TORONTO -- "It's an extremely dangerous situation to put children on the front line of a protest in that way"
-- Toronto Police Chief Bill Blair
It takes a special kind of gutlessness to use children and their mothers to do your dirty work for you.
Somebody out there knows exactly who it is, ordering women and children to be at the forefront of Tamil protests and putting children in so much danger.
"I think it puts them at tremendous risk," Chief Bill Blair said Sunday night of the children on the Gardiner Expressway. "We are trying to ensure that our response is proportional to the threat that currently exists ... we are trying to find ways to solve this as peacefully as we can, using a minimal amount of force."
The translation should have been "we are handcuffed because of all the kids up there and we can't be hurting kids."
Wonder what these scumbag protest organizers have up their sleeves next? Maybe they should leave their kids, many born here in Canada, right out of this conflict and do their own battling.
That they use them like this is a disgrace. Not exactly men of honour.
And because they use children in such a way - having them sitting in dozens of violent protests for hours in the elements - if they had any sympathy from Torontonians, it appears to be gone now.
Blair can't say it but you could tell he was disgusted. A lot of people were.
But the city seems to be helpless to apply the laws to the protests.
There must be some votes there because if you took your kids out onto the Gardiner Expressway, you can be sure there would be somebody in this town frowning.
The rules seem to be different for these Tamil Tiger backers.
They are in charge. And they will decide what the police's next difficult assignment will be because they call the shots in this town.
Several uniformed coppers have told me they are sick to death of taking abuse from some of these protesters and not being able to drag them back to the station for questioning because of politics.
And they tell me it drives them crazy to see children used as a barrier.
The part I don't get is where is the Children's Aid Society? Where are the charges?
At every one of these protests not only are young children present, many times they are leading the chanting. I was wondering yesterday why these kids were not in school? And is there anybody in authority who cares?
The other thing I have been wondering is what kind of person would actually put their children at that kind of risk?
Komala Thani tells me she is one.
"It is risky for them but I can't stay at home," she said of why she had her three children on the Gardiner and at other protests. "There were 3,000 slaughtered."
She says in that conflict she has lost her father, two brothers, a cousin and a nephew to the Sri Lankan army and says whatever the protesters do or wherever they go, she and her children will be there. She says no one is ordering her to go. It's her decision. "There is no plan. People protest on emotion."
Just to keep children safe, warm and out of harm's way, you'd think the leaders would encourage just adults to protest peacefully. Komala seems like a nice woman and it's difficult to not feel for her and all that she has personally lost. And because of her, I urge the Sri Lankan government to allow independent journalists and humanitarian agencies into the war regions to properly assess what has transpired on both sides.
I do that in this local Toronto column, with no international pull, not because of any pressure from thugs taking over roads, or because children were used as leverage, but because it is a fair thing to ask.
If you have nothing to hide, open it up.
But that does not take the spotlight off the embarrassing practice of putting children at the front of a political battle thousands of miles away.
This whole mess has been urban terrorism and using kids has given a black eye to the local Tamil community and the City of Toronto.
JOE.WARMINGTON@SUNMEDIA.CA
