As Goodman says during the broadcast…
“I felt completely violated, I mean, personally and professionally. You know, and for journalism overall. Because this is not only a violation of freedom of the press, you know, the idea that, you know, the state is going into your papers, your documents, your sources, everything—but also a violation of the public’s right to know. Because if journalists feel there are things they can’t report on, that they’ll be detained, that they’ll be arrested, or they’ll be questioned, they’ll be interrogated; this is a threat to the free flow of information. And that’s the public’s loss, that’s democracy’s loss.”
During the broadcast she also interviews Dave Eby and UBC Professor Chris Shaw about the reality of dissent and the upcoming Olympics in Vancouver.
Here are a few important quotes from the above interviews…
Dave Eby: We’ve been on the defensive basically for the last year, defending rights and freedoms here in Vancouver, from Olympic related initiatives. We got a new provincial law that allows the police to arrest the homeless the do not report to the nearest homeless shelter when they issue such a demand to them. We of the police department investing secretly in new equipment that we find out only accidentally, like LRADs, this is the device we saw used on protestors in Pittsburg at the G20 there. A billion dollars are being spent on various pieces of equipment and personnel and we have no idea what is being purchased in terms of rubber bullets, tear gas, that kind of equipment. In addition, we have new city bylaws think pass that restrict the content of people’s signs and a large area of the downtown core, dictating that signs either be licensed or the content of the sign be celebratory, and celebratory is actually a defined term in the bylaws, which is a sign that increases the positive feelings or festive spirit around the Olympic games.
And…
Professor Chris Shaw: Well, the coalition is opposed to the games across a broad spectrum of issues. The first is the enormous cost, the costs have been really rather extraordinary. They are probably topping $6 billion dollars now, it could go much higher, and we were promised it would be much lower. This is not the a-typical Olympic games, they tend to go much higher. Chicago is actually really lucky they dodged the bullet because there would be on the hook for something probably like $15 billion-$20 billion when everything was said and done So we unfortunately didn’t dodge the bullet. So vast costs, as David mentioned, there’s the impact on the poor and the homeless, there have been concerted efforts to move the homeless along, get them out of the way of television cameras in the advance of the games. Massive environmental destruction in various places around Vancouver leading up the games. Something like 100,000 trees cut down, much of it old growth. 3.5 megatons of carbon dioxide associated with games activities and habitat destruction. Lack of transparency across the board, its almost impossible to find out what the various levels of government and the organizing committee are actually up to, how they are spending the money, how they are making their decisions.
And there’s a real lack of democracy. You’re up here in Canada for the show, or at least with David and me being on, and you might call it democracy sometimes, democracy sometimes works in Canada and sometimes it doesn’t. And the civil liberties really becomes the final piece of the equation because civil liberties usually take a hit for the Olympic games, the Olympic organizers have become increasingly terrified of protests or anything that would disturb the IOC. So, as David mentioned, the city has attempted to pass a major bylaw to the city charter that would allow them to essentially stifle dissent in the city, unless you’re going to celebrate you’re certainly not going to dissent.”