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It is expected that the encampment will cease in its current location as of today. I (speaking personally) hope very much that this is a peaceful and respectful day, as it has been for the entirety of the protest.

I hope VIU resists its own threat to call in the RCMP. And I hope this is not the end of peaceful protests on campus, for any issue.

But I fear the precedent and message sent at VIU (and many other institutions in Canada) is clear. Universities are not safe spaces for protest. The expectation that they are places for open and vigorous debate has been shattered.

At their core, Canadian Universities are just another colonial institution based around colonial confrontation and limiting of rights of people, particularly Indigenous and minorities.

The notion that VIU or any Canadian Institution is changing and acknowledging past wrongs is a whole bunch of performative nonsense. Decolonization? Ha!

It’s just more of the same. Assimilation. Like Israel razing Gaza to the ground so it can swallow it whole and destroy the Palestinian people, the assertion in Court of Canadian Universities private property rights over the Charter rights of its community and the un-ceded Territories of host First Nations, make them complicit and actively participating in Canada's Genocide.

@akurjata @davidakin

#Palestine #IsraelGaza #Genocide #Canada #CanPoli #CdnPoli #BCPoli #PalestineSolidarity #VIU #UniversityProtests #Charter