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EDITORIAL

All the pretty horses

April 21, 2003

Organizers of the notorious Ontario Coalition Against Poverty (OCAP) had a deliberate agenda to bring down horses at the violent June 15, 2000 Queen’s Park protest.

Protesters were expected to use bicycles to discourage police horses from moving in on them. Others were warned by their leader to not bring along marbles as a device to hobble the horses

Hypocritical leftwing fellow travelers of the group, who claim a monopoly on the humane treatment of animals and collect money from an unsuspecting public for it, should take note that OCAP is no friend of helpless animals.


Arrested on charges of counseling other people to riot and assault police, OCAP leader John Clarke testified about notes referring to "bikes" and "marbs" found in his backpack about five weeks after the violent June demonstration.

Indeed, as some may recall, the police arrested firebrand Clarke as he was pedaling his own bike over a local bridge.

What do OCAP protesters have against horses? According to Clarke’s testimony, he remembered "the strength of those animals" during a 1991 Metro Convention demonstration.

Strategy pre-June 15 had OCAP organizers toying with the idea of taking a leaf out of the book of the movie Gandhi. A scene in the film inspired some OCAP-ers, where demonstrators are told they should sit down en masse, because that would keep the horses from riding at them.

Why was this strategy subsequently nixed? Sheer fear. In Clarke’s own words: "We rejected the notion of sitting down because we weren’t prepared to take the director of Gandhi’s word for it."

Clarke should know at age 48 that true life ain’t at all like the movies. Real horses rear up in real pain when attacked by humans.

But Clarke and OCAP colleagues see horses as "a dangerous thing" according to his testimony. The subject of the possibility of police horses "being brought into the crowds" came up at protest planning meetings, and "we wanted to reduce the possibility of it happening."

When Clarke was talking about "marbs" on the stand, they weren’t the ones in his head at the time of the protest. Marbs in his retrieved notes were only included in such a way as to say to the demonstrators "don’t bring marbles" and "if discussed, it was discussed from a perspective of ruling it out (and) trying to discourage it.

"If marbles had been used by the protestors, the entire area in front of Queen’s Park would have been turned into a skating rink," Clarke said.

The notion of bringing marbles to the protest was not cast aside by everybody. Toronto Free Press staff attending the June 15 demonstration witnessed marbles being tossed in front of the horses by protesters

Clarke downplayed the significance of his notes to jurors, telling them that they ranged from "a few ironic tongue-in-cheek expressions" to "a mixture of ideas that we discussed and considered seriously," and to ideas that were rejected.

"It was not designed to be conveyed to our people," he stressed. "It was much more random than that."

For an anti-corporation, anti-global, anti-military kind of guy, Clarke used a lot of military terms in his notes.

"Drill front team" and "functioning command team" were two expressions found in his notes. But Clarke, no war mongerer, was merely making an attempt at humour, he said.

The horse is a noble animal, and there are few sights as unforgettable as the one of a proud horse up on his hind legs whinnying with fear. Anyone who saw how OCAP treated the horses at the Queen’s Park protest is not likely to ever forget it.

Meanwhile, if there is one thing June 15, 2000 should have taught Clarke and the gaggle of radicals he calls OCAP, it’s that it needs a thorough public relations overhaul.