By J. Boyden
Rebel Youth magazine's campaign called Fire Kevin O'Leary got a boost today from an surprising source. As the campaign approached 800 signatures on Friday night, the right-wing TV channel Sun News picked up the story as segment on its programme Byline. You can watch the show in the You Tube above.
With the major snowstorm hitting Toronto, I wound-up being the spokesperson for the campaign. Still, facing blizzard conditions a half-hour bus ride to Sun TV Montreal took closer to an hour. Things weren't made easier by the fact that, as far as I could tell, Sun News Montreal studio doesn't really exist -- apart from a TV camera and a fancy backdrop in an unmarked and tiny closet-sized like studio, all on the tenth floor of a major private broadcaster's building, TVA.
The trip to the media outlet may have been full of delays, but the interview went by fast.
Byline is a show that, in traditional Sun TV style, mixes far-right commentary with a few distorted facts that could be called stories -- or so its online detractors basically say. My conclusions and judgement were just based on what came first on the show.
I saw an 'exposure' of the Ontario SPCA for being 'infiltrated' by groups like PETA and not respecting animal-owners rights to privacy. I hear an amazing discussion about the CETA or the Canada-European Union Comprehensive Economic and Trade Agreement (called by some 'NAFTA on crack') and why it doesn't go far enough (Canada should just 'unilaterally' move to Free Trade, regardless of cultural content or jobs).
And then there was a discussion of the New York Times (NYT) vs. the New York Post where the host and guest talked about 'Media snobs', how the NYT 'hates Jewish people', the NYT is pretentious because it prints on large paper, women like the NYT -- and then the interview lifted-off with a sexist and homophobic rant that ended with a defense of the Sun Newspapers 'Page Three Girls' (now no longer on page three).
Here is a quote from the guest:
"I read the times because my wife is a women and they love that newspaper... They [presumably NYT readers, Media snobs in general or perhaps all women] live in a hoity-toity, elbow-patch, blazer-wearing world where women are not attractive. Why not have a man there? I don't know, have you ever seen males nude? Their not attractive, okay? Women are called the fairest sex for a reason, but they live in denial of that. They are just so determined to go against 40 thousand years of evolution that they make fools of themselves and all they care about is diversity mongering, and multiculturalism involving people they don't know, they don't live with, and they don't send their kids to school with!"
We will post that clip another time with some commentary -- your thoughts are welcome.
Seriously, however, if O'Leary's friends continue in charge of the CBC maybe this is what the public broadcaster will become?
Of course, the interview segment rushed by and it is too bad I wasn't able to hammer more of the basic points of the campaign -- especially better development on why "fighting unions with evil" is a type of hate-speak and provocation, inciting violence against working people for just organizing and demanding their rights.
Is "evil" a good way to describe the Postal workers being legislated back-to-work, the Caterpillar lock-out where the boss demanded a 55% wage cut, or Ontario's Bill 115 against teachers and students?
And consider the fact that, in Columbia for example, about 200 trade unionists are killed every single year. The exact time O'Leary was making his "unions are pure evil and must be fought with evil remarks," Canada was signing a free trade agreement with Columbia.
The full video is above, courtesy of YCLtube, or link directly to full screen here. As the campaign grows we will keep posting updates! To everyone who has signed, thank you for your support and excellent comments!
