I wanna take a streetcar downtown ...

[marnanightingale]

I used to live in Toronto. It's not my home, anymore, but it's still my city.
sabotabby:

Downtown Toronto is a ghost town. I haven't been there myself, but I've seen the photos. I've been keeping up with the news of the wall, the surveillance cameras, the sonic cannons, the legions of cops, the private army of thugs, the school shutdowns, the work and transit closures, the prom and wedding cancellations, even the moronic fashion advice.

And it hurts. I have to say it. Mock Toronto all you like, but it's my city, and I love it with all the irrational enthusiasm of a flag-waving Yank. I live here and I work here; it's my haven and my playground and I find its vastness, its variety, even its cold-shouldered anonymity, a comfort and a joy. It's my home, and at the risk of sounding hyperbolic, these soulless bastards have turned it into a warzone for their little photo-op.

...

They have transformed a bustling, prosperous city into a microcosm of the world they wish to create. Governed by martial law, cordoned off, leaders isolated from the people they claim to represent. This is what democracy looks like, indeed. They used to accuse activists of hiding our faces behind black kerchiefs and balaclavas—now they're the ones hiding behind walls.

Comments

[shasplim.livejournal.com]

Sadly, this has characterized pretty much every major summit since 1999, when the Battle of Seattle scared the pants off all the corporate bigwigs at the WTO conference. The police presence at the 3rd Summit of the Americas (in Quebec City 2001) demonstrated how tight security became in only two years.

9/11 probably didn't help much either...

[audrawilliams.livejournal.com]

WORLDS COLLIDE.

[commodorified.livejournal.com]

FIFTY PEOPLE IN CANADA.

AND APPARENTLY FIFTY THOUSAND RENTACOPS.

[pyroclasticgrub.livejournal.com]

*historical revolutionary icon love*

[bibliotrope.livejournal.com]

Yeah. Same thing happened in Pittsburgh when the G20 met there last year. Everyone had been thinking, "What a great way to showcase our city," and then they basically closed the place down in the name of "security."

[ironphoenix.livejournal.com]

They're afraid... and if they keep acting that way, I'm sad to say that they'll be right to be.

[jsburbidge.livejournal.com]

It is not a ghost town, at least yet -- I've been downtown (really downtown) each of the last three days, and it's still busy, although a little less than usual, at street level.

The large banks and law firms have people working from remote sites or from home -- I'm taking the week off to avoid the hassle -- but that hardly creates a ghost town.

I'm not sure what Friday's going to be like -- probably pretty deserted, with everyone ceding civil order to be replaced by a beseiged barrier and confrontational protest -- but there hasn't been anything major and negative yet.