Liberals Declaring Proud Boys An ISIS-like Terror Group Is As Alarmist As It Is Hypocritical

By Robert Stewart —— Bio and Archives February 12, 2021

Comments | Print This | Subscribe | Email Us

Recently, NDP leader Jagmeet Singh pushed out an online petition over Twitter demanding that Prime Minister Trudeau declare Proud Boys Canada a 'white supremacist terrorist' organization. The call came immediately after US Proud Boy members were apparently found involved in the Capitol Building melee that's since led to House Democrats impeaching President Trump a second time.  Although it is CSIS and Public Safety Canada, not NDP Twitter-followers, which decide who is and isn't a threat to our national security, Singh's bit of Two Minutes Hate did exactly what was intended: it pushed Public Safety Minister Bill Blair last week to indeed officially label the group a "terrorist organization", putting them in the same camp as ISIS in the process. 

Move drips with hypocrisy and alarmist, diversionary politics

It's difficult to see the move as anything but pointless, and one which drips with hypocrisy and alarmist, diversionary politics. While the Perry Ellis-wearing, fighting-prone Proud Boys certainly aren't my cup of tea, the group denies being an organizational force behind the Capitol Building siege (which did look pretty spastic for the most part). And as far as I've read about them, its membership is apparently open to all comers and always has been. Moreover, I've never heard either its current leader (Enrique Tario, non-white) or its founder (Gavin McInnes, married to a non-white woman) state that any racial group, whites included, is superior or deserves to rule supreme over others—a requirement, it would seem, for a group open to everyone. Taking them at face value, PBC touts itself, not as white Canadian terrorists, but as 'anti-Marxist defenders of the Christian West'—however dope-ish they may be in their actual execution.  Still, if they do indeed deserve the terrorist label, I cannot see how something like Antifa would not also. Not only has the half-baked, anarcho-communist movement been involved in scores of deadly riots this past year, they've committed multiple murders across the US and elsewhere. And they've indeed been labelled a terrorist group by both the Trump and Obama administrations. With little reason to disbelieve Antifa is any less organized here in Canada, I'd say it's actually this sort of group that most deserves national security-level scrutiny from our elected leaders. I'm especially looking at the Liberals here. Not only have they shown little to zero concern about the openly violent movement, Diversity & Inclusion minister Bardish Chagger recently doled out millions of taxpayer dollars to groups that apparently partner with them. Something really isn't right here—Conservative diversity critic Kenny Chiu, where are you?

Singh and Trudeau's bit of kabuki theatre on the Proud Boys issue

As for the NDP, if its membership truly has a problem with ethno-nationalism, they should consider recalling their very own leader. Jagmeet Singh has been documented as not only wanting to establish a separatist Sikh ethno-state, but he's apparently refused to condemn mass killings of Hindus, and once tried to convert the sentence of an unrepentant Sikh terrorist. In the eyes of the Indian government, at least, Singh's seen as such an extremist, it once blocked him from entering the country. I wouldn't exactly call this a sign of one's love for universal humanity.  Singh and Trudeau's bit of kabuki theatre on the Proud Boys issue is just another installment of something they've long done as political leaders: talk up the supposed daily threat of racism to non-white Canadians in order to secure their votes in key urban ridings—See John Ibbitson's recent op-ed saying as much. This is a shamelessly cynical and extremely dangerous type of politics. At a time when thousands of small businesses are shuttering daily (mine included), I'd say spending time on these sorts of non-issues is to violate the obligations demanded of public office. It also comes far too close to the hyper-neurotic and increasingly fraught politics south of the border. Canadians should be above this. By calling out the fearmongers and alarmists before us, we still can be.