Rebel News Podcast - August 28, 2023


EZRA LEVANT ｜ Rebel Downunder： Kindling free speech in Australia and New Zealand


Episode Stats

Length

45 minutes

Words per Minute

165.23409

Word Count

7,542

Sentence Count

479

Misogynist Sentences

6

Hate Speech Sentences

8


Summary

A report from Melbourne, Australia, where Ezra Levenant is wrapping up a three-city book tour with his friend Avi Amini. They were in Auckland and Wellington, New Zealand, and today we're in Melbourne, where we'll show you excerpts from all of those events, including an incredible Maori warrior dance.


Transcript

00:00:00.000 Hello, my friends. I'm in Melbourne, Australia, just wrapping up a three-city book tour with my
00:00:05.680 friend Abi Yamini. We were in Auckland and Wellington, New Zealand, and today we're in
00:00:10.320 Melbourne, Australia. I'll show you excerpts from all of those events, including an incredible
00:00:15.480 demonstration of the Maori Hakka. You might not know what those words mean. Maori are the
00:00:22.080 indigenous peoples of New Zealand, and the Hakka is a warrior dance that they do, and they did it
00:00:27.760 for us in Wellington. Absolutely riveting, and that's why I want you to get the video version
00:00:33.200 of this podcast. Just go to rebelnewsplus.com and click subscribe. It's eight bucks a month.
00:00:38.940 You get the video version. You'll hear the Hakka on the podcast, that's for sure, but you have got to
00:00:44.700 see this with your own eyes, so just go to rebelnewsplus.com. All right, here's today's podcast.
00:00:57.760 Tonight, a report from Australia. It's August 28th, and this is the Ezra LeVant Show.
00:01:10.280 You're fighting for freedom! Shame on you, you censorious bug!
00:01:16.540 I'm standing in the middle of a beautiful city called Melbourne, Australia. It's an ultra-modern
00:01:31.020 city with skyscrapers. It's a large city. It's a sports city. It loves its different tournaments
00:01:36.900 and competitions. It's on the ocean, a gorgeous beach, but in the heart of the city, there can
00:01:43.220 be no denying it. The center of this city is the Shrine of Remembrance, which is behind me.
00:01:49.380 It was built to memorialize those Australians that fought in the First World War. Obviously,
00:01:55.960 other wars were added. There's a pillar dedicated by Queen Elizabeth to the Second World War,
00:02:02.820 those who had fallen, Korea and other battles as well. Australia and New Zealand, too, were an
00:02:10.220 enormous part of the war effort. Even though the war didn't come to their shores, much like Canada
00:02:16.080 was an enormous part of the war effort, punching above our weight. As you know, Canada had a beach,
00:02:22.560 Juneau Beach, next to the UK and the US in the liberation of Normandy on D-Day. It's called a
00:02:29.420 Shrine of Remembrance, and indeed it has a sacred feeling to it. It's dominant in the city. It's
00:02:36.300 respected. I see even, I'm speaking to you, I'm recording this on a Sunday, there are groups
00:02:42.380 filing in constantly to the education center, the visitor center. And I tell you all this
00:02:47.880 because Australia is a beautiful cousin of Canada, similar in many ways. The reason I'm down here
00:02:56.080 is because the head of our Australia Bureau, our friend Avi Amini, had a book launch. And I've been
00:03:03.300 here for three days. I was in Auckland, New Zealand. And then the next day I went to Wellington, the
00:03:08.640 capital of New Zealand. And today I'm in Melbourne, where last night Avi had his sort of hometown book
00:03:15.360 launch for his new semi-autobiographical manifesto called A Rebel from the Start. And I want to give
00:03:22.480 you a report on how that book launch went, but more importantly, on the things I learned along the
00:03:27.760 way. I had never been to New Zealand before. And although I was coming in personal solidarity with
00:03:33.240 Avi, he's one of our best reporters, best campaigners. He really is a one-man army, as I've taken to
00:03:39.420 calling him. I also wanted to see a little bit about what New Zealand was like, because like you, I'm sure,
00:03:45.980 I've been fascinated by it. It's a political oddity sometimes. It's a small country, only about 5 million
00:03:52.880 people. So frankly, the same size as the greater Toronto area. But in some ways, it's a laboratory
00:03:59.480 of political ideas. There was a point in time when it was held up as the free market, low tax, low debt
00:04:06.420 exemplar. In recent years, however, the prime minister, until she recently resigned, was Jacinda Ardern,
00:04:13.260 who, when she was younger, was the president of the socialist international youth. She's a world
00:04:18.920 economic forum delegate, just like Justin Trudeau, a globalist, a censor, a global warming extremist,
00:04:27.020 a gun grabber. And all of these ideas, she could impose on a country the size of a big city.
00:04:34.400 And because of that, I fear that she was able to twist and transform that country more than she could,
00:04:41.520 more than even Trudeau could in Canada, more than Rishi Sunak could in the UK, more than Joe Biden could
00:04:47.740 in the United States. The sheer size of those other countries makes it more difficult to turn a ship
00:04:53.620 like a battleship can't turn on a dime like a little canoe can. And so I was interested to see
00:04:59.400 what New Zealand in 2023 was like after Jacinda Ardern. Remember that she was one of the most vicious,
00:05:10.340 I'll say, and authoritarian imposers of lockdowns. I'll never forget this statement she made at a press
00:05:17.320 conference where she told the reporters and she told New Zealanders to ignore anything else that
00:05:23.220 anyone had to say. The government of New Zealand would be their only source of truth. Here, listen
00:05:30.100 to her home words as she said it.
00:05:31.760 New Zealand, that in the midst of what is a global issue, as you would expect, there are a number of
00:05:36.980 rumours that circulate. I am present on social media, I see it myself. I cannot go around and
00:05:44.620 individually dismiss every single rumour I see on social media, as tempted as I might be. So instead,
00:05:51.240 I want to send a clear message to the New Zealand public. We will share with you the most up-to-date
00:05:57.140 information daily. You can trust us as a source of that information. You can also trust the Director
00:06:04.040 General of Health and the Ministry of Health. For that information, do feel free to visit at any
00:06:09.940 time to clarify anywhere you may hear, covid19.govt.nz. Otherwise, dismiss anything else. We will continue
00:06:20.340 to be your single source of truth. That's one of the most stunning things I've ever heard. It's
00:06:24.740 akin to Justin Trudeau saying that the country he most admired was Communist Trudeau because of its
00:06:31.220 basic dictatorship. Here's a flashback of that.
00:06:34.180 A little of admiration I actually have for China. Because their basic dictatorship is allowing them
00:06:44.980 to actually turn their economy around on a dime and say, we need to go green as fast as we need to
00:06:50.120 start investing in solar. I mean, there is a flexibility that I know Stephen Harper must dream
00:06:55.500 about of having a dictatorship that he could do everything he wanted that I find quite interesting.
00:07:00.800 I mean, that's a stunning revelation into Trudeau's heart. And it explains a lot these days
00:07:06.260 about why Trudeau will not have an independent investigation into CCP corruption of Canadian
00:07:14.300 political institutions. But what Jacinda Ardern said was not just a momentary flash and insight into
00:07:21.540 her thinking. It was a statement of her obvious and comprehensive policy. She believed and still
00:07:27.700 believes that the only source of truth is government, as if they have some higher moral and scientific
00:07:35.320 understanding of the world, and that you merely have an opinion, but they have the truth, that you may
00:07:41.100 have a view, but it's misinformation. The only reliable information comes from the government.
00:07:46.580 The most incredible thing about that statement by Jacinda Ardern was how accepted it was. There was
00:07:53.000 not an uprising by the media, by other institutions saying, what are you saying? You do not have a
00:07:59.760 monopoly on truth. It's a dangerous thing. You would think that church leaders would speak out against it.
00:08:04.560 You'd think that media leaders, you'd think law professors, lawyers, maybe even civil liberties groups,
00:08:10.520 but no. And I'm afraid that that will be Jacinda Ardern's legacy. Cracking down on freedom in New
00:08:17.180 Zealand, and now with her position at Harvard and around the world to export the New Zealand model of
00:08:23.860 censorship around the world. And that's one of the reasons I went to see how Avi's book launches in
00:08:30.120 New Zealand would go. Because there's one more layer, and I alluded to it the other day. When Avi sought to go
00:08:36.420 to New Zealand about a year or so ago to do journalism, to meet up with New Zealand critics
00:08:43.320 of the lockdowns, he was banned by the government. There was, it was actually a joint campaign against
00:08:50.900 him between the left-wing media and the left-wing government to trump up reasons why Avi couldn't
00:08:56.600 get in. He was legally blocked. Well, illegally blocked, as it turns out. We lawyered up, as we like to do
00:09:02.660 at Rebel News, and they finally relented. So Avi thought it would be poetic, and I agree with them,
00:09:08.520 to have that first book launch in New Zealand, the country that sought to ban him. By the way,
00:09:14.120 this area of the Shrine of Remembrance, because of its central location, its wide boulevard,
00:09:19.280 its large lawns, and its meaning, that the people who died and who are remembered here
00:09:25.060 fought for civil liberties. So this Shrine of Remembrance area was a common place for anti-lockdown
00:09:31.940 protests in Australia. And it was also where riot police, on horseback, charged those peaceful,
00:09:39.960 unarmed protesters, perhaps a template for Justin Trudeau to follow later on during his invocation of
00:09:47.140 a form of martial law to crack down on the truckers. So we are standing on very interesting territory here.
00:09:52.380 Anyways, back to New Zealand. We got into New Zealand. For me, it was a very long journey
00:09:58.040 from our office in Toronto. And we got through with no problem. And you'll remember that Avi
00:10:03.720 wore a shirt that he had made. Kia Ora is a Maori greeting, and it's a welcoming greeting. And he
00:10:10.660 wore a shirt that said, Kia Ora, North Korea. Here, here's what he looked like when he stepped off the
00:10:17.020 plane, if you recall.
00:10:22.700 Kia Ora, North Korea. I am finally here in Auckland, even though the Communist Party tried their very best
00:10:31.960 to stop me with the cover of their state board and paid for mainstream media. Thank you to the New Zealand
00:10:39.100 Herald for promoting my book. For the rest of you that are sane still left in this country,
00:10:44.860 make sure to come on Friday night in Auckland or Saturday in Wellington, rebelfromthestart.com.
00:10:51.260 There are still some tickets left, I believe, rebelfromthestart.com. I'd love to see you all there.
00:10:59.740 The smell of victory.
00:11:01.660 That was pretty funny, because in a way, Jacinda Ardern was trying to turn New Zealand into a kind of
00:11:07.820 hermit kingdom, banning free speech, banning outsiders with bad political ideas. And remember,
00:11:13.180 that's why he was kept out, according to the internal records that Avi was able to get from
00:11:18.060 the government. He was kept out because that he would stimulate a debate, a public policy debate,
00:11:24.540 that the government didn't like. That is not what the men of the New Zealand army, or those in
00:11:29.900 Australia, for that matter, fought and died for. So we landed in Auckland. I got there a day early,
00:11:34.860 just to get over the jet lag. It was quite a long journey. And I want to show you where we met,
00:11:40.860 because Avi Yamini, like the rest of us at Rebel News, he's a little bit spicy, a little bit
00:11:45.900 controversial, as the left would say. Obviously, he's a peaceful debater, a man of ideas. But the
00:11:51.340 left wants to de-platform him, wants to cancel him. You might recall that a few years ago, that happened
00:11:57.180 to me when I was launching my book, The Libranos. We had booked two theaters, one in Calgary,
00:12:03.100 one in Edmonton, paid in advance. But an online mob threatened the movie theater owner,
00:12:10.140 who canceled at the last minute. Here's a flashback to that. I know something about book
00:12:14.380 launches being canceled by street thugs. Remember this?
00:12:17.420 We got ourselves a street protest here, folks. I'm not going to do to Rick Shaw Day what they've done to Mike
00:12:28.380 before. No threats. No threats. No threats. As you can tell, there's a majority.
00:12:35.420 You might be wondering, Edra, when do I get my book? Remember when he was sold?
00:12:48.460 We found another place around the corner that has agreed to let us in, and we're all excited.
00:12:56.460 We got one of them. And we'll all go march there together, get out of the cold, and we'll sign the books.
00:13:10.540 Well, we thought that might happen. And to tell you the truth, that's one of the reasons I was coming,
00:13:15.100 not just to show solidarity with my friend Avi in his book launch, which was a very important...
00:13:20.540 And by the way, I really recommend the book. It's funny. It's revealing. It's passionate. And if you like
00:13:25.900 Avi as much as I do, I think you'll get a kick out of the book. You can find it on our website,
00:13:30.460 rebelfromthestark.com. Anyways, so I was coming to support Avi for his book, but I was also coming to see
00:13:35.900 how New Zealand handled it, given that the government had banned him before for expressly political reasons.
00:13:43.900 Well, Avi was smart, and he found an ally in New Zealand that wouldn't be easily pushed around.
00:13:50.620 You might know that Rebel News often has events in the greater Toronto area, which is sort of a woke place.
00:13:57.020 But we have a friendship with Charles McVinney, the president of the Canada Christian College,
00:14:01.980 and he's not pushed around by Antifa thugs, and he has refused to cancel our events at his facility.
00:14:09.660 And we're very, very grateful to him. And it shows that he's a man of ideas and debate. Well,
00:14:14.380 we found a similar location in Auckland. It was a large church, a largely Maori church. And for those
00:14:22.940 of you who don't know, Maori is the name of the original people of New Zealand. They are often
00:14:29.740 portrayed as warriors. You may know the Maori Hakka, which is a fierce dance of friendship,
00:14:36.460 actually a welcome. And there's many things that that dance stands for. They have a very interesting
00:14:41.900 Aboriginal culture, which we learned about when we were in Auckland. We went to the large national
00:14:48.540 museum there. It was fascinating to learn. Maoris are an important part of New Zealand.
00:14:56.300 And this Maori church, it's a Christian church of an evangelical variety, I'll say. It's called
00:15:03.420 Destiny Church, and it is a positive church whose members are largely Maori. And the leader of this
00:15:11.740 church, Brian Temecki is his name, is no stranger to taking political stands himself. In fact, he's the
00:15:18.220 leader of a party called the Freedoms New Zealand Party. In New Zealand, they have, you know, districts
00:15:26.620 where people vote, but they also have sort of a system, I think it's called MMP, where you have,
00:15:32.460 if any party gets five percent of the vote spread out in any way, they get seats to their parliament
00:15:39.420 as well. So they have seats apportioned by district and seats apportioned by vote. So the thinking that
00:15:45.580 Brian Temecki has is that he can get maybe five percent of the vote across the country. He's an incredible
00:15:51.020 man. He's a religious leader. There's not just one Destiny Church in Auckland. There's churches around
00:15:56.460 New Zealand. He's also the leader of this political movement. And he's deeply involved with Maori men,
00:16:02.620 because Maori men are disproportionately represented in the criminal justice system and in gangs.
00:16:08.060 And he works to bring those men out of the darkness and into the light to give them a Christian belief
00:16:13.820 system as opposed to, say, finding that community in a gang. And what's so fascinating is how he himself
00:16:23.020 and his organization really provides a lot of the social services in that way to Maoris and others
00:16:28.700 in New Zealand. He was an amazing man, a charismatic man. And I have to say, maybe I'm easily bowled over,
00:16:35.660 but just being in his presence, I could see why he inspires so many New Zealanders, especially Maoris.
00:16:41.500 The police and the prosecutors and the politicians hate him for the same reason that they cracked down
00:16:49.420 in Canada on Christian pastors who defied them during the lockdown too. And just like Pastor James
00:16:55.100 Coates and Pastor Arthur Pawlowski and other pastors in Canada were arrested, they arrested this Maori church
00:17:01.660 leader. And instead of standing up for him, the media party condemned him. And despite the fact that
00:17:08.780 normally the media would be very sympathetic to a Maori leader, it reminds me of the treatment in
00:17:13.180 Canada where Tamara Leach, who is a Métis woman, normally a Métis woman in the world of public
00:17:18.620 affairs would be treated with a great welcoming by the media who would say, well, let's listen to
00:17:25.660 our native elders and let's be respectful. They actually tried to deracinate Tamara Leach to doubt the
00:17:32.460 fact that she's Métis. In New Zealand, I think something similar happened. They tried to condemn
00:17:37.900 Brian Temecki because he wasn't the right kind of Maori. He wasn't reading the woke script that was
00:17:45.180 preferred by the white PhDs at the university. It's interesting to me because the Destiny Church
00:17:52.060 has been called a prosperity theology church. And you see this sometimes in US evangelical churches
00:17:58.940 where the pastor doesn't say, be a victim. The pastor doesn't say, be on welfare. The pastor says,
00:18:04.380 raise yourself up, be prosperous. And it's an amazing counter-narrative than to the left-wing
00:18:11.900 woke narrative that would say to indigenous peoples in New Zealand, in Australia, and in Canada,
00:18:16.940 no, no, no, you're perpetual victims and you need handouts. He's a very interesting man. And I think
00:18:22.140 we're going to do some journalism with him in the future. Anyways, back to my main story.
00:18:26.540 It was in the Destiny Church in Auckland that we had our first event. And I want to show you this one
00:18:34.220 tweet that Avi spotted and he retweeted it. Look at this. An Antifa trans protester. You can see that
00:18:42.220 by their name and their flags. A transgender Antifa activist lamenting on Twitter that they wouldn't be
00:18:50.380 able to cancel Avi's book launch because it was at a Maori church led by no one less than Brian Temecki,
00:18:59.180 who wouldn't bend the knee to the government. So obviously he's not going to bend the knee to some
00:19:03.740 woke thugs. Here, I'd like you to watch some footage from that event. It was wonderful. I want
00:19:09.900 to give you a sampling of some of the different speeches there. I gave a few remarks myself.
00:19:14.460 I also want to show you the people who were there. And I want to show you a little bit
00:19:18.940 about the church itself. It is a glorious facility. I found it inspirational and it was a surprise to
00:19:27.260 me. I did not know my trip to New Zealand would be so Maori centric. I thought it was just about
00:19:32.700 Jacinda Ardern and her censorship and Avi's book. Here, just take a few minutes and watch what it was like
00:19:39.580 that first night in Auckland, New Zealand. Take a look. I thought, this is an opportunity to let
00:19:45.500 people know who I really am. Because yes, I'm in front of the camera and the first thing most people
00:19:50.540 say when they see me on the street is, oh damn, you're shorter than I thought. No, no, they actually
00:19:55.660 say, you look taller on camera. I'm like, yeah, just one of those trolls. You're exactly how you are in
00:20:03.420 the comments. And so they ran those smears and they encouraged the government to ban me. And the
00:20:15.900 thing I love about New Zealand is your freedom of information is so quick to respond that it was
00:20:20.700 it was easy to see in black and white that everything they told the media and everything
00:20:26.380 the media had published as to why I was banned was completely false. In fact, in black and white,
00:20:32.780 and I love it. And I'm a bit annoyed that it's on the front cover of the book, because I think we
00:20:36.140 should add it, that they said that their reason, their real reason for banning me was not some
00:20:41.100 conviction that they knew didn't meet the threshold. It was my propensity to incite people with opposing
00:20:49.180 views. Holy crap, I wear that with a badge of honour. That is exactly what I do. And that's what you
00:20:58.060 should do in an open, free, democratic state. As we went further and further into these protests,
00:21:05.180 and as the police became more and more hardcore in their enforcement, and as the numbers decreased in
00:21:11.900 the amount of people that were coming out to the streets, because, you know, obviously, with what
00:21:15.900 was happening, people were becoming more and more afraid to be out there. You know, it was just turning
00:21:21.260 out to be me and Avi there. And through that bond that we built during that time, I really started
00:21:27.820 to learn a lot about the type of work that I was doing. Because when I went out there to do that work,
00:21:34.220 as an independent journalist, you know, I didn't really know exactly what that was at that moment.
00:21:40.140 But by seeing what Avi was doing, it really gave me that courage to take it to the next level,
00:21:45.900 and to feel like that I'm actually not alone out there. There's one young man here who's being a
00:21:50.700 citizen journalist right here, and other people have their phones up. You are as much a journalist
00:21:56.380 as anyone from The Herald, or from Stuff, or anything like that. What is a journalist other than someone
00:22:02.380 who tells about what happened in that day? That's where the word journalism comes from. And Avi Yamini,
00:22:09.260 who I've taken a calling a one-man army, is I think one of the great citizen journalists of our age.
00:22:18.460 My favorite moment was when Avi and Brian Temecki had a bit of a heart-to-heart,
00:22:23.740 and in some sort of foreshadowing, they talked about cancel culture. Listen to the wonderful response
00:22:30.620 by Pastor Temecki. Don't you wish we had more people in Canada like him? Take a listen to him
00:22:38.060 threatened to cancel the cancelers. Why don't they intimidate you? I'm their worst nightmare.
00:22:45.020 And just like they've been canceling you and other people, I'm going to cancel them. They know who I
00:22:51.340 am, and they know who we are. And I think that's very important, never to be afraid of the oppressor,
00:22:58.540 because they are more afraid of you, and they know that you're not afraid of them. Well, that's my kind
00:23:04.060 of guy. Anyways, the first night in Auckland went perfect. And, you know, I was a little jet lagged,
00:23:10.860 and Avi had come in from Melbourne, and we were feeling pretty great about how it went. But then
00:23:16.620 as we were turning in to go to bed at 2am, you know, you just check your emails before you go to bed for
00:23:22.140 the night. At 2am, Avi got an email from the venue that next day in Wellington, the capital city,
00:23:32.220 that that new venue, we had the Destiny Church, the Maori Church event in Auckland, huge success,
00:23:38.300 came back at 2am, found out that the next night, in fact, I guess you could say 17 hours later,
00:23:45.820 it's called the cathedral, the Wellington Cathedral of St. Paul. They had signed a contract with Avi,
00:23:51.580 they knew it was Avi Yamini, they knew it was the book, they knew everything, and yet they got the
00:23:57.580 same threats from the left-wing thugs, from the transgender activists, from the Antifa types,
00:24:04.540 and they're made of lesser stuff than those Maoris. They're not warriors, they're appeasers. And so
00:24:11.100 they didn't have the courage to phone Avi and say, mate, we're feeling threatened, we're getting
00:24:17.900 wobbly here, to which Avi could have said, we'll add more security, we'll have the police.
00:24:22.300 That church in Wellington caved, and they did it in a cowardly way, not just with an email,
00:24:28.540 but their excuse was laughable. Here, let me show you a snippet from the email they sent Avi. It was
00:24:33.340 sent a little bit earlier, but we didn't see it till 2am, because he didn't phone us. And they said,
00:24:37.820 you've just got to look at this language here. Here, let me read it for you. While we regularly
00:24:42.780 enable a wide range of people with differing views and perspectives from our own to use our hall,
00:24:49.340 we do need to review whether we allow a booking for a speaker who is known to hold contentious,
00:24:55.020 potentially inflammatory, or offensive views. And then get this line. In this particular case,
00:25:00.940 it seems that Mr. Yemeni's presence on our cathedral site may be considered by several in our community,
00:25:07.740 to be divisive, and may lead, get this, get this, to attempts by others to prevent the event from
00:25:14.300 taking place. Did you get that? So the church said, Avi, we've got to cancel your event, because if we
00:25:22.860 don't cancel your event, other people might try and cancel your event. So we've got to cancel your event,
00:25:27.260 so the event's not canceled. I'm deeply embarrassed. Look, why don't you just say the same thing that the
00:25:33.180 movie theater owner in Alberta said to me in 2019, when he shut down the two events, he said, look,
00:25:39.420 I'm scared. I'm scared they're going to attack me. I'm scared they're going to assault me. I'm
00:25:44.140 maybe even scared they're going to burn down my place. That's what the guy in Alberta said to me.
00:25:48.700 And although I don't really accept it, I understand it, because who could put up with that? And the trouble
00:25:53.740 is, in some of these left-wing places, like Jacinda Ardern's New Zealand, if Antifa threatens you,
00:26:00.220 the police and the prosecutors don't jump to it. And so that, I think it was an Anglican cathedral,
00:26:06.380 bailed at 2 a.m. Well, at 2 a.m., Avi contacted the Destiny Church and said, can you please help us?
00:26:15.660 And they said, yes, we have a sister church in Wellington. You can be there tonight. Can you
00:26:21.740 imagine? The Maoris saved the day. And we had six Maoris security. And I have to say,
00:26:29.980 I have rarely in my life felt so protected. And pity the fool in Antifa that would mess with those
00:26:37.420 lads. Here, I want to show you a little bit of that event. So remember, we canceled the event. We
00:26:42.540 sent a bunch of emails telling people about the new venue. Hopefully, I don't know if everybody got it,
00:26:48.300 but most people found the new venue. And I have to take my hat off to these Maori warriors who were not
00:26:55.420 going to be pushed around like the Anglican church was. Here's some excerpts from the night we had in
00:27:01.580 Wellington. So we're here tonight to listen to some of the rebel team and talk about their experiences
00:27:09.180 on the streets in Melbourne, in Canada. We've all been through similar things. And we all sat there
00:27:17.420 watching Avi and Rukshan and Ezra, you know, outlining the excesses of the regimes that we've all lived under.
00:27:26.220 And we're all here because we love freedom. And freedom is important. And you need, in order to
00:27:35.260 have that freedom, you need to have free media. And they need to be able to show both sides of the story.
00:27:42.300 And that's why it's so important to have people like Rebel News doing what they do. People like Avi,
00:27:52.380 small in stature, but huge, huge, huge attitude, you know, and bravery. Rukshan, huge bravery to
00:28:01.580 steer down those, you know, the scenes that came out of Melbourne were just appalling, you know,
00:28:07.500 police in black uniforms with boots or militarised with armoured vehicles to deal with people who
00:28:16.140 just wanted to be free. Tell the other side of the story these days is more difficult than it sounds.
00:28:22.220 Because so much of the media is controlled in some way by someone who doesn't want the entire story
00:28:28.540 told. I give you the example, the most obvious example recently of lockdowns and the pandemic and
00:28:34.620 vaccine mandates and things like that. We've all learned that Pfizer and the other drug companies
00:28:40.460 are enormous advertisers with the corporate media, literally billions of dollars in advertising.
00:28:47.420 So is it really surprising that during the lockdowns and the vaccine mandates, the corporate media,
00:28:53.660 which is the dominant media, I call it the regime media, is it really surprising that they weren't
00:28:58.780 willing to tell the other side of the story? There's so many things like that. A lot of
00:29:04.540 the media is government funded. So obviously they're going to run errands for those in power.
00:29:10.540 Corporate media is the same way. You know they won't do anything that would jeopardise the corporate
00:29:15.580 interests of their companies. It was amazing. It was a great night. You'll see our friend
00:29:20.540 Rakshan Fernando was there. He's another independent journalist from Melbourne who went to New Zealand to
00:29:26.700 be part of Avi's book launch. Avi really has inspired other citizen journalists. I should tell you
00:29:32.860 that we met with about half a dozen fledgling citizen journalists in New Zealand. And I don't want to
00:29:41.580 get ahead of myself because we have to expand carefully. If we're going to expand, we don't want to
00:29:46.460 be rash. But I hope that we can find allies in New Zealand, maybe baby steps, maybe once in a while on a
00:29:53.660 freelance basis. But I think there's enough news there and it's an interesting enough country. And
00:29:59.500 people I think in Canada feel a kinship with New Zealand and it's an interesting place. It's part of the
00:30:04.860 Western alliance. It's part of the five eyes, if I'm not mistaken. US, UK, Canada, Australia, New Zealand.
00:30:13.980 They call it the five eyes. It's like super friends. You know, Canada is part of NATO. Canada is part of
00:30:21.260 the, you know, G20. Canada is part of the UN. But the five closest friends from a military and
00:30:27.660 intelligence point of view are called the five eyes. New Zealand is one of those five eyes. And yet
00:30:32.540 it's sort of deviating towards authoritarianism like Canada is. So wouldn't you agree with me that
00:30:38.700 it's sort of miraculous that twice in a row, Avi Yamini, who is not Maori, is not even a New
00:30:46.860 Zealander, his freedom of speech was saved and he was physically protected by a Maori church in New
00:30:54.060 Zealand. My mind is still turning that over a hundred times how wonderful that is. But I want to show you
00:31:00.220 perhaps the most emotionally powerful moment of the trip. It was after the event was over.
00:31:07.100 Avi had signed a bunch of books. Like I say, the Maori warriors were on guard. Antifa didn't come
00:31:12.780 near. They'd pee their pants. And then the haka I mentioned at the beginning of the show. That's
00:31:17.740 that Maori dance that you sometimes see before a rugby match. They performed the haka,
00:31:23.420 which is a very spiritual act. They performed it for Avi. Take a look at this.
00:31:31.980 Told us.
00:31:37.980 Are you not moved?
00:32:03.860 Is that not amazing?
00:32:05.560 They truly welcomed him and his rebellious nature.
00:32:10.900 And look at these tweets from Brian Temecki.
00:32:13.400 He was back in Auckland watching things.
00:32:15.700 He said he stands with Rebel News.
00:32:17.780 Would you believe it?
00:32:19.160 He is a man who believes in freedom,
00:32:21.360 and he is not going to bend the knee to a bunch of street thugs.
00:32:24.980 And I'm so pleased with that,
00:32:27.120 but I'm also heartbroken that it has come to that.
00:32:29.880 I'm heartbroken that New Zealand is in a place
00:32:32.080 where churches are, I believe, genuinely afraid
00:32:35.980 they're going to be torched
00:32:37.000 because even though Jacinda Ardern has moved on,
00:32:40.540 the new prime minister is a mini-me,
00:32:43.160 and just like Jacinda Ardern.
00:32:46.080 And so this church obviously felt
00:32:48.580 they could not rely on the police to protect them,
00:32:51.480 could not rely on the media and politicians
00:32:53.660 to condemn the threats of violence.
00:32:55.260 And that's sort of creepy to me
00:32:58.120 because we already know
00:32:59.280 that the government of New Zealand
00:33:00.520 tried to keep Abiyamini out.
00:33:03.160 They failed because we lawyered up.
00:33:05.240 So maybe they were sort of winking at Antifa
00:33:08.820 and saying, hey, guys, you're our street teams.
00:33:11.740 We can't accomplish this legally.
00:33:13.580 Can you maybe threaten anyone
00:33:15.240 and we'll turn a blind eye to you?
00:33:16.780 We won't prosecute you.
00:33:18.440 Let me flip it around.
00:33:19.740 And you can see that others from the Maori church
00:33:23.240 said this point, if an event at a mosque
00:33:26.980 had been threatened by some paramilitary group
00:33:30.120 the same way Antifa had threatened the church,
00:33:32.780 do you think that the labor government here,
00:33:34.740 do you think that the police
00:33:35.540 and prosecutors would be silent?
00:33:37.240 Do you think the New Zealand Herald or Stuff,
00:33:39.260 those are the two main media,
00:33:40.560 do you think they would have been silent?
00:33:41.640 You know they wouldn't have been.
00:33:43.920 Well, that was New Zealand, and we left,
00:33:45.880 and it was amazing, and it's a fascinating country.
00:33:48.700 It's obviously a gorgeous country, as you may know.
00:33:51.020 The Lord of the Rings trilogy was filmed
00:33:52.960 in large part in New Zealand.
00:33:54.500 Other movies where you need sort of
00:33:56.260 an otherworldly, glorious, sweeping topography
00:34:01.720 and geography and geology, just amazing.
00:34:05.400 As I mentioned the other day,
00:34:06.820 it's a volcanic place with still active volcanoes.
00:34:10.700 Just an amazing, amazing place, but so far away.
00:34:14.660 And I think that's one reason it's sort of isolated.
00:34:17.220 We don't think of New Zealand as much as we think
00:34:19.300 of Australia, as much as we think of America or UK.
00:34:21.320 And so what's happening sort of out of our corner
00:34:23.780 of our eye, I fear that New Zealand
00:34:25.720 has become more unfree.
00:34:28.620 It's the kind of place that needs a rebel noose,
00:34:32.380 which is precisely why they tried their best
00:34:34.740 to keep Avi out.
00:34:35.660 Well, as I mentioned, I'm now standing
00:34:37.680 in beautiful Melbourne, and I want to show you
00:34:40.540 some scenes from last night.
00:34:42.040 It was sort of a homecoming.
00:34:43.580 This is Avi's hometown.
00:34:45.260 And at his book launch was his family.
00:34:47.300 His dad was there, other family members, old friends.
00:34:50.780 And I want to give you a sample of the beautiful words
00:34:53.660 that were said about him and about the book
00:34:56.200 and about how Avi gave people the courage
00:34:58.940 and the confidence to speak up
00:35:00.540 when everyone around was silent.
00:35:03.540 You know, it reminds me of that line
00:35:05.560 from Yates's poem, The Second Coming.
00:35:08.760 The best lack all conviction,
00:35:11.140 while the worst are full of passionate intensity.
00:35:14.340 Remember, that's what it was like during the lockdowns.
00:35:17.560 All the worst people were rampant
00:35:19.420 and all the best people were silent.
00:35:23.060 Avi, not alone, but almost alone.
00:35:26.340 Avi and Rukshan and a handful of others
00:35:28.580 spoke up in this city and it made all the difference.
00:35:32.240 Here's some of how that went last night in Melbourne.
00:35:35.220 Now, remember, this is the same Chantel Baker
00:35:37.240 that they've often targeted
00:35:39.160 as the most unreliable source on the planet.
00:35:42.360 You can't trust anything she says
00:35:44.380 because she's complete fake news.
00:35:45.640 She's a conspiracy theorist herself.
00:35:47.240 But suddenly for this one,
00:35:49.320 this one rumour,
00:35:51.220 this rumour that she posted,
00:35:53.120 they believed it.
00:35:53.900 They didn't even come to me for comment
00:35:54.980 to ask me if it was true.
00:35:56.520 They ran with it
00:35:57.320 and they ran in this article without a byline
00:36:00.580 so nobody put their name to it.
00:36:02.680 They wrote,
00:36:04.020 so we're planning on coming,
00:36:06.300 Chantel Baker says it,
00:36:07.300 and these are the ways,
00:36:09.080 these are the reasons
00:36:10.260 and ways New Zealand immigration
00:36:13.100 and New Zealand police
00:36:14.720 can stop me from entering the country.
00:36:17.200 Basically telling them,
00:36:18.720 hey, what are you doing?
00:36:20.080 Ban this guy.
00:36:21.180 You need to stop him.
00:36:22.280 The next thing we know
00:36:23.320 is I was, of course, banned
00:36:25.380 and they blamed a conviction
00:36:28.020 which they knew didn't reach the threshold.
00:36:31.060 and I talk about that whole story in my book
00:36:33.340 and a lot of, you know,
00:36:34.700 the reason that my book
00:36:36.280 only came out now
00:36:38.220 is because often that,
00:36:39.820 the lies that they repeated in that article,
00:36:42.200 they've said that about me for years.
00:36:44.400 A lot of people have said those things
00:36:46.300 and some parts of those,
00:36:47.660 they knew that I wasn't able to respond until now.
00:36:51.120 It says,
00:36:52.060 judge not on the appearance,
00:36:54.260 but judge righteous judgment
00:36:55.520 and the tree shall be known by its fruit.
00:36:58.880 Now he used different words,
00:37:00.240 but it's the exact same principle.
00:37:02.920 It's a true principle
00:37:04.380 and he's a man of integrity.
00:37:05.920 Now I'm very grateful for this man
00:37:07.580 because he's backed me all the way
00:37:09.040 and I hope that you'll continue to back me
00:37:10.740 because, um...
00:37:11.640 Now I'm...
00:37:12.640 Well, now you have to, don't you?
00:37:14.480 He's committed now.
00:37:16.220 But he's backed me the whole way
00:37:17.860 and he's done this without flinching.
00:37:22.040 He is a man of integrity
00:37:23.160 and we need people that will stand for the truth
00:37:26.200 in this world of lies.
00:37:27.420 Now the enemy,
00:37:27.980 they create their power
00:37:29.520 from their ability to create a false narrative.
00:37:31.480 That's what they do.
00:37:32.940 And that's why their false narrative
00:37:34.780 is it falls apart,
00:37:35.700 changes and it becomes a new false narrative.
00:37:38.080 That's where they get their power from.
00:37:41.220 People like Arby,
00:37:42.980 they destroy the narrative
00:37:44.000 and very quickly do they destroy the narrative.
00:37:46.720 They have a lot of power
00:37:47.520 and if we can support this man
00:37:50.360 and continue to spread the love...
00:37:52.440 You know, it was incredible
00:37:53.660 and there was an emotional connection
00:37:55.320 that people had
00:37:56.320 and actually some of them even recognized me
00:37:58.960 even though I've never done any journalism in Australia
00:38:01.660 but they started to look at the rest of the world
00:38:04.200 through Rebel News.
00:38:05.680 Isn't that amazing?
00:38:06.560 Rebel News, based in Canada,
00:38:08.040 was a source of information about the world
00:38:10.380 to the world.
00:38:11.740 And that's what I said in my remarks last night.
00:38:14.080 I said that Arby told the Australian story to Australians
00:38:18.640 but he also told the Australian story to the world
00:38:21.800 so we could see what was happening
00:38:23.760 and what bad things could come.
00:38:25.840 Here's an excerpt of my own remarks last night.
00:38:28.020 We do at Rebel News,
00:38:29.380 the main thing that Arby and Rukhshan
00:38:31.660 in his own independent spirit does
00:38:33.840 is they tell the other side of the story.
00:38:36.420 But every once in a while,
00:38:38.200 it's not enough just to tell the story.
00:38:41.000 Sometimes that feels almost like being a voyeur
00:38:43.660 or like driving by a traffic accident
00:38:45.580 and rubbernecking.
00:38:47.380 Every once in a while,
00:38:49.160 don't you feel that we have to stop
00:38:51.100 and do something about it?
00:38:52.820 And I think that's the special part of Rebel News
00:38:56.000 that Arby has excelled at.
00:38:58.720 And during the lockdown,
00:39:00.620 when all the official civil liberties people
00:39:02.980 and the champions of the working class,
00:39:05.440 when they went silent,
00:39:06.960 when all the checks and balances failed,
00:39:10.160 Arby not only told the stories,
00:39:12.120 he did, for those who know the Jewish phrase,
00:39:15.840 a little bit of tikkun olam,
00:39:17.980 which means to save the world,
00:39:19.720 to build the world.
00:39:20.460 There's a Jewish saying,
00:39:21.280 it's not up to you to save the whole world,
00:39:23.340 but neither are you free to do nothing.
00:39:25.160 And didn't Arby live up to that so beautifully?
00:39:28.540 Well, it was an amazing trip
00:39:29.820 and it was a busy trip.
00:39:31.380 To go from town to town to town
00:39:32.940 is actually more exhausting than it sounds,
00:39:36.080 but it was a thrill
00:39:37.320 and I'll still be processing it for days to come.
00:39:39.560 I'm coming back to Canada tomorrow,
00:39:42.020 but it's a 24-hour series of flights.
00:39:44.840 I have to go from Melbourne to Sydney
00:39:46.720 to San Francisco to Toronto.
00:39:48.300 I'm tired just thinking about that.
00:39:51.020 And that's one of the reasons
00:39:52.340 why we don't have as much interaction
00:39:53.940 with New Zealand and Australia,
00:39:55.680 the time zones and the distance.
00:39:57.620 Obviously, we have a lot more kinship
00:39:59.200 with our neighbors and best friends,
00:40:01.060 the United States,
00:40:01.720 and even the United Kingdom is closer.
00:40:04.280 But I think that perhaps
00:40:05.820 because of their geographical marginalization,
00:40:08.660 the fact that they're at the ends of the earth,
00:40:11.100 maybe that's why things have happened here
00:40:13.180 that shouldn't have happened
00:40:14.860 because the world wasn't watching.
00:40:16.980 I think Jacinda Ardern has taken New Zealand
00:40:19.260 in a terrible direction
00:40:20.380 and I hope that country comes back.
00:40:22.540 And I believe that having journalists on the ground
00:40:24.900 who tell the other side of the story
00:40:26.160 could make an enormous difference.
00:40:28.860 And that's the thing.
00:40:29.900 If you're one great citizen journalist
00:40:32.280 in the United States of America,
00:40:33.700 it's such a large place,
00:40:35.200 you can make a difference,
00:40:36.140 but it's a huge place.
00:40:38.080 Whereas in New Zealand,
00:40:40.020 one powerful, charismatic, confident citizen journalist
00:40:44.500 can make a real difference precisely
00:40:46.580 because it is smaller.
00:40:49.280 In the days ahead,
00:40:50.180 we'll be contemplating what we saw,
00:40:53.800 talking to people that we met
00:40:55.060 and trying to think of a way
00:40:56.280 to have a Rebel News presence in New Zealand
00:40:59.580 that we can afford
00:41:01.020 because that's the thing
00:41:01.880 with a small population base.
00:41:03.800 Can we crowdfund to support the journalists there?
00:41:06.740 We'll be working on those and other questions,
00:41:08.560 but one thing's for sure,
00:41:09.660 we made some great friends.
00:41:12.060 I'm going to come back to Canada now.
00:41:14.260 So for tomorrow's show,
00:41:15.520 I want to remind you of the amazing work
00:41:18.680 that Rebel News,
00:41:19.520 through Avi Amini
00:41:20.420 and actually some other friends,
00:41:22.500 that we've done in Australia.
00:41:24.400 I think, in fact,
00:41:25.260 some of the biggest differences we made
00:41:27.200 have been here,
00:41:28.340 including some amazing
00:41:29.480 fight the fines cases
00:41:30.980 that were crowdfunded in Australia.
00:41:32.560 And just some shocking scenes
00:41:35.960 of police brutality
00:41:37.420 that we helped fight back
00:41:39.260 for Avi Amini himself,
00:41:41.420 but even for others,
00:41:42.540 like that terrible case
00:41:43.860 of Renee Altacritti,
00:41:45.600 who literally had her young boy
00:41:48.060 ripped out of her arms.
00:41:49.240 Remember this?
00:41:50.960 Oh my God, you brutal!
00:41:53.940 Oh my God!
00:41:55.560 No!
00:41:57.500 You animal!
00:41:58.660 What is she under arrest for?
00:42:07.900 What is she under arrest for?
00:42:11.920 Oh my God!
00:42:22.340 I think that is one of the worst videos Rebel News has ever shown.
00:42:37.740 Whenever I hear that boy screaming, it upsets me for an hour afterwards.
00:42:43.460 But Rebel News covered that, and Rebel News actually crowdfunded for Renee's legal case.
00:42:48.040 So that's our show for today.
00:42:49.560 From the beautiful Shrine of Remembrance in Melbourne, and I think it's appropriate to stand here when we talk about freedom of the press, freedom of speech, and the other diminished freedoms that were infringed upon during the lockdown.
00:43:06.040 Melbourne is such a visually beautiful place, but there was a tremendous ugliness in this paradise during the lockdown.
00:43:13.060 And the media party didn't want to talk about it, and the political parties were complicit in it, at least the big ones here.
00:43:19.560 But Avi helped shine a light on that.
00:43:21.960 Now, there's some interesting and hopeful politicians in Australia, too.
00:43:25.540 For example, if you can believe it, a sitting senator, an elected senator in Australia, actually attended Avi's book launch.
00:43:32.140 I was about to sign off, but I just, how can I not show you the sitting senator attending a Rebel News book launch and having some great words, including praise for Rebel News.
00:43:42.780 Take a listen.
00:43:43.260 I'm so thankful for that, because just like you, I was sitting at home, I was unhappy, I was looking at everything that was happening in the world, and I felt alone.
00:43:54.280 I felt alone.
00:43:55.320 And if I didn't have Avi, and other people like Avi, but if I didn't have this guy here, I don't know what I'd be doing today or where I'd be today.
00:44:04.860 It would be a lot harder.
00:44:06.460 But he brought the world to us.
00:44:09.600 He brought everything that was happening to us.
00:44:11.860 And he took what was happening here, out of Australia and into the world as well.
00:44:16.940 So everyone got to see what was happening here.
00:44:19.440 And like Ezra said, like Ezra said, you know, Victoria was a warning to the world.
00:44:26.300 If we didn't have this guy here in Victoria spreading the message of what was happening here, who knows what could have happened everywhere else.
00:44:32.620 We were like the canary in the coal mine, because it was the worst here, in my opinion, anyway.
00:44:37.740 It was the worst here, the most locked down city that the world had ever seen, Victoria.
00:44:43.440 Victoria.
00:44:44.100 And we owe all of that to our best mate, Chairman Dan Andrews.
00:44:48.260 I am no fan of Chairman Dan.
00:44:51.100 I am no fan.
00:44:52.520 And I know Avi isn't either.
00:44:54.560 How great is that guy?
00:44:56.440 So don't let me tell you that it's all bad news.
00:44:59.320 You have amazing green shoots of freedom in this area.
00:45:04.220 And I hope so, because, you know, they say Australia is the lucky country.
00:45:08.380 And I think one of the things that makes it so lucky is its freedom, something that we share in Canada.
00:45:13.680 And I believe that Avi is a fighter for that freedom.
00:45:17.160 I'd love to continue the fight for freedom in Canada, where my own home is.
00:45:21.500 But if we can help fight for freedom around the world, we will.
00:45:25.740 From all of us at Rebel News in Melbourne, Toronto, and around the world to you at home, good night and keep fighting for freedom.
00:45:34.220 Have a good night.