Sir Isaac Newton published his laws of motion in 1687, the third of which states, “For every action, there is an equal and opposite reaction.”

This law is the foundation of rocket science where engines must fire and burn fuel that accelerates from the rear of the craft. This causes a force in the opposite direction to push the rocket forward.

Dribble a basketball, the same thing. The harder and faster you push down on the ball, the harder and faster it will bounce back up.

In its own way, Newton’s law applies to the trucker protests in Canada and elsewhere in the world. It seems that in countries where the pressure was applied the strongest and for a longer period of time has triggered a proportional response.

Governments in Canada, New Zealand, and Australia have been three of the worst offenders when it comes to attacking citizens’ basic liberties.

To be sure, while most countries in the world have experienced varying degrees of restrictions, Canada has created one of the more potent cocktails of lockdowns, mask requirements, social distancing requirements, vaccine mandates, vaccine passport mandates, travel restrictions, contact tracing, quarantining, surveillance and policing.

How Bad is It?

Canada, notoriously, has become one of the first to take steps towards building COVID camps. The Canadian government announced last summer that it was funding the construction of four “isolation sites” where “people who have COVID-19 -- or have been exposed to it -- access safe isolation accommodations to keep themselves and their community safe.”

Translation: The government is building camps where people who test positive can be coerced into “voluntarily” leaving their own homes and placed in sites under lock-and-key until they check after being deemed by the government no longer a threat to public health and safety.

Australia did much the same as Canada, only at times harder with even more menacing rhetoric. In fact, the COVID camps in Australia are already operational.

The small island nation of New Zealand with its population of 5.1 million did its very best to keep up in the totalitarian spirit.

Add other countries to the list of COVID oppressors, and you’ll see that the worldwide pressure is mounting to set up that equal and opposite reaction in Israel, Spain, France, Germany, Austria, and elsewhere.

Canada’s Freedom Convoy Reacts

Fed up with Canada’s oppressive restrictions, Canadian truckers and farmers reached a breaking point of sorts, but instead of breaking, they decided to peacefully push back against all of the coercion and pressure they were receiving from the Canadian government.

Starting on January 22, 2022, hundreds of trucks and other vehicles formed what became known as the “Freedom Convoy” which traveled through several Canadian provinces, arriving at the nation’s capital of Ottawa on January 29th. The convoy was joined by farmers from throughout the country and thousands and thousands of pedestrian protesters.

While the tone of the protests is generally upbeat, the protesters have made it clear to their government: no more vaccine mandates, no more restrictions. They’re done.

What has made the trucker protests unique is that through the sheer size of their vehicles, their numbers, the amount of support they have received, and to some extent their working-class grit, they have been practically immovable.

In a communications sense, they have never deviated from message; they have kept it peaceful and generally positive. This has Prime Minister Justin Trudeau scared. He wants the protesters to self-implode. He wants them to make a mistake so he can paint them as violent or radical.

His latest step in a game of chicken with the Freedom Convoy came Monday when he gave himself emergency powers to resolve the situation his way. What this means remains to be seen, but for at least 30 days, all options are on the table for Trudeau who has yet to do the one thing the protesters want him to do -- listen.

Instead, he seems prepared to ratchet up the pressure, which according to Newton’s Third Law, is almost guaranteed to force an equal and opposite reaction. Maybe that’s what he wants. Maybe that’s the excuse he needs to become the totalitarian he’s already being accused of being.

The Cards are Beginning to Flip

Trucker protests are already happening around the world, inspired by Canada’s Freedom Convoy. All of that collective pressure applied to the populace is creating a pent-up global energy that’s could push back in a bigger way than the elites may realize.

There have been huge protests in Australia, France, Israel, Spain, and other places. The one thing all these countries have in common is that the pressure on the citizens was applied through centralized authority at the national level. 

The U.S. is more fragmented due to state powers. An American living in Florida experiences almost no COVID restrictions, while one living in New York City can’t go about any sort of normal routine without factoring in such things as vaccine passports and other restrictions. The pressure from the government to America’s citizens is not being applied evenly from coast to coast, which makes the notion of “equal and opposite reaction” on a national level less likely.

All this, however, is enough to make any student of history or physics wonder if the pandemic’s orchestrators have truly thought this through. One way or the other, this is the year we will find out.

Image: JimmySuperStarz