Canadian politics (not uniquely here) is plagued with petty squabbles. The really meaningful political and social issues don't get any airtime.
120dB train horns at 2AM in the morning in a residential area is not a minor inconvenience.
Have you ever actually been to downtown Ottawa, where those protests were held?
It's not "a residential area" in any sense.
The moderately-wide Ottawa River forms the north-west edge of the downtown area.
Along it are the Alexandra Bridge, Major's Hill Park, the Rideau Canal, Parliament Hill, the Supreme Court, Library and Archives Canada, and other government-related buildings and infrastructure. Those aren't residential.
Immediately south-east of those is Wellington Street, where those protests were held, literally right in front of Parliament Hill. It's about as close as they could physically get to the Parliament Buildings.
South-west of that, there are numerous government office buildings, commercial office buildings, small shops, restaurants, a few hotels, and so on for a number of blocks. Again, those aren't residential.
Also keep in mind that the government-imposed lockdowns and other restrictions being protested were preventing or severely limiting the use of the offices, hotels, restaurants, and other businesses in the area.
You have to go out about 1 km from Parliament Hill before you even begin to start encountering any significant number of apartment buildings and residences.
Downtown Ottawa is not "a residential area", and those protesters were in the most relevant, appropriate, and reasonable place they could have been to protest policies imposed by the Government of Canada.
For example, https://www.google.com/maps/place/9+Rideau+St,+Ottawa,+ON+K1... is a condo building.
When you say it is not a residential area in “any sense” and he finds a counterexample showing it is clearly a residential area in some sense then what you said is just untrue.
i dont see why a bit of road would justify honking the horn all night at an apartment building though. can you elborate on what changes when there's a road? the apartment building has people sleeping in it.
> It's not "a residential area" in any sense.
World-renowned pianist Angela Hewitt would disagree:
* https://ottawacitizen.com/news/local-news/angela-hewitt-play...
* https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Angela_Hewitt
Her living room, with her piano, is in the area.
It isn't uncommon for posh famous people to have their posh second, third, etc., residences in places that where normal regular people don't actually live...like Downtown Ottawa.
This just illustrates why pure/Athenian democracy doesn’t work. Madness of the crowds and all that. Decide most issues by plebescite and you get an emotional outcome.
The Republic fell because a bunch of senators were too greedy and refused to do basic land reform or anything else to make life better for anyone other than themselves.
There's no shortage of absolutely insane tyrants that made people's lives miserable.
The trucker protests were right in the middle of the Covid supply chain issues. Not defending the actions taken in particular, but it had the potential to be a much worse issue than a minor inconvenience.
Travel the country up and down, big cities and small towns, and I guarantee you will conclude that Canadians are the best people around.
1/3 of the country's entire population is in the GTA. That brief moment is the most contact that Canadians will have with each other on any given day.
And they treat everyone worse than garbage. I've been in busier commuter zones that have been far more civil than that.
Even the drunks going home on the LIRR are better than that.
I won't disagree with you that Canadians are great people -- I spent a lot of time living there for a reason -- but you have to judge people by when their hair is down, not their Sunday best.
So the most annoyed 1% of Canadians go through there every day.
Not the world’s most rigorous basis for a sweeping statement about an entire culture.
The funniest thing about the responses here to me is that not a single person has disputed the characterization I presented -- what I'm describing seems to be clear enough to everyone.
It’s just a whole bunch of stressed people in a hurry.
I do understand where you're getting at though, and trust me, if you go to Berlin and you only speak English, you'll get far worse than you would from the Québécois for doing the same.
It's almost like those Americans who give people shit for not speaking English, except we have even less entitlement to that.