What happened in Calgary?

Two groups of protesters met in Calgary yesterday: 25 members of the "Aryan Guard" white supremacist group, and 150 assorted leftist urchins, led by Bonnie Collins, the Communist Party candidate and spokewoman for the often-violent group, Anti-Racist Action.

A pox on both of their houses, I say.

And that's the point. I despise them both. But I don't think either group should be arrested for having foul ideas. According to the press reports that I've seen, there was some chanting and sign-waving and even a few leaflets being handed out, but no violence, and no incitement of violence. In other words, it was calmer than a typical Friday afternoon at Syed Soharwardy's mosque.

Like Soharwardy the radical Islamist, the two groups on display were ugly -- fascists and communists. And passers-by were appropriately appalled. That's exactly how it should be. As Gilles Marchildon, the executive director of EGALE, the gay rights group, has argued, one of the advantages of free speech is that it lets us know who the bad guys are, and motivates us to take our civic duties seriously. That's the difference, though, between bona fide activists like Marchildon, and anarchists and communists like the ARA, and their supporters like Richard Warman, with his "maximum disruption" philosophy. They just want a fight.

In a city of one million citizens if only 25 white supremacists can be marshalled on a sunny spring day, that's a pretty good indicator of just how marginal white supremacism is in Canada. (Question: how many of those 25 were agents provocateurs for the police, human rights commissions, or others in the anti-hate industry?) The larger numbers on the communist/anarchist side aren't surprising, especially given that Collins is a union boss. But even their numbers are pitifully low. The sheer entertainment value of the clashing protest should have been enough to bring out more. Professional grievance-mongers of all stripes have a better time of it in Vancouver, Toronto and Montreal. It's just not a Calgary thing to do.

That's my reaction. But it won't surprise you that the usual suspects on the censorious left want to ban public demonstrations like this -- but only for the side they don't like.

Warren Kinsella, on cue, is apoplectic. But what exactly is his complaint? The white supremacists rode the transit together, walked a few blocks, and were turned back by counter-protesters and police. The news report from which Kinsella excerpts doesn't say a word more -- no mention even of flags, chants or literature. Other than being politically marginal and offensive, where exactly is their crime? If I was a political activist like Kinsella, I'd be careful about calling for the banning of peaceful public rallies.

Even the ARA had trouble finding some crime to quarrel with, other than ideology. According to Jason Devine,

“We can’t just sit around and wait for the police,” Devine argues. “Essentially, the police’s hands are tied. Until they break the law, it’s our job to alert the community. We show up to let them know that we’re watching them and that the community doesn’t have to be afraid.”

No laws are being broken -- not even trumped up "hate" laws or even fake "human rights" violations. But Devine wants a fight anyways -- maximum disruption-style. It sounds to me like he's more of a threat of violence than even the thugs he opposes.

Nothing much happened in Calgary -- certainly nothing that comes close to the incitement you'd see on a typical day at an "Israel Apartheid Week" on a Canadian university campus these days. Kinsella and the CJC are mum on those demonstrations, and often ignore real jihadist threats of violence, too. To make up for that shameful silence, they hyperventilate about fake threats like yesterday's non-event in Calgary. Sorry, I'm not buying it.