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

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 0.87

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, 0.98

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 0.99

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 0.97

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 0.53

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 1.00

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 0.94

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 0.95

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 0.97

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 0.97

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, 0.94

00:24:04.540 and they're made of lesser stuff than those Maoris. They're not warriors, they're appeasers. And so 0.99

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 0.99

00:26:37.420 lads. Here, I want to show you a little bit of that event. So remember, we canceled the event. We 0.99

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 1.00

00:26:55.420 going to be pushed around like the Anglican church was. Here's some excerpts from the night we had in 0.95

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 0.99

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 0.97

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. 0.95

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. 0.53

00:35:45.640 She's a conspiracy theorist herself. 1.00

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! 0.71

00:41:57.500 You animal! 0.54

00:41:58.660 What is she under arrest for? 0.94

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. 0.52

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.

Rebel News Podcast - August 28, 2023

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

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