada and MP for Saanich-Gulf Islands. "The right to assembly is a fundamental right for everyone."
Not one to mince words, Sabourin was unequivocal: "Quebeckers seemed supportive of the Charest government's attempts to end the crisis. This time, I'm afraid the jig is up for good. Clearly, we will have elections this fall. The Charest government has lost all sense of legitimacy."
How much energy have the students put into "riot and mayhem"? Whether or not the "students" per se are guilty of these acts, they have occured and the students' spokespersons have not quite condemned these unlawful acts.
While reasonable individuals can understand the lengths either side could stoop to to manufacture public response, the sight of groups such as Black Bloc etc lends credulence to the fact that it is not simply the police trying to create an opportunity to respond.
Popular opinion in PQ is not behind the students. "Riot and mayhem" is not the method to promote the students' views to change that fact and, without wider appeal, if the agenda encompasses more than just tuition hikes, the students can only compromise or fail.
Glib? My point is that trusting politicians or elected officials will simply lead to more betrayal, leaving going directly to the people as the only remaining option.
With the passage of Bill 78, recent indications are that popular opinion is with the students. And my own impressions are that by and large the student demos have been among the most congenial and charming mass movements around. - hardly 'riot and mayhem', despite the best efforts of the authorities to provoke them. As for 'unlawful acts'the proto-fascist Bill 78 is the only unlawful Act we should be concerned about here..
It seems a largely un-reported element of this is the massive, peaceful, pro-social element in all these protests. Major sports events seem to leave more burned garbage and broken glass. The current red protest is amazing: to see hundreds of thousands protesting in the evening, week after week, the city largely treated with respect, could be a huge story. They seem to be an engaged, commited public, who gets out night after night. The peaceful organization earned my respect.
Tuition fight could spill outside Quebec as Ontario students get set to join protests
http://news.nationalpost.com/2012/05/25/ontario-students-poised-to-join-...
a view from the UK...
Oh Canada
http://plashingvole.blogspot.co.uk/2012/05/oh-canada.html
"...However, we have the French - or rather, French-Canadians to thank for another reminder of how to protest properly..The initial cause has fed into a general sense of social outrage. The Canadian Conservative government is one of the most unpleasant, self-righteous, reactionary, undemocratic the first world has seen for a generation: Prime Minister Harper has taken George Bush as a role model and perhaps gone even further.
The cuddly Canada of peacekeepers, William Shatner, Due South, Degrassi Jr High and Anne of Green Gables has been replaced by a vicious corporate puppet which seems to actively enjoy poisoning the planet through tar-sands oil..and yes Canadian voters are responsible for this insanity...If Canada's corporate government manages to smash Quebec, that's the end of social justice in North America."
Full Comment in today's National Post. Its the older generation thats entitled; not students:
http://fullcomment.nationalpost.com/2012/05/24/john-moore-its-the-older-...
Bill 78 does not only affect student protests of course. Although it seems to have disappeared from the coverage, there is still opposition, Indigenous and others, to Plan Nord for example...
I am in awe of the small protests in neighbourhoods as much as the large demonstrations. Families banging pots like it was New year's Eve is scaring the fuck out of Charest and his cronies. Maybe even more than the students themselves and the two together are an unbeatable political force aimed squarely at him.
Crawling out of my hole a little...
I don't know if you were being tongue-in-cheek... Anyway, you'd have to work quite hard to NOT be a witness to some sort of student-related event. No place is safe now—even Saint-Eustache has been overtaken by terrifying, smiling hordes of casseroleurs! Muhuahahahahaha!
You'll probably like this video then...
This one's working (for now).
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rCS5rQH0OYg