I get email. Here’s one with a reoccurring theme. I thought it might be useful to post my answer publicly in case it helps. I’ve edited it for spelling and typos and added one tiny bit as indicated below.
‐‐‐‐‐‐‐ Original Message ‐‐‐‐‐‐‐
On Monday, May 3, 2021 6:54 PM, WordPress <***> wrote:
Re Bill C-10: a Chinese-style dish of big (Canadian) government censorship chop suey
From: *** ***** – ***@telus.net
Message Body:
i agree wholeheartedly with your views on C-10 but, when it comes to Canadians just sitting back and doing nothing, what would you like us to do? We write to our MPs where, in most cases, they agree with us. However, we have a very disappointing Conservative leader who tends to lean way too far to the left for my liking. As you pointed out, our only pushback comes from writers like you. I don’t think that Trudeau pays any attention to them. He doesn’t have to….he gets all the support he needs from Jagmeet Singh. I despair for our once proud and free country.
Keep up the good work. I really enjoy all of your articles.
**** ****
My reply:
Hi ****,
You’re right to despair. If you’ve done everything you can do and everyone else just sits there and takes it, it’s extremely discouraging.
I’ve written along these lines before — about the fact that liberals speak as though everyone in the room agrees with them. It turns out that it’s impossible for them not to think that way, because as I’ve seen (much to my despair and frustration), even the most ardent conservative… just sits there and says nothing in the face of ridiculous lefty pronouncements. In essence, it appears as though everyone in the room totally agrees with the lefty because by all accounts, they do! And it’s not just a “meek and polite Canadian” thing; this has been going on for a long time in America too. Maybe it’s a conservative thing. Clearly, it’s an incredibly self-defeating attribute.
It reminds me of the anecdote about the restaurant owner who is shocked by the fact he had to close his restaurant due to a lack of customers. He recalls that his waiters had been instructed to always ask all the guests how their meal was, and the guests would always answer “oh it’s just great thanks.” The owner didn’t realize that everyone always says that just to avoid the hassle or any embarrassment — that’s their default answer. So he thought his restaurant was doing “just great.” Right up until it was wasn’t, and it was too late. Dead.
How could liberals and leftists not think everything they’re doing or saying is “just great?”
And by the way, this extends not just to that situation where a lefty aunt spouts off about “white supremacists” (or whatever). I wish I kept a list of every issue — even the tiny issues — that were blown off by conservatives as “not worth getting all worked up about,” and “not the hill the hill I’m going to die on.” They “let this one go,” because “when we regain power, we can just reverse it.”
But that’s absolute folly. These gradual moves — the ever-increasing social programs, the ever expanding government and ever expanding powers and control over us, the ever decreasing freedoms and so on: these were all little hills that we didn’t want to die on and didn’t see the need to make a big deal out of. Each time! It’s literally how we got here.
Every hill is a hill to die on. The leftist’s whole modus operandi is slow, gradual, “progressive” changes, shaming those who oppose them (if they dare to at all), hopefully driving a momentum and its speed such that suddenly what we knew is literally dead and gone forever. We’re on the verge of that right at this moment in history. You’ve also seen me write the words “Fabian socialists” a hundred times over the years. That’s exactly what they do. Look them up. Their brand is literally characterized — by themselves — as “a wolf in sheep’s clothing” [that last bit added here but not in my original email reply.] I believe that’s what the Liberals and the NDP — and quite a few Democrats in America — are engaged in. (Although so many of these people are so dumb, they may not even know they are doing it.)
So the takeaway is this: When they say stuff, tell them they’re wrong. At every, single, opportunity. I mean at the government level, in the news media, and at work or school. But it really is at the grassroots level that it makes a difference. Make sure these people know what they’re saying is not “just great,” and in fact, tell them it’s just ridiculous (if it is). If you can’t find enough good arguments in your own mind, you can certainly load up on the arguments against them by reading what I and others have to say. That’s half the reason I write them — to help provide arguments for exactly this purpose.
I would just add one more thing: conservatives are good at supporting the Conservative Party. The CPC regularly out-fundraises the Liberals and the NDP, as I recently wrote. But I’ve always believed that they — that huge and rather institutional, and sometimes elitist monster whose paid-up members sometimes select questionable leaders — are not the driver of conservatism and the conservative movement. For example, I do NOT take my cues from them. Rather, I like to think it’s the other way around. The regular people down here are the real leaders: you and me and the people who have a stage and make their views public. So conservatives need to start showing some of that same support to the people who can really make a difference.
Would you mind if I post this email exchange since I went on so long about it? It might help others. (I will erase your name and email address.)
Sincerely,
Joel Johannesen
https://ProudToBeCanadian.ca
PTBC was founded by Mr. Johannesen in 2000.
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