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Apparently, the revolution will be televised. And apparently, people will sit down and watch and then bitch about what they saw the next morning.

According to a just released Angus Reid poll, the majority of Canadians believe that the police’s actions against G20 protesters were justified.

Now “majority” is a funny word since for this poll 1,003 Canadians and 503 Torontonians were interviewed. Now, doing a little math here, that equals a total of 1,506 Canadians, which is actually less than the number of activists and bystanders who were arrested over the weekend.

I’m not a psychic, but I can certainly tell you what 1,090 people think of the police’s conduct over the G20 Summit weekend.

And why the choice to only interview 503 Torontonians when they were the most impacted by the G20 protests in the first place?

Anyway, back to the results:

— 73 per cent of Torontonians and two-thirds of Canadians believe police treatment of protesters was justified during the G20 summit.

— Two-thirds of Canadians are disgusted with the G20 demonstrations in Toronto. Fifty-nine per cent are ashamed, 57 per cent are angry and 54 per cent are sad.

— In Toronto, 81 per cent said they are disgusted with the G20 protests, while 74 per cent are angry, 65 per cent are sad and 61 per cent feel ashamed.

Considering the media coverage Torontonians and Canadians were subjected to over the weekend, I can’t blame them for feeling the way they do.

Apparently — and I say apparently because I was not at home watching the protests on TV myself but am relying on the trusted feedback from family, friends and colleagues (left, centre, right wing and libertarian) — all the major media networks were covering the protests, with CP24 and CTV covering the events live.

In order to catch the viewer’s attention, the major networks all had promo loops playing during commercial breaks that featured images of Black Bloc anarchists setting a cop car on fire.

But these promo loops played so often, and on every channel, that it looks like there were actually a thousand cop cars burning in the streets, set alight by a million strong army of anarchists (in total, only four police vehicles were burned). One friend even likened the media coverge to that of 9/11 where people were similarily fixated in front of the TV, watching the same horrific violence play over and over.

It honestly looked like nothing else was happening in the city but the riot. And by “nothing” I mean the 25,000 strong Labour/NGO/Peace march that rallied at Queen’s Park to protest the G20’s policies.

Of course, people did eventually hear about Queen’s Park through the media, but only in relation to what occurred after the official Labour/NGO/Peace march when police began using their horses as weapons to charge through the crowd they trapped there.

Please note that the Canadian government designated Queen’s Park as the official free speech (“safe protest”) zone.

Back to the Angus Reid poll, it found:

— Fifty-three per cent of Canadians and 86 per cent of Torontonians watched the protests closely or moderately closely.

Hey with MSM friends like that, who needs enemies? I can see why average Canadians thought the whole city was burning.

Ironically, if the MSM was trying to buy nice from the police(=state), not every journalist reaped the rewards. Some got owned: G8/G20 Communiqué: Journalists attacked by police at G20 protests

Krystalline Kraus

krystalline kraus is an intrepid explorer and reporter from Toronto, Canada. A veteran activist and journalist for rabble.ca, she needs no aviator goggles, gas mask or red cape but proceeds fearlessly...