The offensive Sundre parade float (Photo: @Airdronian/Twitter).

Surely there must’ve been a few folks in the Central Alberta town of Sundre who, when they noticed the racist jackassery of the now notorious “the Liberal” manure-spreader parade float on Saturday morning, thought, “Oh no! Please, God, make them stop!”

Someone was looking for a tractor to pull the float in May (Photo: Facebook/Lynn Hoff).

Alas, by the sound of it, no one spoke up.

Well, one guy from out of town tweeted “Yikes!” But that was about it during the parade. 

I imagine that there are several people in Sundre who now sincerely wish they’d said something, but for whatever reasons held their tongues.

Now that the story’s gone viral, despite all the other good things that may have happened in the Sundre Pro Rodeo Parade, folks from that place will be thought of as the embarrassing cousins of Confederation in many parts of the country and wise travellers from there, asked where they’re from, will say something like, “it’s just a little place in Alberta … you’ve never heard of it.” 

Folks in that part of Alberta don’t like Liberals, or New Democrats for that matter, so some still-mostly unidentified brainiacs thought it would be a great idea to dress up like Justin Trudeau and Jagmeet Singh and parade through town on the now-notorious manure-spreader pulled by a vintage John Deere tractor.

Calgary Mayor Jyoti Gondek (Photo: Facebook/Jyoti Gondek.)

That no one had the sense to recognize that a crude caricature of a Sikh man, complete with a tied-on beard and a mis-tied turban, does not send a very reassuring message about, among other things, what’s being taught in the nine or more Christian churches that grace the town of about 2,500 located 90 kilometres northwest of Calgary. 

The reaction, as the local paper put it, was fast and furious.

Sundre’s been taking a drubbing on social media ever since. Politicians from all points of the political compass have joined the condemnation of what the Dashmesh Culture Centre, a Sikh gurdwara and community centre in Calgary, called the “horrendous display of racism towards the Sikh community.”

“These kinds of acts have no place in Canada. This should be condemned in strongest terms by all,” said Jasraj Singh Hallan, the Conservative MP for Calgary Forest Lawn, speaking for most Albertans, I am sure. 

“Do better, people,” tweeted Calgary Mayor Jyoti Gondek

Faced with the wave of popular revulsion, about the best thing parade organizers and elected town officials could have done would have been to apologize sincerely and vow they’d never let anything like that happen again – and brace themselves for a reaction that might linger like radioactive fallout whenever the name of their town comes up. 

Rimbey-Rocky Mountain House-Sundre UCP MLA Jason Nixon (Photo: David J. Climenhaga).

Jason Nixon, the United Conservative Party MLA for the riding seemed to have the right idea, saying “I strongly condemn the racist float that appeared in the Sundre parade.” 

Parade and town officials didn’t do so well, though. A social media statement from the rodeo did promise, “We do send our deepest apologies and something like that will NEVER HAPPEN AGAIN.”

But organizers were soon insisting that it wasn’t really their fault. “The entry was not approved and upon further investigation joined the parade without passing through any registration,” a statement insisted on the parade’s Facebook page. “To be clear it was NOT approved.”

The problem with this was that folks pay attention and soon started noting stuff that suggested otherwise. 

MountainView Today, a local news site, ran a clear photo of the man in the turban and fake beard wearing a VIP ribbon given out by parade marshals. 

Calgary Forest Lawn Conservative MP Jasraj Singh Hallan (Photo: Facebook/ Jasraj Singh Hallan).

Organizers told MountainView Today’s reporter that the volunteers who handed out the tags didn’t know who was registered and who wasn’t – so, obviously, getting registered wasn’t a very meaningful process. 

Another shot seen on social media shows the controversial entry lined up with others waiting for the parade to start.

Pretty soon screen captures of a Facebook post last month looking for someone with a tractor to pull the manure spreader were posted. Screenshots of conversation at the time make it clear the plan was well known in the community – and that not everyone thought it was a good idea.

But tracked down by CTV as the controversy continued to boil over, the owner of the parade float insisted the whole bad idea was just political satire. “The last thing it was, was racist,” Lynn Hoff told the network. “… It wasn’t anything to do with the Sikh community.”

Well, that kind of comment isn’t going to help the town now or settle down the controversy. 

A suggestion from the Dashmesh Centre, though, just might help Sundre start to put this controversy behind it. 

“We need to have serious conversations and actions to stop these forms of racism,” the centre said on its Twitter account. “We welcome @SundreProRodeo and their parade committee to visit DCC and learn about Sikhs.”

The rodeo, town officials, and the people who rode on the embarrassing float should all take them up on their generous offer. There’s contact information on the centre’s website

Join the Conversation

57 Comments

  1. Having come from a small town, I can understand how this embarrassing and terrible incident happened. Smaller places can be quite insular and accordingly many there have odd and racist ideas about people from different backgrounds, not actually knowing or having met many people from different backgrounds. Perhaps the intention was satire, or something like that, by people who didn’t realize or appreciate the racist implications of what they were doing, or perhaps they just didn’t care.

    Yes, someone should have spoken up, or maybe that did happen and they were ignored or dismissed – that wouldn’t be surprising either. The prevailing views in some of these places sometimes seems like a gang of crazy uncles. So those who have better sense are sometimes either bullied into silence or fear they will become the next target of ridicule, so they do not speak up. This is why things like this happen and places like Sundre are then forced to look into the mirror and see themselves as others might. It is not pretty, but it can actually be an opportunity for reflection and learning.

    There is a saying in politics about throwing dirt and losing ground. Likewise if you are going spread political manure, maybe you will end up covered in it too.

  2. Considering that this is a rodeo in Sundre, AB, I wouldn’t be surprised if the organizers adopt a Most-Racist Float category for the next parade. All this incident demonstrated, to me, was that this is the sort of thing is what is spoken of but only in whispers in rural Alberta. It’s not usual to encounter this sort of nonsense in any part of rural Alberta, where it is invariably cheered and laughed at. Now that the organizers and others have denounced this, I can hear screams about Cancel Culture going full-tilt.

    It’s like in a recent exchange I had with someone who’s too old and too white to care anymore. He was convinced that there is such a thing as Cancel Culture. To that I asked what it was and he replied that it was taking away everyone’s right to say whatever they wanted about anything they wanted. Okay, so it’s okay to yelled “Fire!” in a crowded place? He said it was a stupid thing to do, but it wasn’t that big a deal. Okay, so what about throwing around racist taunts that are clearly hate crimes. Old Boomer went on about people are “such pussies” these days. I noted he would say that because he’s old and white. At that point, he went full back-my-day rant about how the “snowflakes are ruining everything”. At this point my Wow-Meter was hitting some amazing numbers. Before he could go on with some Do-Your-Research thing he saw on Facebook, I excused myself because I was going to be late for a Pride event. I watched him shake his head as he walked away.

    1. Hi Just Me. “Considering that this is a rodeo in Sundre, AB,” Ok, I’ll bite. Just what does this mean? I’m going to guess you’re saying you know a lot about Sundre so tell me about that, I don’t think I’ve ever been there.

      A separate question – you don’t believe there’s such a thing as cancel culture? It’s in the dictionary…

      1. Sundre, AB is no different than places like Viking, Tofield, Innisfail, Olds, Cardston, Brooks, and a host of other places in Alberta, that is to say really white, really Christian (Evangelical) and really, really racist.

        Viking, in particular, is an interesting place in that the community had an influx of emigres from Rhodesia and South Africa in the 60s and 70s of mostly wealthy farmers. So all these white Rhodesian and Afrikaans so up and the first thing they do is implant their world onto a very receptive rural Alberta. Ever wonder why the former Rhodesian national flag is so popular in some parts of Alberta? White supremacy plays well there.

      2. As for cancel culture, there are things that need to be cancelled, whether by legislation, cultural change, or blasted from the face of the Earth.

        Nazi Germany was cancelled — a good thing, no?

      3. “Cancel culture” is right up there with “woke” for causing me to roll my eyes and disregard the arguments of the person using it unironically. To the extent that it exists, it is not a new phenomena – if I go to the bar and deliberately run my mouth at everyone until someone takes a swing at me, I don’t get to claim I was assaulted. If I get on TV and deliberately spread a bunch of offensive ideas until nobody is willing to pay for the advertising that keeps me on air, I don’t get to pretend to be a victim.

        Notice that I said “to the extent that it exists” right? Show me one of these snowflakes melting down about cancel culture who isn’t speaking to a mic with a camera filming them and a network broadcasting their every action. The people who go on about “cancel culture” never shut up about it, and are very rarely de-platformed. The worst part about it is that it provides cover for white supremacists, who are very actively trying to promote their ideology, particularly online. Very oversimplified, it goes thusly:

        Person 1:Racist dogwhistle.
        Person 2:Hey, that’s a racist dogwhistle, you shouldn’t do that.
        Person 1:You’re cancelling my culture!

        Sounds like a losing argument for person 1, right? First of all, it will be dressed up with a bunch of rhetoric. Secondly, person 1 has been actively planning and practicing their talking points, person 2 is some rando on the internet. Person 1 is hoping that their racist dogwhistle will go unnoticed, except to the other racists, but if they are called out on it they have a perfect out. Finally, there is a permanent record of your conversation online, and a lot of right wingers who wouldn’t be comfortable calling themselves white supremacists are going to be on person 1’s side. Getting people comfortable with their proximity to white supremacy is an important step in promoting and spreading white supremacy.

        As an aside, whining about “cancel culture” is also an evasion of personal responsibility. If I choose to go out of my way to needlessly piss a bunch of people off, and they tell me I pissed them off and why, and I choose to continue pissing them off, I am not a victim. I should take responsibility for my words and my actions, and the Tucker Carlsons of the world should have to, too.

  3. There are readers of your blog who do have rural backgrounds, including myself. I don’t think for a minute that this parade float could have been just snuck in. It was deliberately planned, and based on other information, it was set up far in advance of this parade. If you are from a small enough town, it’s quite impossible for you to do something like this, and not get noticed. There is also glaring hypocrisy here. The same people who condemn Justin Trudeau for wearing blackface, want to just brush this off. Also, this is not something that adults should be doing. I’m sure there are people who dressed up for Halloween, when they were a child, and when they got older, they regret what they dressed up as. We learn from experiences like that. Alberta is going to get ridiculed even more, because of different things, including this. There are parts of Alberta, where bigoted beliefs still exist with a segment of the population. Jason Nixon was at this parade. How did he not know what was transpiring sooner? Why didn’t he instantly condemn this stupid act? He condemned it a day later. If I recall correctly, Jason Nixon was the one who helped get a single mother fired, after she had raised issues of being harassed at her place of employment. This doesn’t help his credibility. The creator of this parade float doesn’t have any credibility either, let alone maturity. She is intent on bashing Justin Trudeau and Jagmeet Singh, for what she thinks they are doing wrong, but she will likely turn a blind eye to the very pricey shenanigans, and bad policies, that the UCP are doing, which ended up costing Alberta billions of dollars, and has even cost Albertans their lives, such as with Covid-19 pandemic response, and with healthcare related matters.

    1. I’m from a tiny rural town and 100% agree with you.

      When Conservatives post shots of JT in blackface with masturbatory delight, they are actually making the argument from hypocrisy.

      What they’re claiming is that Liberal voters don’t care about racism because they elected a racist, and he must be a racist, because here’s a picture of him doing something that his supporters would normally call racist. Halfway educated adults are crying “rubbish” on that, and with justification, but we don’t teach logic outside of universities, so this is what passes for our political discourse.

  4. This province and the vast majority of people in it are an embarrassing joke. These people are as dumb and ignorant – and just plain mean spirited as they come. This place is a dirty miserable backwater and has always been so.
    As bad as things were during the Klien era when they persecuted Wiebo Ludwig, it’s gotten so much worse.
    Evil is not too strong a word to describe these people. Dark, dark forces across the land.

  5. This _IS_ Alberta. The people of Sundre should embrace their ignorance and racism. The faux repudiations ring hollow after the umpteenth episode.

  6. After all the years I spent living and working in rural Alberta for the Royal Bank my wife and I never thought of them as being morons who are easy to fool, yet here they are, believing every lie these Reformers feed them, ignoring what is right. The polls continue to show that the UCPs biggest support is in rural Alberta. The conservatives in my world are thrilled that Trudeau and Singh would join forces to hold each other accountable to the people, so what’s wrong with that? We need this kind of government. We were also happy to see Notley and Trudeau working together for the benefit of our oil industry. After all it was our oil executives who wanted the Carbon Tax implemented and it wasn’t Notley and Trudeau who invented it to steal the peoples money like Kenney told them it was. Too damn dumb to realize it’s been in place in Sweden since 1991 and hasn’t financially destroyed anyone like these Reformers claim it will.

  7. Under the category of ‘when you are in a hole, stop digging’, Mountain View Today might also want to disable the comments section of their report on this story.

      1. Yeah, when I go to forums where people talk like that I don’t post under my real name. It was hilarious to hear Trudeau and Singh described unironically as communist dictators… the first time. Now I’m just like, “ugh, if I want to engage with this person I have to start all the way with ‘communism is actually a real thing and this isn’t it,’ and go from there.” Like teaching trigonometry to someone who thinks addition is a sandwich topping. If you don’t like a particular politician, fine, but holy hell, you don’t need to create absurd fantasies to justify it! Compare:
        “I don’t like Trudeau because he’s a vainglorious fart-sniffer whose accomplishments were only made possible by his father,” with:
        “I don’t trust bearded men so I don’t trust Singh.” Absurd, but human. Now compare with:
        “I don’t like Maxime Bernier because he’s a secret vampire pedophile werewolf robot cyborg psychic who is in league with space antifa and wants to steal our teeth!”
        Those are three very different conversations to have, and I’m losing the willingness to have the third one.

  8. I was in one of the floats near the start. I seen that tractor and manurer spreader go east on the highway past the start about 5 minutes to 10. All of the approved entries were on the side road. That tells me it was not an approved entry but a sneak in.

  9. Someone ought to tell those Bible-loving Sundre folks that the Bible has a new release called “The New Testament”. It’s a bestseller.

    As for the Calgary Stetson Show Band and the Red Deer Royals, do parents of these youth want to support racists going forward? Surely there must be some visible minorities in these bands. I have seen photos from previous years that suggest there are. What does it say about the adult organizers of these groups if they decide to march in a Sundre parade ever again?

  10. The same folks who moan about the Prime Minister appearing years ago in black face don’t see any harm in donning “a tied-on beard and a mis-tied turban”. It’s anything but racist they say. Hypocrisy runs deep in conservative circles.

  11. I’m clearly in the minority here, but I don’t get how this float is particularly racist. In my view (granted, that of an older, white, privileged male) it’s more a caricature — using recognizable visual cues to identify the persons being mocked. Had they been slagging Brian Mulroney, a giant chin would be in order. Boris Johnson, a crazy mop of hair.

    IMO, this presentation of Justin, Jagmeet and John (Deere) would have been right at home on any of Postmedia’s op-ed pages and raised little fuss beyond some well-deserved eye rolls and pitiful head shakes.

    There’s lot of real racism in todays society, institutionalized and individual. I just don’t think this fits the bill. Nor do I think this sort of thing belongs anywhere in a family-friendly activity.

  12. Has anyone considered that when Lynn Hoff said the float was supposed to be political satire and not racist that maybe she was telling the truth? Certainly it could have been done better but when I saw it that’s exactly what I thought. A bit clumsy, which is sort of like us city-folk think rural-folk are, right? Are we saying that Lynn Hoff and all the Sundrie crowd who laughed at it are racist? That’s implied everywhere but what’s the basis for that?

    Commenters are calling Albertans ignorant, dumb, morons, racist, mean-spirited and worse – particularly rural Albertans. Maybe that’s what you think but although I’m not in Alberta and don’t agree with the political/environmental views of many Albertans, I’ll take the rural Albertans over the self-indulgent zoom-crowd in this city who are unhappy because they are now expected to come into the office instead of “working” in their pajamas from home.

    I’ll throw something out here and to be clear I’m not saying this cannot be perceived as a racist display but can you tell us exactly what was racist about it? I’m serious, explain it to me exactly. Would it have been ok to get an actual Sikh to ride in the wagon? Or maybe a white guy with a big sign on him to tell us who he’s supposed to be? I’m thinking that would have been better. Maybe if you can clearly explain it the rubes of Sundrie will read it and become better people…

    1. This thread is getting stale but as no one has adequately answered the question of “Why is this racist?” then I’m with Tom Cabine & Don and say that this is not racist and also you guys are a bunch of snowflakes who like to tap out vitriol on your keyboards but don’t have anything to back it up. What we have here is “perceived” racism. Perception is a lot like imagination…

      1. Here’s the thing, friend: I’m sick to death of playing whack-a-mole with Tucker Carlson’s latest talking points. 20 minutes I spend “proving” the overwhelmingly obvious to someone who is engaging in the conversation in bad faith is yet another 20 minutes I am not getting back. I spend a fair amount of time online trying to de-radicalize people, and I’ve come across the “but nobody will prove X, therefore X is obviously false,” schtick before. There are times I throw my hands in the air and say, “If you wanted to know you would.” This is one of those times.

        You’ve posted here a lot. If your comments, in general, read as coming from a less educated person, I might think you were speaking in good faith, in which case I would engage with you if I had the time and energy. You consistently read as having the mental toolkit to be able to do decent research, and I think if you wanted to answer this question you would do it yourself instead of asking some random comments section to do it for you.

        If I’ve misjudged you I apologize. The best way to show me I’ve misjudged you would be to answer your own question.

        Of course, if you sincerely think there is nothing wrong with this behaviour, I would invite you to make your own definitely-not-racist float and enter it in a parade. Live your values. Be the change you want to see in the world.

        1. Ok Neil. I don’t believe this float was a racist display. It was political satire which has a long history in Canadian discourse. I wasn’t acting in bad faith – I said ” I’m serious, explain it to me exactly” which I meant to make clear that the question was completely legitimate. Maybe you didn’t understand, I wasn’t just asking a question I wanted the people who were calling this racism to justify what they’re saying. Accusing someone of being a racist is a pretty serious charge and it’s fair enough to be asked to back that up. If you can’t explain it in 30 seconds then you don’t know, simple as that.

          1. Sorry Mickey, I wrote a lengthy post softening and explaining the prior one last night but either didn’t click ‘post’ or it’s still in the queue. I’d rather accidentally double post than not address your points, so apologies if you get two responses. Before posting, I try to ask myself, “Is this reasonable, fair, and helpful?” I forgot that step. I’m going to be spending a fair amount of time in a Fox/Trump household over the next couple weeks and I’ve been dreading it, pretty sure I projected a bunch of stuff on to you and that wasn’t fair, reasonable or helpful.

            Anyways, a younger version of myself also didn’t understand it. Hell, I still might not, it’s not like there’s a Central Authority For Racism that you can run google searches on. Here’s my best (very rushed, going to the airport in half an hour) take:

            “Racism” is a word that is continually being redefined as new scholarship emerges. Not all new scholarship is good scholarship, and their are both sincere fools and bad faith actors on all sides, although IMO not in equal numbers. Anyways the point is that thought is advancing, and it takes effort to keep up. Some things that were okay 20 years ago are considered offensive today. This is not because those actions have changed, but because the context they are taking place within has changed.

            I used to think of “Racism” as “when an individual deliberately does something cruel to someone else because of the colour of their skin.” I now think “racism” is more useful as a category of behaviours, and the one thing they have in common is that they will perpetuate the suffering of downtrodden people because of their skin colour. However, society hasn’t had this conversation yet, IMO because the oligarchs who control 90% of our mass media don’t want us to have it, because if the working class wasn’t fragmented on racial lines it might unite and begin to advance its own interests.

            Okay, racism. Whipping Levar Burton until he answers to a dog’s name is awful, but it’s not really comparable to skipping over a resume right after reading the name Mohammed… except that both of them perpetuate the suffering of a downtrodden racial group. In other words, racism isn’t just about harboring malicious hatred in your heart and deliberately inflicting it on people, it can also be actions taking place almost unconsciously.

            There’s a thing people do that I barely-jokingly call “white manning.” It goes like this:

            NON-WHITE MAN: Can you please not do that? I find it really upsetting.
            WHITE MAN: Here’s why you’re wrong to feel that way. Now here’s why I’m going to keep doing the thing you just politely asked me not to.

            Ah crap I have to go to the plane. I have barely scratched the surface. Sorry, this argument is incomplete and imperfect. Hopefully it at least gives you the idea that this is a really big subject. I haven’t put this together from any one source, but rather from doing a ton of introspection (holy crap, not only my prosperity but my very existence is predicated upon the systematic subjugation of “inferior races,” that’s kind of hard to take in), to doing a ton of re-evaluating (my family was allowed to gather and transfer intergenerational wealth, many others were prevented from doing so by police violence because of the colour of their skin, wow I thought of Canada as being good and now it really doesn’t seem so good, etc etc). Crap I still haven’t done a very good job here but I ahve a plane to make. Gotta run Mickey, we’ll take this up another time when it’s current. Sorry for attacking you instead of engaging with your ideas, hopefully this gives you an idea of how much work it is to get into this. The people who could give you good explanations are rare and are stretched pretty thin. It’s also much more effective as a conversational dialogue because you’ll likely keep thinking “but what about X” and I won’t get to address that promptly and it’s already a stale thread.

          2. Neil: The delay in moderating and posting your comment was my fault. Readers need to remember that this blog remains my hobby, not my job, and other than technical web stuff, I basically do it all myself. Sometimes real life intervenes and there are delays. DJC

      2. Hey, sorry, that last one was maybe a little needlessly judgemental of me. I feel I should apologize to you. I’ve been in your position before, and it took a fair amount of effort for someone to clue me in. I remember really feeling a lot of resentful anger at people for, to my mind, trying to make me feel bad for being born, or to tie my morality to my skin tone, or something. The answer to your questions isn’t “overwhelmingly obvious” as much as “asking it in 2022 is a little puzzling.” I don’t remember what Halloween it was when newspaper stories about white people getting in trouble on social media for certain costumes, but it’s been quite a while now. Any reasonable adult could have foreseen how this would be interpreted by society at large, if society at large were aware of it. I think it was made by people who thought society at large would not find out. FWIW as far as the whole “costumes as cultures” things go I think of it as a thing that wasn’t racist, then was racist, and one day, won’t be racist again. The context in which an action is taking place is one of the factors that must be considered, and this action took place in the context of a society that is well aware that “white people shouldn’t dress as non-white people.” Oversimplifying but one day circumstances will change enough that non-white people won’t feel hurt and angry watching white people dress like them, and when that happens, it will be okay again. It’s not the wearing of the clothes that is the problem, it is the intentional disregard for someone clearly and politely asking you to consider their feelings. That for sure is JMO though there is a lot of room for reasonable adults to disagree in good faith and the scholarship of racism is hard to keep up with.

        When someone says “prove to me this is racist,” experience has taught me to expect they have six or seven talking points pre-researched and ready to go, and they aren’t interested in a good faith conversation, they are interested in “owning the libs”. There is a really good chance you are a better person than I was making you out to be.

        That said, if you are asking to have racism proven to you in good faith, you are asking someone to just give you, for free, a whole bunch of their time and energy. Have you ever tried to convince someone of something they didn’t want to know? Exhausting under ideal conditions. I had to be clued in too, and the person who did the lion’s share of it did not find the process enjoyable.

        Anyways, I am about to have to go spend a lot of time in a Fox house over a couple of weeks, and I think the despair, sorrow and disgust I feel over watching loved ones succumb to that crap in slow motion over the past several years coloured how I perceived your points. On second reading I think I was needlessly unfair and unkind to you. Sorry, civil online political discourse is hard 🙁

        1. Hi Neil,
          This is way past the due date to reply but I’ve just not had time to write a reply suitable to yours. I appreciate your answers and understand that being asked to explain something which you see as obvious is a time consuming pain. I want to at least give you something brief in return.

          Your arguments have merit in that we should try to not deliberately make people feel unwelcome or uncomfortable. But I see your points as just perception – “I feel like this is racism so it must be racism.” Doubling down on that, the persons responsible must be vilified. I reject that. I find the claim which came out later that the people who put this together have racist tendencies to be a good point but even if true that does not make this skit racist and it certainly does not make everyone who lives in rural Alberta racists.

    2. Before giving Lynne Hoff the benefit of the doubt, you may wish to have a peek at her Facebook page to see the utter nonsense in which she believes. She is full to the brim with hate and anger – a staunch anti-vaxxer who hopes for a Trump 2024 win, and actively wants Alberta to leave Canada. A lot of her posts have been flagged as false information (surprise!). She’s a great study in everything that’s wrong with being ultraconservative. Have “fun” deep diving into this vile person’s inner “thoughts”.

      1. Beverly: I must admit that some of the defenses of the idea that the Jagmeet Singh character on the float may have simply been political caricature and therefore legitimate commentary, such as that put forward by my regular commenter Mickey Rat, have merit. My assumptions of the true nature of the project, however, were influenced by some of Ms. Hoff’s commentary, to which you have referred. DJC

        1. Well then, now we’re basing our perception of this satire message on the beliefs of the person responsible for the float? Ok, but the blog post and all the negative commentary was about the people of Sundre, UCP, Alberta (especially rural Alberta) the Rodeo organizers, etc. Now we find out it’s about Lynn Hoff. She sneaks a political satire float into a rodeo parade and all of the rural Alberta population is slagged for it. Man you guys have serious polarization going on, worse than BC.

  13. Suppose for one moment that Tom Mulcair is still the leader of the NDP and the current NDP/LPC incestuous alliance is in place. The parade float would have been with a caricature of Tom Mulcair sitting in the manure spreader being pulled by a tractor driven by a caricature of Justin Trudeau.

    The political satire is that the leader of the NDP is, for all intents and purposes, a “Liberal” being lead by Justin Trudeau, spreading the same Liberal policies (here deemed as “manure”). Is this float racist? I do not believe so.

    But the leader of the NDP is not Tom Mulcair, it is Jagmeet Singh. So the parade float was a caricature of Jagmeet Singh sitting in the manure spreader being pulled by a tractor driven by a caricature of Justin Trudeau.

    The political satire is still the same, the leader of the NDP is, for all intents and purposes, a “Liberal” being lead by Justin Trudeau, spreading the same Liberal policies (here deemed “manure”). So why is this float racist? Is it because the leader of the NDP happens to be Jagmeet Singh, a turban wearing Sikh? This should be irrelevant. Does the fact that Jagmeet Singh is a turban wearing Sikh protect him from political satire? If yes, why?

    Being old (70), I’ve seen some great political satire in my time, and I’ve watched some great comedians that could not have the career they had today – Lenny Bruce, George Carlin, Richard Pryor.

    Today’s “woke” generation have lost all objectivity and are offended by everything. Their political correctness has killed comedy, humour, and political satire. The late George Carlin, regarded as one of the most important and influential stand-up comedians of all time, said: “Political correctness is our newest form of intolerance. Pernicious, it comes disguised as presenting fairness yet attempts to control people’s language with strict codes and rigid rules.”

    PS: I actually think the “float” could have been better if the caricature of Justin Trudeau was sitting in the manure spreader and was being pulled by tractor driven by a caricature of Jagmeet Singh. It is Trudeau that spreads the “manure,” and it is Jagmeet Singh who is in the driver’s seat keeping Trudeau and the LPC in “power.”

    1. The thing is Tom that Carlin knew what racism was, and wasn’t. That is something that you could do some personal research on instead of expecting us to explain it to you.

      1. Hi Darcy. I’ll explain it. This wasn’t racism, it was equivalent to a political cartoon. It may have been put together by a person with racist tendencies and some of the people who saw it may have racist tendencies but the cartoon itself was not racist.
        I don’t have to prove this is, how do you prove a negative? You guys said it was racist so it’s reasonable that you might be asked to at least explain your reasoning. A couple of commenters on here have done a pretty good job of explaining why it’s not, but no one can explain why it is racist. Is this so difficult? Well I guess it is difficult because they can’t. I wouldn’t be going on about this but that people are using this to disparage all Albertans and that is BS.

  14. Had a Kenney dress up been atop the manure spreader and Stevie Harper steering the Deere would the town fathers have taken action?

  15. Just to add more to the What Other Stupid Stunt Will Rural Alberta Try Next?, it appears that FreeDUMB Convoy leader Tamara Lich was arrested in Medicine Hat and will be held for six days before she’s extradited to Ontario for breaking the conditions of her bail. And she broke a ton of them. Of course, she’s Rebelmedia’s defender of all that is Albertan and, therefore, decent. So, they have started the Free Tamara Lich fundraiser, because FreeDUMB costs money.

    Social media is going on about protests being organized to rescue Lich from PMJT’s stormtroopers (aka Mounties) before she’s whisked off to Ontario and Gitmo. Judging by the raging nonsense coming down in advance of Canada Day, this could be a very entertaining weekend. I’m looking forward to far more interesting fireworks this year.

    1. Hey Just Me, interesting take there on Tamara Lich “What Other Stupid Stunt Will Rural Alberta Try Next?” She’s born, raised and lives in Medicine Hat, is that not urban enough for you? I wouldn’t call Medicine Hat rural but even if it is, calling Albertans who live in rural communities ignorant morons isn’t going to make them “see the light.” I’m thinking you’re one of those snowflakes the old white guy was talking about.

      Also Ms. Lich is of Metis heritage which doesn’t matter a fig except I guess she’s an indigenous racist and the cops had better treat her with kid gloves.

      1. Yes, Canada’s police have a well-documented past of treating indigenous people with kid gloves. /s

      2. Mr Rat: As a resident of another of Alberta’s small cities, let me tell you that while folks in places like the Hat and Grande Prairie aren’t truly ”rural”, from a political attitudes perspective they tend to lean the same way as truly rural Albertans. From a political standpoint, Alberta only has two urban centres with urban political attitudes, and those are Calgary and Edmonton. There is very little political daylight between a resident of Red Deer and a resident of, say Rocky Mountain House or Fairview.

  16. This is one of the reasons I was delighted to leave Alberta in 1998. Yes, at that time there was some progress in Edmonton where I lived. But for the most part, Alberta felt like Canada’s answer for Mississippi. Content in a 1950’s racist white bread time warp. Stuck in a strange delusion that it is a rural society, which it is not. Socred based brown shirts didn’t seem very far removed. It seems little has changed in the rural areas since I left some 25 years ago. The shadow of Jim Keegstra remains like a grey poison. Is it any surprise I now visit rarely.

    1. Former lbertan: Social Credit did in fact have a shirted movement in Britain in the 1930s. They were the Green Shirts, though. DJC

      1. Amazingly the Alberta Social Credit under Aberhart also had a troop of uniformed enforcers. Little known but true.

  17. Sundre is just down the road from Caroline where Terry Long tried to establish a foothold for the Aryan Nation in the mid-80s. Caroline is just down the road from Eckville where Jim Keegstra was a holocaust denying teacher in the early 80s. Bit of a history of racism in those parts.

  18. After working with farmers and ranchers for many years I got very upset with city folk who called then Red necked Hillbillies , yet here they are proving me wrong and proving the name callers right. Take a look at the comments in the blog in the Mountain View Newspaper. They see nothing wrong with what was done. Like a lawyer friend used to say “ there is nothing dumber than an Albertan going around trying to pretend what a great conservative he is by bad mouthing Liberals at every chance, while he is the fool supporting Liberal Ralph Klein. It was no secret Klein always called himself a Liberal and I think it’s why he deliberately tried to destroy everything Lougheed created for us. There was nothing conservative about him . Instead he adopted the reform parties policies. His daughter Angie confirmed that he called himself a Liberal even if he wasn’t one, in her interview in 2015 . I certainly haven’t forgotten how furious his father Phil was with him for the mess he created. Now Jason Kenney another Liberal has deliberately tried to copy Klein and you can bet Danielle Smith and Brian Jean will do the same thing.Their mandate is to destroy whatever conservatives have created for the good of the people.

  19. They definitely shouldn’t have used stereotypes for representing the Liberal and NDP leaders.

    They just should have used boat anchors or the like.

  20. I see that still not a single person has been able to answer the question of “how is the float racist”.

    The NDP leader is Sikh and dresses like that! Should every impersonation of president Obama on a tv show be called racist because it’s a black man in a suit? Are we only able to show white people as to not be racist?? I think denying what someone looks, talks, or acts like when doing an impersonation would be the racist move. I’m not going an impersonation of Jack Nicholson without squinting my eyes a bit but is squinting my eyes a racist move?

    Racists see racism where ever they can. Those who actually know about the political parties saw the float for what it really was: a live action political cartoon.

    Instead of flying off the deep end and believing that the first thought you had about something must be true and condemning everyone else for not thinking the same overreaction you did, try asking questions and being open to the answers given and making an informed view on a subject.

    Try answering the question, “How was the float racist?”

    If you can’t then you are a non thinker throwing an over-reactive temper tantrum. Saying anything you can to distract from actually answering the questions people ask of you.

    1. Crunchy: I have taken the liberty of editing your comment in, I hope, the spirit of your additional comments, which I have deleted as unnecessary. Let me know if you’re not happy with the changes. There’s an email for me on the site. DJC

  21. I know this is very stale, but Crunchy just made me do it.

    The more I look at the float, the more racist it looks.

    The man on the manure spreader doesn’t look like Jagmeet Singh and is not dressed like Jagmeet Singh: Mr. Singh wears very brightly coloured turbans. The man on the float is wearing a white turban which is not tied the same way as Mr. Sing’s. Mr. Singh wears (when at work) a suit, vest, and tie with a pocket handkerchief in the jacket. He’s famous as a flashy dresser. The man on the float is wearing a brown blazer and blue pants (maybe blue jeans?) without a vest, tie, or pocket handkerchief. Mr. Singh doesn’t wear glasses. The man on the float is wearing a pair of glasses with very thick frames. They look almost like glasses from a Halloween costume.

    There just isn’t any way that the man on the float is trying to look like Jagmeet Singh, unless you want to say that all Sikhs look alike which seems to be what some of the comments suggest.

    Even if I expand the image of the float to full screen, I can’t see anything that actually identifies the man driving the tractor as Justin Trudeau. The mask worn by the driver has a full head of hair, but so do billions of men. The driver is carrying a small blue flag with some text on it, perhaps that is supposed to identify him as a Liberal Party member. I can’t see his full face, but Mr. Trudeau has such regular features that It would be hard to make an effective caricature.

    Studying the float to see if it could possibly be valid political commentary has convinced me that it is a racist statement.

    1. He also doesn’t look like a boat anchor. Maybe the government of Canada should fund them better so their float graphics are better.

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