Monday, May 11, 2009 1:25 PM
Tamil protests: Free speech or illegal outrage?
Mathew Ingram
On Sunday night in Toronto, thousands of protesters who had gathered to demonstrate their opposition to the Sri Lankan government's attacks on members of the Tamil minority took over all six lanes of the Gardiner Expressway, the major southern route across the city, and closed it for several hours. Although the demonstrators eventually left peacefully, many Toronto residents complained about the protest, saying they supported the Tamil groups but drew the line at interrupting traffic on a major highway.
Close to 600 commenters posted their thoughts to our story on the protest, many of whom were outraged at what they saw as criminal behaviour by the protesters. Unfortunately, we had to close comments on the story because the volume of offensive and violent comments became too overwhelming for our staff to handle. So I decided to open a live -- and fully-moderated -- discussion on the issue here, using Cover It Live. Feel free to post your comments and thoughts on this issue, but be warned that ad hominem attacks and racist commentary will not be permitted.
Note: This discussion is now over, but the archived version is still available for those who want to read it. Thanks to everyone who took part; I apologize if I wasn't able to get to your questions or comments, but there were quite a lot.
