Protesters and counter protesters clashed near the Kamloops courthouse, Sept. 20 (Image Credit: CFJC Today)

By Joseph Jack

Sound Off

SOUND OFF: When one side spouts hate and conspiracies, how can there be common ground?

Sep 26, 2023 | 9:09 AM

A RESPONSE TO ARMCHAIR MAYOR Mel Rothenburger, regarding “finding common ground” with anti SOGI protesters.

As someone who attended both the Kamloops Pride Drag Queen Reading Hour counter protest and Sept. 20 counter-protest to the “1MillionMarch4hate” — or as they want to call it “1MillionMarchForChildren” — let me tell you why there’s little chance of finding common ground.

Nearly every protester who attended the Kamloops Pride Drag Queen Reading Hour on Saturday, Aug. 26, was in attendance at the Sept. 20 protest. They had to leave the Aug. 26 protest early because they’re the same people who protest in Valleyview on the TRANSCanada Highway each Saturday.

At the drag queen library protest, the people in attendance literally asked me:

1. If I was aware that George Soros, a Hungarian Jewish billionaire living in the US, was directly funding Kamloops Pride, a “Marxist” organization?
2. If I was ready to die from blood clots from the COVID-19 vaccinations?
3. If I knew about Bill Gates’ plan to lower birth rates?*
4. If I was a paid protester by Klaus Schwab, the head of the World Economic Forum?

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Now, what this had to do with drag queens reading stories (sorry they didn’t hire you, Uncle Chris the Clown), I will never know.

For good measure, one of them had a “TRUMP WON” sign. Yes, that’s right, a Canadian was proud to declare Donald Trump won the election the rest of us know he lost in 2020.

One of the protestors at the drag queen story hour said to another Kamloops media outlet that the trans movement was a “fad.” She said it was part of a wide-ranging plot by the World Economic Forum (Klaus Schwab) to reduce the world’s population. She believed it was a spiritual battle between good and evil. She also didn’t believe COVID-19 was real and that 5G networks are poisoning people “electromagnetically.”

The phrases ‘groomer’ and ‘pedo’ were bandied about by graying boomers and Gen-Xers with little to do on a Saturday. These same phrases were bandied about on Wednesday, too. Protestors would want you to believe that SOGI means eight-year-olds are being handed worksheets encouraging children to masturbate. They say that kids are using litter boxes in schools. The anti-SOGI protestors want you to believe kids are learning about anal sex as children.

The issue I have with those claims is logical. Claims require evidence.

When you ask the protestors to “show me the money,” they offer a pic of a screenshot of a picture of a computer screen. They tell you it was on the news. They tell you they saw it on TikTok or some other social media channel.

When you ask for the direct link to the lesson plans for the school, you’re told, “DO YOUR OWN RESEARCH!”

Logic states if you make a claim, you back it up with evidence. See: Burden of Proof. Show us that, in BC, little kids are learning to use litter boxes, being taught to masturbate and learning about anal sex. Curriculums are not confidential or classified materials.

That’s just a taste of what that ilk believes. Spend 20 minutes with one, if you can, and they’ll refer you to a number of TikToks and YouTube videos, all of which offer no evidence. You’re challenged to “connect the dots.”

You know what the pro-SOGI people believe?

The reality is:

1. 2SLGBTIA people exist and form families.
2. 2SLGBTIA people did not “learn” the lifestyle and were not “groomed” into it. They *ahem* WE were born this way.
3. 2SLGBTIA people knew at a young age they were who there were and sought acceptance and for generations and could not find it.
4. 2SLGBTIA teenagers are attempting suicide at a rate seven times higher than the hetero crowd.
5. By promoting acceptance, we might lower the rate of teen suicide.
6. If a 2SLGBTIA kid isn’t accepted by their families, there are people in community who will accept them and love them for who they are.

The pro-SOGI people also respect democracy — something the anti-SOGI people cannot handle. They cannot handle that democratically elected governments fund democratically elected school boards to carry out the will of the majority of electors. (Psst, it was the BC Liberals, now BCUP, who introduced SOGI in 2016.)

The anti-SOGI people cannot handle that most Canadians have moved on from the “culture wars.” For example: gays, lesbians, transgender people, etc. have been welcome to serve in our armed forces since the 1990s. Same sex marriage has been the law of the land for almost 20 years and since 2017, gender identity and expression are part of the Canadian Human Rights Act.

The majority have moved on.

So the Armchair Mayor wonders why we can’t see eye to eye. Well, given that one side is completely off the deep end, relies on social media for what’s true and spouts conspiracies as absurd — and more — than the ones mentioned above, how could there be common ground?

Joseph Jack

*Bill Gates is trying to lower the birthrates in African countries by increasing vaccination rates. In places where the infant mortality rates are through the roof, so is the birth rate. By giving kids a chance to live, so they don’t die of childhood diseases, the birth rate goes down.

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Editor’s Note: This opinion piece reflects the views of its author, and does not necessarily represent the views of CFJC Today or Pattison Media.