The Canadian Truckers Freedom Convoy 2022

~ Amusives

Since the beginning of this Pandemic, Truck Drivers (like so many other people) have been designated Essential Workers. They have transported the goods and materials that kept society functioning and allowed so many people to work from home.

After nearly 2 years of truckers not having to be vaccinated in order to cross the Canada/USA border, both Canada and the United States have now decided that they must be vaccinated. Neither government seems to have produced data to show that licensed cross-border truck drivers have been causing a disproportionate increase in Covid related disease compared to, say, the 15-20 million people who marched in Black Lives Matter Protests or the fans who today attend sporting events in large stadiums.

Many truckers have had enough of Government imposed mandates, whether they be vaccinations, vaccine passports, masking, curfews, lockdowns, etc. That is what led to the Freedom Convoy.

Canada’s Prime Minister Trudeau did not meet with the truckers when they arrived at their destination in the Nation’s capital. Why? He has reportedly said that the convoy members and their supporters hold “unacceptable views.”

Speaking of unacceptable, on the World Covid-10 Stringency Index, Canada’s score is 78.24 (out of 100) with only a few countries having higher levels of school and workplace closures, travel bans, cancellation of public events, gathering restrictions, stay at home requirements and restrictions on internal movement. Since I’ve lived in the midst of it all, I can understand why some people have had enough of what they think are ‘unacceptable’ levels of government imposed mandates and are now expressing those views.

“The Canadian food system really rides on the back of a truck because of our short growing season,” he said of the C$21bn worth of food imported from the US each year, and trucks play a key role in moving it.
In many way, Covid-19 has exposed the necessity of the trucking system as well as headwinds within the system, including a shortage of drivers.
“At the end of the day, we need more trucks on the road. If everyone came to the table for an honest discussion about this, rather than making political statements, it’d be better for everyone”.

– Simon Somogyi, University of Guelph, study of food business and supply chain management –

9 thoughts on “The Canadian Truckers Freedom Convoy 2022”

  1. I don’t disagree with the perspective that we’ve all “had enough” of lockdowns, mask mandates, etc. However, vaccines have been proven to reduce the severity of infections (thus keeping people out of hospitals and morgues). THIS is what we need to be focusing on (not whether or not the government has the “right” to tell someone to get vaccinated or wear a mask). The convoy is all about the “rights” of the individual (which is terribly selfish), not the “rights” of the population at large (including the most vulnerable citizens who will suffer the most). I’m reminded of that great line from Star Trek, “The needs of the many outweigh the needs of the one.”

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    1. To me, the convoy is all about the rights of the many vs the rights of the individual.

      I agree, the vaccine has proven to reduce the severity of infections. It has been known almost since the first roll out that the vaccine is not a sterilizing vaccine (does not entirely stop you from getting the virus.)

      As the omicron variant is showing, the vaccine not only does not stop a vaccinated person from getting the virus, it isn’t stopping the virus from spreading at a remarkably fast rate among the vaccinated and the unvaccinated.

      In my province, people who are older than 70 are the most highly vaccinated. They are also the most hospitalized and overwhelmingly the most who died. And among that group, unvaccinated seniors were the most likely to end up hospitalized or dead (though over the age of 80, the percentage of those who were vaccinated but also hospitalized or died, continues to be high in relative terms.)

      Yet here we are, two years later, putting the physical health of one small group of people (who we have tried to shield but failed to be able to protect because they traditionally get ill and many die from yearly colds and flu viruses) ahead of the needs of another group of people (the many) who are at very low risk of illness, whether they are vaccinated or not.

      In my mind, the truckers are just one group of the ‘many’ – the essential workers who have lived an ‘unsafe’ life that has made it possible for another large group to shelter in place and ‘be safe’. New vaccine mandates now are simply government virtue signalling that will do little to nothing to make the vulnerable any safer.

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      1. All true, Margy. But there’s a much better, safer, and more civilized way of protesting than what they’re doing (especially when a large number of the protesters / convoy really don’t give a rat’s a** about vaccine mandates or anything else – they just want to stir up trouble!)

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  2. The Freedom Convoy 2022 is about ending mandates and restoring our constitutional rights and freedoms. Let’s face it, 90% of them are vaccinated.
    None of us want to see more mandates or restrictions.
    Great post Margy!

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    1. Yes, I have read that the vast majority of truckers are vaccinated. I would also suspect that some of them might have had the virus because they have not had the privilege of sheltering in place for the past two years.

      It is now accepted that the immunity from having had the virus could be as good as immunity from vaccine, though it isn’t a message that has been widely accepted by the governing authorities who just want everybody to be vaccinated.

      A growing number of places have pivoted to accepting that the virus is endemic and it is time to drop the mandates and restrictions and treat it as we treat the flu and the common cold.

      Personally, I am in full support of the truckers and their convoy. I don’t really understand how anyone who approved of the right to freely express opinions during BLM marches (like our Prime Minister) doesn’t support the right of truckers and their supporters to also express their opinions.

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        1. I think Trudeau is disconnected from the reality of the lives of the working people. He also tried to paint truckers as a group of racists. Reports I’ve seen from middle of the road journalists say that the truckers and their supporters are as ethnically diverse a group as you could find in Canada.

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