What the Chi‑wai Hu Case Made Us Remember About Our Own BNO Journey

Originally posted on Voices in Exile titled Who Will Inherit These Tools? Canada's Architecture of Digital and Financial Control

Originally posted on Voices in Exile on July 2, 2026 titled Refusing to Stay Silent: Petition e‑2835 and Canada's Reckoning with Foreign Interference.

I’ve been thinking a lot about what “promotion” even means anymore. After reading a Hong Kong musician Denise Ho’s recent reflection on how something as ordinary as promoting an album has become strangely fraught, I felt an unexpected jolt of recognition. My own attempt to promote a small film screening—something that should have been simple, procedural, almost boring—turned into a lesson in how visibility can be quietly distorted or derailed. We sold more than 150 seats, yet nearly half were purchased by a single unknown individual, and only a small fraction of that block ultimately appeared. I wasn’t just trying to reach an audience; I was trying to understand why someone would buy out such a large block of seats, why the people who genuinely wanted to attend were displaced, and why every step of the process felt like pushing against an invisible wall. What I encountered wasn’t a failure of publicity. It was a glimpse into how marginalized voices are managed, contained, and kept from reaching the people who might actually care.

During a Hong Kong solidarity rally in 2019, hundreds of counter‑protesters flooded Old City Hall. They arrived in coordinated groups, waving flags and shouting slogans. The tension was unmistakable. I learned then how quickly political pressure can mobilize, especially when international student networks and diaspora politics are involved.

What do we value as Canadians? Freedom? Human rights? Democracy? All excellent answers, and answers I’m sure we can all agree with, without a second thought. If we hold that to be true, then surely denouncing a country that denies its people their freedoms, human rights, and democratic input should be the easiest thing for even the most hidebound of politicians to do. So, why exactly has our response as a nation been so ineffective in regard to the People’s Republic of China and their systemic human rights abuses? Does our government pivot so often to appeasing China when we should be doing more to hold them accountable?

The great thing about being a member of the Green Party is that sometimes, there are issues with easy answers. For instance, take the issue of Doug Ford’s proposed Highway 413. This new highway would stretch from Vaughan to Mississauga, connecting the 400, 401 and 407 Highways. It’s not a new idea, as Kathleen Wynne’s administration was considering just such a project back in 2005, and some might say that it’s a solid bulletpoint for Doug Ford’s re-election campaign. It’s also a plan that would involve cutting through the Greenbelt, an otherwise-protected area of natural greenery in the north of the Golden Horseshoe Area. You can probably imagine how I feel about such a project, but it’s worth discussing why Highway 413 is a bad idea and what can be done in its place.

A recent survey by Angus Reid Institute indicated that 3 in 5 Canadians prefer a “proportionate outcome” to the outcome they are left with now. Unfortunately, this is not the first time we as a nation have voiced our disapproval.. Civil society has been calling for “electoral reform” for a long time, and we haven’t got much to show for it. Remember Prime Minister Trudeau’s promise from 2015? The one where he promised that the 2015 election would be the last one to use the First-Past-The-Post (FPTP) system? I thought it was a pretty good promise for a politician to make. It was the kind of social change that most voters could get behind. Indeed, 63% of voters in 2015 cast votes explicitly for parties that said they would “make every vote count,” a useful shorthand for enacting voter reform. So why exactly are we still using the FPTP system more than half a decade later?

Another variant of COVID-19 has emerged, labelled the “omicron” variant. It is the fifth variant strain of the novel coronavirus that has held an iron grip on our world since its first emergence in late 2019. Since the omicron’s first sighting in South Africa, four cases have popped up in Ottawa and one case has popped up in Quebec. This comes as the holiday season dawns, bringing with it a wave of travel. This is, to say the least, a worrying development.

Today, Canada “celebrates” its first National Day for Truth and Reconciliation. What do you as a reader make of that statement? I must confess, I dislike it. Specifically, I dislike that the word “celebrate” is part of that statement. We “celebrate” things we’re proud of, things we’re happy for and things that we look forward to. I cannot imagine that there is a Canadian alive today who is proud of the events that made a National Day for Truth and Reconciliation necessary. Nevertheless, it is indeed the first National Day for Truth and Reconciliation, and we should certainly celebrate it as such. It would not be enough to merely “observe.”