For a party that says it believes in charter values like freedom of speech or freedom of association, the Trudeau Liberals have a strange way of showing it.
In fact, the folks that like to call themselves the Party of the Charter are currently bullying all kinds of Canadians over a movie with a message the PM himself doesn’t like.
Unplanned is based on the true story of Abby Johnson, a young woman who went from being an abortion advocate and one of the youngest directors of a Planned Parenthood clinic to a pro-life crusader.
The movie isn’t for everyone, but as liberal-minded folks have been telling conservative-minded folks for years: if you don’t want to see the movie, then don’t.
Instead, the Liberals are trying to turn the fact some theatres are allowing showing of the movie into a political wedge issue to attack Andrew Scheer and the Conservatives with.
We have actually seen cabinet ministers and the PM’s chief of staff bully theatre owners over this.
When did that become an OK thing to do?
Trudeau cabinet minister Melanie Joly took to Twitter to call out Vince Guzzo, owner of Quebec based theatre chain Cinema Guzzo for allowing the movie to be shown.
Funny, she didn’t call out Cineplex for allowing the same movie to be shown in its theatres.
Cineplex CEO Ellis Jacob issued a statement about the value of freedom in this country, including for artistic works that not all agree on.
“In this instance many of us will have to set aside our own personal beliefs and remember that living in a country that censors content, opinions and points of view because they are different from our own is not a country that any of us want to live in,” Jacob wrote.
Bravo to him, and shame on the Trudeau Liberals — including the PM’s chief of staff Katie Telford who has been tweeting relentlessly against this movie and attempting to have it shut down, or at least tie it to the Tory leader.
It doesn’t matter that Scheer has said he will not reopen this issue if he becomes prime minister, the Liberals think any Conservative being pro-life anywhere means Scheer can’t be trusted on this.
That’s a bit rich coming from the party and a PMO that took three days to distance themselves from former cabinet minister and Trudeau’s hand picked ambassador to China after he said Beijing should go easy on Canada in the Huawei controversy to help the Liberals win the election.
Hypocrisy is nothing new for Trudeau’s Liberals, or in politics period — but this is stretching it.
The party that would have been apoplectic had Stephen Harper tried to do this to a movie Conservatives didn’t like is acting like a group of moral censors.
They are also backing and encouraging the protesting of a movie that has already had threats of violence aimed at it in Canada.
One screening was cancelled due to threats, while other theatres have hired extra security.
And in the background, Justin Trudeau and his brain trust push a narrative that very well could lead to violence — just to score cheap political points.
He predicted this election would be a nasty campaign, but I didn’t expect him or anyone else to stoop this low.
Copyright Postmedia Network Inc., 2019
