WATCH: Protestors take to the streets of Toronto to call for defunding of the police | The Post Millennial
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WATCH: Protestors take to the streets of Toronto to call for defunding of the police
“F*ck the police,” and “Justice For Regis,” could be heard from protestors at the Downsview march. These activists tried to prevent The Post Millennial from reporting on the event.
Black Lives Matter protestors took to the streets of Toronto as part of a nationwide "National Day of Protest to Defund the Police Across Canada."
There were two protests in Toronto, locally organized by Not Another Black Life. The first saw about 100 people march from Downsview Park to York University. The second attracted upwards of 2,000 people, and marched from Christie Pits Park to police headquarters downtown.
The demonstrators chanted slogans like "ACAB!" "Who keeps us safe? We keep us safe!"
"F*ck the police," and "Justice For Regis," could be heard from protestors at the Downsview march. These activists tried to prevent The Post Millennial from reporting on the event.
The protests occur days after the police involved in the Regis Korchinski-Paquet case were cleared of wrongdoing after it was determined that there was "no reasonable grounds to believe that any of the officers committed a criminal offence."
Initially, Korchinski-Paquet's mother had claimed the police pushed her daughter from the young woman's balcony, although witnesses have said she fell trying to move from one balcony to another.
Speaking to The Post Millennial during the second of the day's protests, one observer commented "this one seems more militant than usual, but I'm afraid of saying more than that."
Anil Philip from Forward Through Progress said the the goal is to first defund the police by 50 percent and re-invest it into the community as the first step towards abolition.
When asked how he thinks that will help, he replied "we just put a whole bunch of money back into policing, and yet when talking about smaller class sizes, there's no money for that. That makes literally no sense. We want smaller class sizes, we want to put money back into education."
The Toronto Raptors and others sports teams have decided to cancel games to protest police brutality including the shooting injury of Jacob Blake in Kenosha, a city currently reeling from ongoing riots related to that event. Anil commented that "I think it shows that there is a growing solidarity not just here in Canada, but across the world."
Not Another Black Life tweeted that "To end the war on Black and Indigenous people, we seek reparations, investment in the education and health of Black and Indigenous people, endowing tangible economic justice, and the allowance of greater community control leading to, and supporting, Black + Indg political power."
Korchinski-Paquet’s sister Renee has said "It seems like nobody’s getting justice or what they deserve. What happened to my sister shouldn't have happened to her, but it did, so people need to be held accountable for their actions."
Toronto police reported that the day remained peaceful.