Greetings, friends. My name is Jess McLean, and I'm here to provide you with some blueprints

of disruption. This weekly podcast is dedicated to amplifying the work of activists, examining

power structures, and sharing the success stories from the grassroots. Through these discussions,

we hope to provide folks with the tools and the inspiration they need to start to dismantle

capitalism, decolonize our spaces, and bring about the political revolution that we know

we need. Well, this week has been another tough one for leftists in Canada. I know a lot of

you out there feel as though you don't have a political home. And in terms of electoral

politics or partisan politics, you're absolutely right. The NDP has, again, shown us for who

they are. And I think a lot more people are listening this time. The expulsion of MPP Sarah

Jama by the Ontario NDP and the complete lack of courage by the feds around Palestine have

been real blows to those who still held hope in the party. But I don't want you to despair.

And I certainly don't want you drifting over to the Greens or heaven forbid the liberals,

because it's all part of the same game. Just different colored jerseys. The kind of change

that we are out there advocating for does not come from delicately navigating through colonial

institutions, from playing their games. Influencing electoral politics does not require you to

be a part of them, to legitimize them. We've had over 70 episodes at this point with so

many different ways to apply political pressure from the ground up, in spaces that are mutually

created and beneficial, in communities we've built towards true purpose. So although Gaza

is still very much on our mind, We want to make sure that we continue to bring you ways to

organize, to mobilize, and to fight back. And that's what this episode is. We recorded this

almost a month ago now. It's a great discussion with two activists from Ground Up Waterloo.

It gives you some real practical tools to engage in community defense and some advice on how

to create networks between your community groups and organize labor in your area. These two

things are critical in not just responding to what's happening around us, the chaos frankly,

but also to move forward together and focused on a common goal, whatever that is. Let's get

to the interview so we can get to work, right? Welcome folks. Ramsey, can you introduce yourself

to the audience? Certainly. So my name is Ramsey Abde. I am a local activist. I'm involved with

my union. I'm an elementary teacher, so I'm involved with EDFO. I'm also involved in my

local labor council. And on the community front, I'm very active with a local group called Ground

Up Waterloo. You're one of those labor activist types, yeah? I am. All right. David, can you

introduce yourself? Yeah. Howdy folks. I'm David, pronouns they them. And I, a couple of years

ago, some friends and I, we founded this grassroots organization called Ground Up Waterloo Region,

and we've been organizing with some on many different fronts since. I also support the

Unsheltered Campaign, which is a local homelessness advocacy group as well. So you folks caught

my attention, particularly Ramsey did first. Sorry, David. But it was... You got a little

bit of airtime there at Ford Fest. So that was in your neck of the woods. Normally, Trontonians

have the joy of being able to protest at Ford Fest, but they held it out your way, maybe

hoping there wouldn't be so much resistance, I think. You made sure that wasn't the case

alongside other people. Ramsey, you particularly got a little bit of access to Ford. And reading

the... Ground Up Waterloo Twitter account in the bio is talking about holding politicians

accountable. So you don't mean at the ballot box when you say this, right? Like the kind

of work that Ground Up Waterloo does is a little bit more, shall we say, in your face activism?

Is that an accurate description? And if not, tell me more about the organization. Well.

Let's see, we have a couple different ways to go here. With Ford Fest, it was actually kind

of ironic that he chose Kitchener Waterloo. When he came to town last year, there was actually

a similar protest, a little bit smaller, but it was organized by the Ontario Nurses Association.

That was in the middle of a big kerfuffle he was having with them. And they put a call out

to the community to come out and support them, and a lot of groups did. So it was kind of

interesting when he came back and we were very well prepared for him. The Labour Front, through

Labour Council, we organized and we got a whole bunch of people together and the Ontario Health

Coalition has a Grand River

chapter which they used and they were able to round up a lot of their healthcare related

allies and advocacy groups. And there's also the Grand River Environmental Network, which

was there. And we actually reached out and connected all three to make sure that all three groups

were there to hold him accountable for his treatment of labor, particularly education, his mismanagement

of healthcare. And of course, we're in the middle of the entire Green Belt scandal and how he's

kind of destroying the green parts of the province. So it was really a very intersectional thing

We all were kind of very upset and he handed this opportunity for us to come out and air

our grievances. We're just salivating at the chance because this is peak Greenbelt time.

Right? Ford Fest was a few weeks ago now, but this was right when everyone was in fever pitch

mad. And I would have had real fun organizing this. David's even smiling at us getting to

talk about it again. I think everybody had been waiting for it. Educators, we've been dealing

with all kinds of nonsense in terms of how he's been treating schools and education unions,

particularly in negotiations. We're seeing some other issues and Ford fed right into this in

terms of the demonization of educators and what we do to try and support marginalized communities.

right now, particularly our 2SLGTBQ community. And, you know, for us, it's really important

where we're there and we want it to be seen. On the labor front, he's been attacking unions.

And so we were able to come together on the labor side and kind of round up people. It's

also very convenient right now because we're in the middle of a by-election here in Kitchener.

and we have a very progressive riding here. We had an NDP MPP and we have a Green MP and

we are a fairly leftist community. We want change, we want positive change. And so we were able

to get people out from both of those campaigns as well and bringing forward a lot of the other

issues that they wanted to talk about. You know, I talked about those three, but there were

also groups out there for universal basic income. There were groups out there for Ford had recently

or in the past he'd gotten rid of some rules around animal cruelty, right? We had our local,

very recently we actually started up a local acorn chapter to help protect tenants, right?

And the affordability crisis is a huge thing. That's not a labor thing. That's not a healthcare

thing. That's not an environmental thing. That's people just struggling to survive under Ford.

and we were able to bring all these groups together. And there were a couple of clips there. You

know, there was my clip there, but you probably also saw the clip when he pulled up in his

SUV and the police were trying to get him in. And we just had 150 people just walk into the

middle of the driveway and say, like, no, that's not happening. Like we had people laying down

on the road. Like it was Gandalf style, like, you shall not pass. I can only appreciate how

much that would have been like if I were there, but I promise you, being able to watch that

on Twitter when you couldn't go to Ford Fest was wholly satisfying. And I was so happy to

share that clip around because the reaction it got from people, I think was really important,

right? That resistance is pushing back and the optics of the police kind of sorta trying to

get them in. is obviously very educational for folks to see. So yeah, though, FordFest did

provide a lot more clips for our particular cause than I think it did photo ops for him.

I mean, that's an entire PR stunt that it's, it makes me mad to think, cause it happens

in every community, FordFest is the big one, but we all have barbecues and stuff held by

these conservative. And Pete, well, you're lucky you don't have to be subjected to this in your

progressive writing, but I do. And they're full of Canadian flags and they're really obscene

for the most part. And they seem to go off with impunity. You listed a whole bunch of reasons

to hate Ford and the gang. And still, you know, I get really kind of irritated at the idea

that they... They feel safe enough to parade. Like this isn't to subject them to violence,

but they should be really uncomfortable around the working class, the way that they're treating

us. And sometimes they're celebrated, like in my community, they're invited to the yearly

gala for the food bank, the two conservative representatives here. And one is heavily featured.

Carolyn Mulrooney is usually, like her children are up there dancing and she's like essentially

the guest of honor. And... The disconnect there makes me angry. So when we see acts of resistance

like this, even some of the smaller ones, it just it's a reminder to them that we're not

gonna sit down and take it. And it emboldens other people who wanna say the same thing,

but it's not the safe space to do it. You'd be the only person hollering at them. When

you start to even bring pairs of people to this and you start to really see the wave. David,

do you want to tell that story from a grassroots perspective? So labor got organized. They've

got lots of reasons, right? Ramsey talked just a fraction of the attack on workers that would

justify local labor councils gearing up. But the grassroots movement, getting people involved

in that and getting them mad enough to act, it's a little bit different. Yeah.

I guess the tactics and thinking at the grassroots level in Waterloo region in terms of really

at this moment trying to make opportunities for everyday people to access action, like

access political action, people who might not know, you know, like they might not have a

connection to a union, they might not be a member of a political party, they might not understand

those kind of pieces of those bigger infrastructures. But they have lots of feelings about things

going on. I mean, there were so many, so many of the groups that Ramsey was talking about

are grassroots groups. Like a lot of the stuff around the green, but was grassroots. A lot

of stuff are animal rights. The acorn group is very grassroots based locally. And then

there was just people who were upset and looking for a way to get involved. And so when I think

of how ground up tries to position ourselves in this landscape, it's to try and help be

an access point for people. who are feeling frustrated and don't know how to get involved.

And so we try and be very accessible in that way so that people can understand, okay, these

are actions, this is a place you can go, and these are how you can go to that place. And

then when you're there, you're gonna start making the connections. And meanwhile, at the same

time, behind the scenes, like me and Ramsey are making connections between grassroots groups

and more established labor groups or kind of political structures. And so I think we have

this very, kind of network mentality here, where we are trying to really allow ourselves to

be loose and open enough that we can build these relationships and we can act together quickly.

And I think that was very important. But I will also say, like, specifically for the main,

one of the main campaigns that Ground Up has been focused on for the past while is this

horrendous kind of Christo-fascist attack on school boards. and on our education system.

We've been following this for over a year and a half now at every school board meeting. And

so that was something that was very important to see at FordFest because what we saw at FordFest

was Doug Ford taking that campaign and making it part of the provincial conservative party

platform. And so it was, I think, a very concerning element of what we saw that day. But I also

think having all that coalition of people be there to witness that was also very important

because, I mean, right afterwards, then we had the million march for Canada parents' rights

terrorism moment, right, where they are just terrorizing our streets. And so I don't think

we would have had the same support in the following week if we hadn't had that coalition experience

Doug Ford jumping on those talking points and realizing that, oh, this is now like where

mainstream Canadian conservatism is heading. Yeah, I think for some people, these, the protests

that we saw last week that you just referenced, and the attacks on school boards, because most

of these happened outside of school board buildings, seem new, seem revived. People, but we were

absolutely expecting it. Folks just need to think back to the last time kids were in school.

Like I have kids in school, so the summer is like this different entity. And this is just

a continuation of what we saw of heavy runs to the school boards by anti-trans people,

right? Those were heavily contested for a reason. This was expected. And then Ford making that

announcement, knowing what was coming, was just such fuel to that fire. So that must have been

disheartening to be at that and witness that. And I understand, I'm glad that you're drawing

kind of a positive, that at least everyone was there to see that it got a lot of exposure,

which is good and bad. But I want to go back to what you were talking about in terms of

making the connections between labor and grassroots, because we all have local unions near us. And

I think quite often, Sometimes you get small community groups, like you're talking about

the animal rights groups, and there'll be some issues that are a little bit harder to sell

to labor than others, perhaps, but they mobilize and they understand the value of labor partnership,

but have no idea how to obtain it. It seems inaccessible, labor with the big L, like it's

a really huge, powerful entity that moves as a monolith, right? Because each labor council

works or how each local works is not necessarily readily known to people who aren't unionized.

So can, Ramsey, I'm going to go to you first. Can you talk about the technicalities almost,

like how to start to connect to local unions and how specifically grassroots groups can

start to make access to big L labor? Absolutely. So I'm actually going to go off a little bit

here. The concept I like to refer to is capacity. And we all have issues that we are very passionate

about or issues we're very involved in. But we all have a limited capacity for how much

we can do and how much we can act. But there are many other issues where we say, yeah, I

support that and I wish I could do something. And I wish I knew more about this. Um, and

I think a big part of what ground up has done was bring in advocates from different areas

or different groups or different passions where we all came together and we are all like-minded

and we are all progressive. We all want better for the community and for each other. And that

really kind of enabled that. Now, going back to the labor side, I'm actually very fortunate

to be in a very progressive labor council. And so that brings together our various unions.

But a lot of this kind of went back to a change in leadership. And we went to the CLC in Montreal

in the spring. And there was definitely a shift recognizing that there was a need for more

advocacy. And more activity and what could we bring back? The Ontario Federation of Labour

had a campaign and they regularly have campaigns. But the campaign they are using this year is

called Enough is Enough. And as a Labour Council we sat there and we said, okay, you know what,

we can have this campaign, which is just about the labour issues. But if we're saying enough

is enough, we need to reach out and involve those community groups and get... more voices

involved because the issues are bigger. And when we had our enough is enough kickoff event,

that was the goal. The goal was to bring in the community and was to bring in those groups.

And our vice president reached out to a number of different organizations. And we had that

and it was a big success. And we looked around the room and we said, who are the voices who

should be here but aren't here? And how can we improve that? Because we want it to be a

whole. We want complete community involvement here. And that led to our May Day event, which

was a big success. And then, again, over the summer, it's a bit of a slow time. But what

can we do to kind of reengage with that? Ground Up actually came and gave a presentation. One

of the things we do at Labour Council is we try and bring in different community groups

each week to bring in different groups. kind of raise the awareness within the representatives

of labour about what are some of the other things going on. And the people who are there can

take that back to their various organisations and say, hey, if you want to learn more about

ground up, here you go. If you want to learn more about the Ontario Health Coalition, here's

the contact. If you want to learn more, this past month we had a great presentation by Anna

Shebek Outreach which provides services to our... members of our local Indigenous community and

they're actually trying to roll that out even wider just to support that community and it's

a lot something that a lot of us wish we saw more of but don't necessarily have the connections

or the resources to do but what we can do is we can support those organizations One of the

things that we've been critical on the show here is unions not holding the line for things

outside of their bargaining agreement. The almost kind of general strike in Ontario was a kind

of a prime example of the connections made between grassroots and labor was done quite quickly,

mobilized local actions across the province. but never did it include anything beyond the

single kind of demands of not taking away the right to strike from that particular local.

And that power seemed to have kind of faded, I'll be honest. You talk about enough is enough,

and we were really excited about that. That built for quite a few months, but it never

reached the fever pitch that the... that came around those education sector workers, or perhaps

that came around the green belt. But we really did see it come back to the counter protests

that, again, we keep going back to. So David, knowing that and being a grassroots organizer,

I know none of this is news to you, that like getting disability issues on the docket for

labor rights, even climate issues can be a really tough sell. because they're fighting for their

workers' rights and there's capacity issues on what they can do. But it's frustrating because

you know the power that exists there. So how did it feel as a grassroots organizer to see

that kind of mobilization happen, even if it was for a bit of a defensive position? We would

like this to be on the offense once or twice, make some gains rather than holding off bigots

alone. That's exhausting. But it happened. It's a huge positive. What did you draw from all

that? Yeah, I mean, it was definitely, we wouldn't have been able to have as, I don't want to

say successful, because there are many people who were very traumatized by what happened.

But as maybe impactful an event without labor's help. And I think, I guess what I think, to

grassroots organizers, there is some structures within labor, there is a bit of a labor mentality

that can sometimes act as a barrier. But I think there is huge benefit to us as grassroots groups

being in relationship with labor, being loud in labor's face, building those connections

because labor has things that are very useful for us as grassroots organizers. For example,

it is far easier for labor to get access to valuable organizing materials. like, you know,

safety vest, sound equipment, you know, those kind of things that are really needed to have

a strong event. If you don't like, and labor can get this stuff so much easier. And most

labor council meetings are like publicly accessible, or it's not that hard actually to get into

a labor space. And in where your grassroots causes, usually there is a labor, labor space

somewhere nearby, intensive, like, whether you're at the university, there's tons of labor stuff

in universities. If you're thinking about public education, there's labor stuff there, you're

thinking about poverty and homelessness, there are labor groups that are connected there.

And so I think there's immense value in building those relationships. And I think that's what

we, you know, I don't, when enough is enough was happening, you know, I tried my best to

mobilize our grassroots groups to participate in that, but I wasn't super stressed about

this process campaign being, you know, the thing that's gonna bring us success. Because when

I think the thing that's going to bring us success is us as relationships walking forward to each

of these battles that are like more, far more immediate in terms of what we've seen at the

school boards, for example, or, and then now that morphed into this new conservatism, right?

So I think I see the value of the relations we built. And now that has come back to us

in terms of when we were trying to organize this counter protest, we knew we could go to

labor and be like, we're trying to get some of the logistics sorted. Can you help? Can

you help? We need to amplify this message further. Can you help? And labor, because we had been

in relationship for a while, it was very easy for those things to move ahead. And so I think

there is very much value in that. And we don't have to be in lockstep as grassroots in labor.

We can be in relationship and collaborate on stuff and also be like, some things, those

are labor things and I'm not gonna jump in on that. And that's okay. And sometimes labor

is not going to be, you know, in the exact same politics, because also grassroots groups have

many diverse politics. But being able to at least have the relationships and the understanding

to collaborate, especially on these kind of key fronts that we are seeing, is very helpful.

Absolutely. You hit so many important points there, but I especially love the reference

to the borrowing of equipment. I can relate so well. Shout out to QP. I know five, I don't

know how many megaphones and tables and they even let me use their kitchen. And yeah, no,

sometimes you even forget as an organizer because you have someone really reliable and labor

that can help you out. But endless, endless resources that you just can't scrounge up sometimes,

especially with short turnover, the way that we have to respond often in small community

groups. So yeah, that. that and the greater scheme of things. Right? So keeping those relationships

building, a lot of these labor councils even have Zoom links to a lot of their meetings.

So you can be a fly on the wall first, see what they're like, understand who you probably need

to talk to or email in order to get on the docket, you know, to get on the agenda. And you don't

have to be a union member to influence labor. Right? So I love those examples, David, that

you gave kind of real practical inroads that folks can make. Do you see any other big issues?

Like I don't always want to be on the defense. It's a necessity. It's a necessity and we will

do it. But can either of you think of an issue in Ontario, perhaps, that we could get that

same level of cooperation? Because, you know, ground up is... as you describe a real broad

coalition in itself. And even the needs of different locals and labor and their politics are very

broad. But other than what we've just seen, can you kind of envision anything else that

we could or should be mobilizing around? I mean, oh, I think as Ramsey mentioned earlier, like

we just got our acorns helping doing tenant organizing locally. And I think... there is

a lot of value that can come from more collaboration of different parts of our ecosystems on tenant

issues or housing issues. Because one that is like what is setting so many people into a

state of vulnerability and is a big pain point for a lot of people who we are trying to reach

on so many other causes. So I think it's a great way for us to show up and essentially be teaching

a whole new generation of people how to organize. It's like meeting them where they're at. But

also, like when I think of this kind of what I'm seeing as this new conservatism that is

really borrowing from, like it's stealing from far-right grassroots movements, I'm like we

can replicate that in our own way in terms of getting a new progressivism that is borrowing

from our movements to meet that need. And also, I'm almost like to intercept. Because when

you look at, when I looked at the people, who were at that rally. I mean, in terms of the

Million March for Canada, a lot of them are the same people I see who are really experiencing

huge issues on cost of living, really experiencing huge issues around housing stability, really

experiencing huge issues around racism and access to many pillars of life. And so I'm like, if

we can get ahead on those areas, I think there's a way to even intercept that. this new conservatism

that's moving because really, people's basic needs are a far closer way and a far easier

way to actually get them to understand so many other aspects of our movement. One of the items

I saw on your Twitter feed, I'm always going back to Twitter feeds, it's so obvious, it's

all I read sometimes, but you had a call out asking people for a book. And you're talking

about accessible ways to essentially politicize and mobilize people, right? For them to realize

their collective power. But books have a real way of opening up people's eyes and kind of

taking a book home to digest on your own and not in a reading group and not with anybody

telling you anything can sometimes transform people. So... Tell me about the initiative

you have around indoctrinating people with books. No, but you had, they love to say that about

us, don't they? But it's absolutely about being critical. But tell me a bit about that initiative,

because I think that's something that's so wholly accessible to anybody listening. Well, I can

speak at least to the book, but then I also think it's like, Labour Council has been very

helpful in pushing this campaign further as well. When I think of, so the book is that

we're working on with right now is called Let This Radicalize You by Kelly Hayes and Mirian

Caba. And so some folks in Ground Up were like wanting to read it. And then we're like, wait,

what if we just bought more and, and then filled little libraries with them and then like seeded

this into the community. And that's when then, because we have a diverse coalition of people

within the Ground Up network, all of a sudden it was like the university students were like,

okay, we're going to get our union on top of this and I'm pretty sure Ramza you got some

connections to through this so maybe you want to speak to that kind of seeding further. I

think the challenge is even within the labor movement union members come with very diverse

political opinions. As a whole labor does tend to be a little bit more progressive but we

need to understand even within that we will have people who want to take that next step.

And a lot of organizations, I know mine, advertises itself as an equity seeking organization. So

how do we provide those tools to the members to progress along that journey? And I think

books as an educator are a fantastic tool to do that. A lot of people don't know where to

find the information. A lot of people don't understand our history in terms of the labor

movement and the progress that we've helped to create.

For myself, when the opportunity came up with this book, it's like, absolutely, give me a

couple copies and I'm going to get this out to my Equity and Social Justice Committee and

I'm going to get this out to my Status of Women Committee and I'm going to get this out to

my Political Action Committee and all of the members that- I interact with in those various

communities, hopefully they can fan it out as well and have people, you know, have that slight

shift in their mindset and say, what more can I do or how can I do more differently? I love

that because even all our communities, there's free libraries everywhere, even if you're talking

about sending it to committees and people who know might absorb it really well. But also

just kind of leaving them rando in those little. boxes that people put on their lawn that says

free library, leave one, take one, and just like filling that up, you know, taking something,

one of those murder mysteries out, replacing it with the book of the month. And I just kind

of, that one really made me smile because I think, again, it's just really accessible way

for people to radicalize other people. And I don't think that's such a bad thing.

labor as a system has bulk orders much easier to do with labor's help than just individual

grassroots people. So it's been a really nice collaboration. LESLIE KENDRICK Absolutely.

And I mean, just see like passing on your own books and asking folks to forward on any copies

they have. But purchasing and supporting the author is obviously a good choice too. But

yeah, the labor resources. are pivotal, but it also sends a very clear message when the

two groups work together, because nothing was quite as satisfying as seeing how much the

far right squirmed at the announcement that Cupid in particular would be joining the counter

protests and the vitriol, unfortunately, that Fred Hahn was subjected to that he did not

squirm away from, not even when he asked if Cupid aligned with Antifa. And I think that

sends very clear message, even though it riles them up real bad. You know, like I saw someone

going to do an investigative report on how all these groups are now working together. And

it was like, we've openly been calling for this for eons. See it like South America. We on

this on the show, we did an episode Lessons from South America. And the one lesson we drew

from that is nothing of this is possible unless social movements are step in step with labor.

right, not kind of as add-ons, you know, to bulk up the numbers, but actual key players

in the mass movement. And so when it started to happen and they just started to lose their

shit, you were just like, okay, yeah, this reinforces what we've been saying. It shows a positive

example to people. So not only do they come with somewhat deeper pockets than grassroots

organizations who literally have to find everything for free for the most part, you know, borrowing

and whatnot. I think I have a tent from, I never gave back to ops who I'm so sorry, you know?

But that's like my confessional. I might edit that out. But you know, it's that messaging,

that visual too of the side-by-side step. I still cringe when the politicians walk in,

although it's important that they show a clear side, but it's just like giving them that photo

op without any kind of tangible action when typically they just come along as players,

right? They're not generally sending out emails to also ask their supporters to get on the

line, but there are a few exceptions to that. I think that's actually an important distinction,

right? Labour in those counter protests showed up, made public statements and like got their

members, called their members to show up. I mean, not a single government, not a single,

like, you know, there might have been individual politicians there, but you didn't see like,

all of a sudden, the Green Party of Canada all show up. You know, you didn't see the city

of Kitchener, they just put out a statement. There was no, right. And so I think there's

a huge distinction there that Labour is actually modelling for other... even more bigger institutions

that this is actually what solidarity looks like. And then institutions can and should

be doing solidarity. Yeah. Even Cringeworthy is quite often when you have these moments,

the emails that do go out from the political institutions, we know what they say, right?

You could help by signing this petition or by donating $50 by midnight. there's a huge difference

in the approaches there. So yeah, you got a big smile from me when you said like that's

a more of a model to follow. I would argue to say that the grassroots model is a model for

labor to follow, which is then a model for politicians or at least leftist political entities to at

least pretend to follow. But that's another episode. Well, I think that's something we're

actually seeing within the labor movement is kind of that recognition. that we do need to

shift more to a grassroots model of organizing. I think we see that a little bit in certain

political parties as well, but within labor, it's very clear that we need that grassroots

organizing. We need those conversations, those one-on-one conversations. We need people to

feel heard. We need those voices to be amplified. Because right now a big barrier for labor is

engagement. And we do see it, you know, great in some unions, but not so much in others.

Uh, we saw, um, OSSTF have their, uh, arbitration vote. And, uh, you know, I'll be honest, it's

very disappointing. One of the things they were giving up was the right to strike. This is

something that unions fight for. And they're handing it over. And the vote was 78, 22, again,

not overwhelming, but still very disappointing to see that high. But also the engagement,

the number of people who actually voted in that was extremely low. And it's like- Did we ever

get the final numbers? I mean, it was at 22% a few days before the vote closed, or maybe

just two days before the vote closed. And- I don't think they release the numbers, but that

is really low engagement. That's like by-election in some places, engagement. Right. You're asking

union members if you feel that you should have the ability to choose your collective agreement

or whether you want somebody else to figure it out for you. And I'll just ballpark this,

75% of them said, we don't care. To me, that's terrifying. We really need people to feel that

passion and that engagement, especially when we see, on the labor front, our rights being

attacked. As a fellow education worker, union worker, I imagine that particular vote really

upset you. Like, I did a whole episode about it, so I'm not gonna go off again. We called

it... binding teachers to arbitration. But one of the key points was that it really kind of

left the other education workers out to dry, as well as it's really hard to contrast that

to the mobilization that happened in the very same province around education workers, around

their right to strike, not even a year ago. Or was it a year ago? COVID, I have no dates

in my mind anymore, but. No, it was last December. We were... on the verge of a general strike

because the government was trying to take away our right to strike and was trying to give

us a contract that we could not vote on. And that was the line in the sand where we were

willing to go all in and we're here 10 months later and people shrug. And for me, I'm a bit

of a collective bargaining nerd. Provincial EFRO Standing Committee for collective bargaining.

So I take that as a big deal. I'm there to try and represent all of the EFRO members and have

that little bit of a voice in the air of our executives and of our staff who are handling

all of this. And I look around and I see members saying, we don't care. Now again, that's not

my union, that's their union, but- And a small fraction of that union. Right. I'm going to

kid myself in thinking if everyone voted, the result would be different. But I might be wrong,

but we've gone on a bit of a tangent, although critical issues. But again, I could really

go off on this for a long time because that did bother me. And as a bargaining unit member,

I feel you, man, that really kind of says I don't have any faith in their ability to get

us a good deal or our collective ability to mobilize. But... Again, I think even taking

the question to the members put out a very dangerous message. But again, perhaps we'll have that

chat in another podcast. Well, yeah, no, again, like we did. And those are definitely all the

positions that I took. It just, it was, as soon as it was introduced, it weakened everyone's

hand. So I was never happy with the OSSTF elections in the first place, but okay. I'm going to

completely transition. This is not going to be a smooth transition at all. It never is.

Sometimes we go off on tangents, but that's how people talk politics, because it's all

connected, man. But there's one thing that around the community defenses that were put up last

week and getting people to take baby steps into activism is you got to keep them safe. Our

very first episode, I took the responsibility seriously. It was, we keep us safe. I thought

if I was going to encourage people to be disruptive, we would first give some basic tips and tools

on how to do it safely without exposing you and your comrades to doxxing, cops, harm, how

to... and ground up Waterloo in anticipation of what was going to happen last week, put

out a few images that were just some basic safety tips for these counter rallies. There's two

I want to talk about in particular and what it means, you know, why we do these things

because maybe not everybody agrees. The first one is not to photograph allies. David, why

do you guys say people like those images, right? We like to see the really inspiring faces holding

the line. Those are good shots. Why don't we take those? Yeah. I mean, I think what is important

for people to understand, and we as grassroots groups who are really following these things

need to help the people who are just... trying to live their life and want to show up the

day up to support. Um, understand because like that far right ecosystem runs, um, like it

runs on this kind of online content grift of, you know, um, and so at rallies, they are using,

like they, their, their whole ecosystem exists on like taking our, our of defenses, our responses,

and turning them into their own little outreach machine, turning it into things to fuel themselves,

right? Fuel their own sense of victimization, fuel their own mockery, they use a lot of...

I mean, anyone who's been online knows like the obsession with cringe and all that kind

of stuff. Those are weaponized in these far right spaces to keep them fueled. And the problem

is that there are people in those spaces who are so... who become so, I guess... fragile

from their indoctrination that they will use though, like they can then use that in dangerous

ways in the sense of, I mean, even just a sense of basic online harassment, but also going

to the lengths of like calling people's bosses, showing up at people's houses, like creating,

and these are things that actually do, they actually are like, they try and keep track

of who is at these events. There is a very insidious side to that kind of organizing. And so we

are, we don't want... to give them any fuel in that. We don't want to put anyone in a position

where they are at risk. And it is sad in a certain way, because there are very valuable, the idea

of projecting joy and the idea of wanting to invite other people into this organizing space.

There is an accessibility thing that we lose when we aren't able to take photos in that

kind of way. But we also want people to be. to help people start to understand the actual,

the level of risk that we are dealing with in terms of how this growing organizing is coming

to. And so that was really important is just, I think it's most important actually just to

start get people to think differently, to start realizing, oh, like this movement is actually

a real threat. Like it's an actual threat to like queer and trans people or, you know, I

think of like many of the staff at the school board, like they have had terrible things happen

to them because of how this movement is accelerating. And that's something we actually, as a community,

need to start taking seriously. And this is a step to start educating you that you need

to start taking that seriously. I think when I think of the tools in another way, and like

in my way of trying to make this actually, like not just about protecting ourselves, but also

into this idea of positive forward momentum. is, I mean, a huge part of our local grassroots

organizing scene is abolitionism. And we, every year we go to council to tell them, you need

to stop funding the police. They're draining and crushing all our resources, and they are

causing harm and violence to communities. There was literally an incident of police violence

in our region just past week that was documented. It was very traumatizing. But people don't

understand, like, they freak out. What do we mean? Like if we don't have police, who's going

to provide safety? And these defenses are our way of actually explaining to people what is

safety? What does safety look like? And so this idea of us as community members showing up

to create space between us as community members showing up to essentially shame and put and

try and disrupt. systems of hate, that is actually abolitionism in action. And that's what it,

like, our world without police is a world where we have systems that do that. And if you were

at any of these creative offenses, you would have seen, one, that the police spend way more

time policing the creative offenses than they did the 4 million mark. And that was two, because

they were, the police themselves were actively terrified of the 4 million march parents' rights

groups. And it was a very, like, and so you can see that the police themselves are looking

to grassroots organizers to understand safety themselves, because they don't know how to

provide safety in these situations. And so I think, one, there is, this is a very real risk.

And we try and go to the most extreme so that you are protected from the most extreme, even

though most likely the everyday person at a rally like this is going to be fine. But also

we're doing this so that you can start thinking and learning and practicing what safety looks

like so that you know then. This is what the abolitionist future is going to look like.

It's going to look like you knowing and trusting that your community has your back and that

they know how to respond to protect you. If I can just jump in here, I think a lot of people,

like you said, most people will go to these events and not experience anything, but the

risk of the harm is absolutely real for us here in Waterloo. We had the attack at the university

back in June, if you recall that. And one of the things that we did with Ground Up Waterloo

was listen to the community where they said, we don't feel safe. We don't trust the campus

police to take care of us. You know, we need to come together for healing. And we were able

to facilitate that. And, you know, we, when we organize, we have. representatives who are

the liaisons to work with, you know, law enforcement. But the reality is, we try and manage it and

tell them, like, you are not helping the situation. And I think back to the Million March, and

it was, there was a team of us and we were, you know, very committed to trying to make

sure that space stayed safe. Unfortunately, people say, oh yeah, everybody came, everybody

went, and it wasn't a big deal. But there were actually five incidents with roaming groups

who were trying to hunt down followers after the event had dispersed. So we had five incidents

that day. Thankfully, we had members of our security team with them, and everybody did

get home safe. But the very next day, we had... an attack on a couple of students at one of

our local high schools. The safety risks are very real. And so as a community grassroots

group, we take ensuring the safety of the people who come out very seriously as well. I just

want to mention like the flip side of not photographing your allies. You guys mentioned it in your

post. Sorry. You folks mentioned it in your post. And it's not wearing anything identifiable.

I also love how you add wearing masks because that now has a two-fold purpose because COVID

isn't over and it helps reduce your ability to be identified. And just another reminder,

because I know there's a lot of people that are really angry and willing to do whatever

it takes to confront these people. And we'll kind of get into that in a second, but. your

mentality may be, I don't give a fuck if they come after me. But they will then know that

your networks of friends, it's not just about keeping you, the individual safe and organizers.

There's so many things, you know, go back and listen to that first episode that we need to

do, like having marshals with high vis-biz and training in keeping people safe and what that

means and having liaisons so that not everybody is talking. to the media or the police or whatever.

There's actual tools that you need to do before you bring out masses of people to highly confrontational

events. But it's, yeah, it's about keeping your entire network safe from all sorts of intrusions

that I hope people don't need reassuring that they do actually happen. I think there's so

many examples, particularly of female journalists and... school board trustees like that have

been amplified. It happens to all kinds of folks, but just for evidence sake that have been documented

that absolutely these steps aren't to scare people because that might be intimidating as

a first time protester. And that's what a lot of these counter protests are going to be because

this is angering a lot of people. These are people who have been willing to be on the sidelines

for a while and now know that they got to hold the line. They've got to get out there. This

is unacceptable. it's spurred a lot of people on both sides. That might be scary to be like

getting all these instructions around your physical and your identification safety. And, but it's

such a necessity at this point. So I totally agree. Like it's sad, but necessary. I'm sorry,

if I can chime in here. If the other side already knows who you are, it's a bit of a moot point,

but if they don't keep it that way. You know, everybody knows who Fred Hahn is. Everybody

knows. Um, he should still wear a mask if he's listening. Yeah. Organizers have your rallies

be masked. We had, so even with our rally being entirely masked, I got COVID, several people

still got COVID. So if you are organizing any rally, please mask up, protect yourself and

protect your, uh, your neighbors. Thank you for that service announcement. I think we should

have it on every episode. I think I probably do. People are probably at least so annoyed

at this point, but I don't care. Let's talk about that confrontation, especially emotions.

That's what's getting a lot of people involved in any movement. David, I think you said that

earlier. It's usually what makes you spur into action, not logic, but emotion. And like we

are seeing people hold up signs that we've seen. I don't even wanna repeat it. that just make

your blood boil. They're collectively making demands that would erase some of our community

members. And literally, literally. you want to go out and you want to punch these people,

right? That's what you're feeling. You're like not fucking on my watch or not, you know, like

you come near my kid's school, da da. You know, there are high level emotions. There's also

only so much people can take when confronted, like the stories that came out from last Wednesday

or last Friday at the North York school and countless other examples that I, you know,

I know I'm missing and I apologize. awful things being shouted at people. How, and one of your

instructions speaks of a real non-confrontational approach about trying not to add fuel to the

fire. Because I know a lot of folks worry about violence. Not the single acts of violence that

we're talking about, but an escalation. repeat of some acts that we've seen that are just

fueled by hate. And a lot of people worry about stoking that fire. Some people aren't going

to agree with that approach, though. Do you want to hit on that, on the need to emphasize

the need for a safe space in those counter protests in particular versus the need to confront a

bigot? Well, what I can say is that, like, ground up as kind of this, we had this very open,

fluid network, and that allows us to collaborate with labor, but it also allows us to collaborate

with the anarchist punch a Nazi networks. And it's- I just wrote down punch a Nazi. I just

wrote that as you said it, but oh my. And so- Sorry for the interruption. But it's important

that we are building relationships in that space as well, because that was networks who, I mean,

Waterloo region has a long history of Nazis. It was in the 90s and early 2000s that it was

the- anarchist punch and Nazi crews that got the Nazis like out of our downtown. So like

they have a wealth of knowledge about a very like about that type of organizing. And and

it's important for us to be in relationship with them and communication so that we can

actually be strategic in all actions. And so we talked before with the rally about, you

know, what do we what do we expect these Like, what are we, what's going to be the dynamic

of the space so that we were all on the same page? There was flexibility within that, flexibility

for us to move, change directions, set up safety like- Punch a Nazi. Set up safety, but there

was also flexibility for punching Nazis if that was needed. But we don't want, like that's

one thing for the org, and it's important for us to have that at the organizing level so

that us as organizers beforehand have an idea of the frame of the event. And then at the

event, we were constantly checking into each other to be like, okay, where is things at?

But we really wanted everyone, the everyday people attending to have a far more constrained

bucket because we like, you know, so that they have expectations on how, um, how to engage.

So that gives it's a lot easier than for us to manage the space and make those decisions

on the fly of like, okay, if this is escalating to the next level, then we need the people

who are more vulnerable, we need to get them the fuck out of here and we need to create

the systems in place for this new type of organizing. We had those kind of conversations beforehand,

but we need the people and everyday people in the public to not be going rogue before without

the organizers being on board. That's why it's very important. Your organizers are going to

have a safety plan, follow their safety plan. And we're going to adjust as needed. If you

are a punch a Nazi person, hold, hold onto that. Cause there may be a place for, there is a

place for that, but we need to like, no, you need to be working with like the community.

Cause what we are doing, right. Is we are trying to collectively practice safety. Going back

to what I was talking about, like the abolitionist action, like we are trying to actually practice

safety. And so it's not just about what you're feeling. You're also thinking about the people

around you and how do you organize with them and it became very clear at our, at least the

Waterloo region. queer youth defense, that the people we were counter-protesting were very

willing to do violence, were very close to doing violence. And so that's why we were very, we

wanted that guaranteed, okay, we know that this is a very violent group so that we need extra

precautions for our folks so that we can protect them and make sure they're not getting into

situations. I'm going to have so many sound bites from your answer to that question that

are just going to make so many people smile because what an inclusive approach to this

because there is absolutely a place for everybody on community defense lines. But also remember

there's 10 year old, there's kids there, there's families showing up to this because it is about

protecting the kids from these bigots and larger issues. But yeah, those are particularly tough

ones. Maybe a defund the police. rally would have a slightly different demographic, but

these really are families coming out, you know, and it's a really tough way to organize as

a grassroots because there's that fear of you will be responsible for an escalation or for

someone getting hurt, even though that's not ever your intention. And everyone always needs

reminding that it is the most marginalized people that typically face the police violence that

ensues from an escalation or from the far right folks trailing off maybe in small pairs or

by themselves afterwards. It's like predators, they will go after folks that they think that

they can attack. So that's a huge responsibility for organizers who can't shy away from calling

people out to do this, but certainly have a huge responsibility in keeping. people relatively

safe, but there's no guarantees. Like, this is a class war, a culture war, if you want

to call it. It's not, it's still a class war, but we get it. We've kind of like done an hour.

That's typically our episode length. Obviously the three of us could talk about a million

things, but like, is there anything that we didn't hit on? or anything that you folks are

up to, you wanna make sure everyone knows about. Well, I was just gonna say, like just to make

the connections, right? Like we had been following this movement from when it started just as

harassing our school board a year and a half ago to now where it's being parroted by the

provincial and federal conservative parties. So I think one, just to follow what's going

on in your school boards,

progressive, this new conservative movement, right, this new wave of conservatism. And we

can't just, we shouldn't be surprised when we see it happening at that federal and provincial

level because we are seeing it on the ground. And so please be checking in on your school

boards. I think that's just very important because I think they're breeding a lot, or the movements

around them, not the boards themselves, but the people attacking them are, I think, seeding

a lot of what we're, and platforming and mainstreaming a lot of what we're seeing now move up. through

the political system. Thank you. Ramsey, do you have any parting thoughts? I have many

parting thoughts.

I think what David says is very much true. We look at what's happening with Scott Moe. That's

the Premier of Saskatchewan. Yes. And he wants to call back the legislature to use the notwithstanding

clause to put in these things. That was never the intent of the rule to take away people's

rights and put... marginalized youth at risk. That was never the intent of the law. And we

need people out there to kind of stand up. We've seen our government here in Ontario try and

use the notwithstanding clause a couple of times just to attack people's rights. And that's

what it really is. Our rights are under attack and we do need to stand up and to organize.

One thing we touched on a little bit that collaboration piece and labour does have those resources

and if you are a community grassroots group, reach out to your labour council, reach out

to the local unions wherever possible. It's not just the equipment that's available, but

if you would like some information about how to use different programs, how to use different

software, networking, one of the big things we're trying to work on is set up flying squads.

help respond to these hateful events. And that's very difficult at a grassroots level simply

because of the resources. But that's absolutely something that labor can assist with because

we have those tools and the technology to get those things in place. And when we need a quick

defense, they can mobilize that quickly. So You forgot the mailing list, right? Those mailing

lists. They don't data mine for no reason. But not just that. Like we have like familiarity

with getting those online petitions and things like that set up. We often have a little easier

access to politicians sometimes. We have databases and again databases can be a little bit depending

on the topic can be a little bit uncomfortable for some people in terms of handing over your

personal information to somebody you don't know. But, you know, I'm part of groups on Slack,

on Signal, on WhatsApp, right? Like, there are all these different networks that these different

groups use. And if you're not familiar with what the tools are and how to use them, reach

out to Labour because there will be somebody there who can get that ball rolling for you.

And just that act of reaching out is that first connection to building that stronger relationship

with them. Yeah, I think folks would be surprised how many different committees that labor councils

already have dedicated to issues that aren't necessarily labor issues, worker issues, they

are, but that's a different discussion. So there might already be a response network for the

green belt for... the community defenses around LGBTQ rights. So yeah, I love how we gave people

kind of practical blueprints to engage with labor. But I really appreciate both you taking

the time to sit down and hash this out, but also for doing what you do on the ground. We

love getting especially smaller community groups on for the very reason that you frame your

organization the way that you do because it makes it seem so much more accessible to make

a difference. That sounds so cheesy, but you know what I mean. And it's not out of reach.

Getting labor on your side isn't necessarily out of reach. Radicalizing people is not a

formidable task always. So thank you so much. And we will make sure to link back in our show

notes. all kinds of ways to keep up with this particular group, Ground Up Waterloo and Ramsey

and David. So thank you guys. Thank you folks. Blessings. All right. Thank you. That is a

wrap on another episode of Blueprints of Disruption. Thank you for joining us. Also a very big thank

you to the producer of our show, Santiago Halu-Quintero. Blueprints of Disruption is an independent

production operated cooperatively. You can follow us on Twitter at BP of Disruption. If you'd

like to help us continue disrupting the status quo, please share our content, and if you have

the means, consider becoming a patron. Not only does our support come from the progressive

community, so does our content. So reach out to us and let us know what or who we should

be amplifying. So until next time, keep disrupting.