“Stop Harper” Protest by Parliamentary Page During Conservative Throne Speech

A Senate page managed to stand just meters away from the prime minister with a sign saying “Stop Harper” during the government’s throne speech in Ottawa today.

Brigette Marcelle De Pape had this to say after being escorted out of the Senate Chamber and then fired:

Harper’s agenda is disastrous for this country and for my generation. We have to stop him from wasting billions on fighter jets, military bases, and corporate tax cuts while cutting social programs and destroying the climate. Most people in this country know what we need are green jobs, better medicare, and a healthy environment for future generations.

Contrary to Harper’s rhetoric, Conservative values are not in fact Canadian values. How could they be when 3 out of 4 eligible voters didn’t even give their support to the Conservatives? But we will only be able to stop Harper’s agenda if people of all ages and from all walks of life engage in creative actions and civil disobedience.

This country needs a Canadian version of an Arab Spring, a flowering of popular movements that demonstrate that real power to change things lies not with Harper but in the hands of the people, when we act together in our streets, neighbourhoods and workplaces.

Well, Brigette is one Canadian who stood up and took a strong, nonviolent stand for a safe and sustainable future for Canadians. She is an example to the rest of us who realize what is at stake over the next four years.

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-3hCWTqluU8]

More links:

Senate Page Explains Her Brave Stop Harper Protest On Floor of Senate Today

An interview on Global TV: Page Fired For Protest During Throne Speech

Update: Interview with Brigette on Power and Politics today:

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MFOys8Fqgno&feature=player_embedded#at=64]

0 thoughts on ““Stop Harper” Protest by Parliamentary Page During Conservative Throne Speech”

    • I agree – it’s people like Brigette who will inspire the rest of us to speak out and oppose Harper’s agenda.

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  1. good for her and her courage!.. too bad she and her stance will be all but forgotten by next week, and of course she lost her job as house page, giving any thinking person absolutely no representation in the house..

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    • I’m not sure that pages have much influence anyway, Francis. And as the head of Citizens Climate Lobby, Marshall Saunders, likes to say, “Be outrageous, it’s the only place that isn’t crowded”! I think Brigette occupied that corner quite well this week!

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  2. Now how will she pay for that university degree so she will actually have a clue. No doubt a child of the left.

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    • It won’t be long before it becomes abundantly clear, Greg, that clean water, clean air, and a stable climate aren’t important just to people who identify themselves with the left of the political spectrum. Whatever happened to the “conserve” part of Conservatives?

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      • I am very much about the environment but a little “hissy fit” will do nothing to help the cause.

        Cheers.

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        • Fair enough. But don’t doubt that when Mahatma Ghandi started to stand up against the British, many dismissed it as a “hissy fit” (or whatever the early 20th century British equivalent term was). As he said, “First they ignore you, then they ridicule you, then they fight you, then you win.”

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    • Greg, science is not right or left in spite of ideological bias, religious extremism or vested business interests.

      Your reference to the “left” betrays your bias. I’m a red Tory with a science background and I resent the political bias that we now have.

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      • My apologies but the political bias started with the breach of parliamentary protocol yesterday.

        It will all be forgotten in a week or so of headlines.

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        • LOL – best twitter feed yet: “Contempt of Parliament”: the thing that gets young women fired, and old men re-elected.

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  3. Greg,

    Brigette will not have any trouble getting a university degree. She’s already brighter and more aware than the climate change denier faction, and with guts like hers she can do what she wants with her life.
    She will no doubt continue to learn and to respond rationally to the world around her. She knows already (along with 97% of the world’s climate scientists) that climate change is a real issue. She also knows that issues of “breach of parliamentary protocol” reduce down to non-issues in the face of the impending (and already starting) climate disaster the world is facing.

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    • Let’s be honest with ourselves here, the world is not facing a climate disaster – “mankind” (or womankind if you feel the need to be unnecessarily politically correct) is.

      The world was here long before us and will be here long after we have passed into history. What a selfish belief to think that all this is for you; get over yourselves ā€“ mother earth certainly will.

      Now I need to excuse myself so I get back to work to pay more taxes and support some other misguided child down the path to a misconceived notion of self-importance.

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      • LOL ā€“ Iā€™m glad to hear you value the earth, Greg. What you are missing in your perspective is the fact that civilization (and humanity) has flourished over the last 10,000 years within a narrow temperature band that fluctuated within a small plus/minus 2 degree band. You are absolutely right, planet earth will be here long after humanity ā€“ but do we really want to be the first species in the history of the earth to be responsible for our own extinction?

        From my perspective as a mother, that is both the saddest and maddest thing I can contemplate, all the more so because the benefits of switching to a clean energy economy are so overwhelmingly positive (unless you happen to be an oil company executive with no children).

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  4. You’re preaching to the choir here and no I didn’t miss it at all – you have in fact proved my point. We are still not that important; ourselves or our offspring.

    What you find as the saddest thing is also the most beautiful – the resilience of the plant to put up with us and all the previous species that have contributed to their own extinction: there have been many that have failed to adapt (we are NOT the first).

    Cheers again.

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    • Failing to adapt IS NOT the same thing as deliberately hastening our own extinction. I presume from your comment that you don’t have children.

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      • Yes I have children.

        We (the collective we) are not performing a deliberate extinction – we are ignoring the possibilities of changing our behaviours.

        Again, I agree with you.

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        • We will have to agree to disagree – we are indeed being led down the path of deliberate extinction by those who should know better (our governments and the powerful corporations that hold the sway of power over them, and don’t want to lose their lucrative edge). There are SO many better ways of doing things than the way we are going about things now, but it will mean big changes. And there are those with vested interests who are very interested in delaying change as much as possible. From my seat, it is not moral for me to know better and not to act on that knowledge, for my children’s sake as well as yours. There’s too much at stake. Twenty years from now, whatever the situation, I want to look my children in the eye and tell them I did everything I could to make their world safer and more secure. Today’s quote from Churchill sums it up for me – although a clean energy future in time to stave off the worst effects of climate change is by no means a sure thing, it is the courage to continue in the face of these odds that counts. Which is where Brigette’s stand comes in – as a fellow climate hawk says, “the only thing that scares me these days is that my children may not have a safe and secure future because of global warming”.

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  5. Remember, we are the ones that voted for that government, at least those of us who actually got out of our cars long enough to do so.

    Blame those who did not think the issue important enough to vote. Those are the one to focus on.

    Stop the masses……………..not the right honourable Mr. Harper who they supported either by parliamentary action or inaction.

    The only thing we disagree on is “who is responsible“.

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      • Thanks, Alan, great stuff. There is a roadmap out of the quagmire we are in – our elected leaders just need to get their heads out of the tar sands trough to lead us!

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    • It’s an easy out to focus on the “masses” rather than our individual behavior, as well as being disempowering. Each of us has an incredible amount of influence within our own sphere, which isn’t apparent until we “stand up and are counted”. Brigette did not expect to be interviewed on CBC P & P – she used her middle name initially instead of her last name so that her parents wouldn’t find out, until it quickly became apparent that it was out of her hands! The question is not “what is that person there going to do to solve this problem”, or “who am I going to blame for the situation we are in?” rather what can I do? That’s when life starts to get really interesting!

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      • Again, we the individuals become the masses. Stop passing accountability to others.

        Cheers Christine, gotta go deal with some important issues.

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        • Greg, I hope that those “important issues” include holding your children tight, and promising them that you are doing all you can to make their world safe and secure. That sounds like individual accountability to me!

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  6. I`m a 67 year old grampa and as a Canadian, I would like to tell Briggete how proud I am of her. I fail, for the life of me, to see how she was being disrespectful she behaved quite the opposite, I`d say. Maybe it time for more of us to stand up for what we believe.

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