Despite court rulings saying they could stay, the Region of Waterloo has spent considerable effort trying to remove people living at the 100 Victoria Street encampment in Kitchener.

Aaron, from KW Fightback talks about the conflicts the Region, the Police and even social workers instigate to try to push residents out. From the denial of services, a carceral approach and continued court battles, activists have had their hands full organizing to defend the rights of their unhoused neighbours.

The discussion is about the community that exists at the encampment, and the deliberate choices 'authorities' are making to punish anyone surviving in ways that defy the capitalist model.

Hosted by: Jessa McLean

Produced by: Santiago Helou Quintero

Call to Action: Sign Petition to Demand a Public Camping By-Law

Related Episodes:

1. Rabble Rant: Housing Half Measures (Sept 2023) On Waterloo Outdoor Shelter 'Community'
2. Resisting Toronto's Tactics Against the Unhoused (Sept 2024) Organizers with Voices for Unhoused Liberation share what they're doing to fight encampment evictions and against the war on the poor.
3. Voices for Unhoused Liberation (May 2024) On strategy building, the limitations of advocacy work and the need for escalated direct actions.

More Resources:

• The Regional Municipality of Waterloo v. Persons Unknown and to be Ascertained – 2025 Litigation – Waterloo Region Community Legal Services
• Region ordered not to evict people from homeless encampment
• Bay Observer: Waterloo Shelter Formula
• Statement: FightBack @ 100Vic Full Time

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Two Toronto based Legal Observers from the Orange Hats return to give us details on the tactics Toronto Police are using to try to bring down the Palestinian Solidarity Movement.

Tasked with keeping an eye on cops during protests and other actions, Gisela and Leon have lots of stories to tell. Together the group recently issued a 2025 Year-In-Review on Toronto Police Services conduct at protests. The report includes statistics on injuries and arrests; it warns of trends in policing; and it points to a clear strategy to suppress the activities of activists - and legal observers.

Its not all bad news. Thanks to their experience, the Orange Hats are a great source of advice for organizers and activists - or anyone coming into contact with Police.

Hosted by: Santiago Helou Quintero and Jessa McLean

Produced by: Santiago Helou Quintero

Call to Action: Support Legal Observers - Donate to the Orange Hats

REGISTER FOR ONLINE COURSE: Documenting Protests - Feb. 25 @6pm ET

Related Episodes:

1. Watching Cops: Advice for Activists (Feb 2025) The Orange Hats share how to stay safe at protests, and the tactics Toronto police use to harass, intimidate and brutalize activists
2. Exposing Toronto Police Tactics (Sep 2025) Activist and journalist Benjamin Nolan on the Toronto Police Services' violent responses to peaceful protests and their use of the knee-on-neck technique.

More Resources:

• Inside the ‘shocking’ police operation targeting pro-Palestine activists in Toronto - The Breach
• Police Chief Plays Loose with the Truth on Radio Call-in Show - The Grind Magazine
• What is Strategic Incapacitation – Orange Hats

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Guest Jamie Kneen, of Mining Watch Canada gives an overview of the Canadian mining industry, while making the case its a continued colonial enterprise our politicians are more than happy to enable.

How is it that an industry so big, with so many established cases of human rights abuses, continue to operate with such impunity, and under the radar?

Jamie answers this, and talks about the work Mining Watch Canada does to support local efforts to resist resource extraction, share knowledge and in turn, influence policy here in Canada.

What is clear is the impacts of mining are devastating, and Canadian politicians are complicit.

Hosted by: Santiago Helou Quinter and Jessa McLean

Produced by: Santiago Helou Quintero

Related Episodes:

1. Canadian Mining Imperialism: Guatemala's 13 Brave Giants, Grahame Russell of Rights Action on a landmark legal case that exposed HudBay for horrific human rights abuses;
2. Canada's Colonial Imagination, Professor and author Tyler Shipley on the ideology used to justify the genocide of Indigenous peoples and shape foreign policy today.

More Resources:

• Mining in Canada: Latest News and Updates | The Narwhal
• Arbritral Award — Gold Reserve Ltd
• Letter to the Minister of International Trade: Canada’s commitment to a strong Canadian Ombudsperson for Responsible Enterprise (CORE) | Mining Watch Canada

All of our content is free - made possible by the generous sponsorships of our Patrons. If you would like to support our work through monthly contributions: Patreon

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Aliya Pabani, Organizer and Producer, joins us to help unpack the clear paradigm shift taking place in Canadian politics.

The episode examines the deterioration of Canadian media, with their obvious vitriol towards leftist politics. It also takes a look at Carney's now-famous Davos speech, and what that means for the neoliberal project, and for us.

What is our role now, as the façades of liberalism falls away? Pabani makes the point there are a lot of Liberals trying to navigate this disruption of their world view, and this could be a unique moment to reshape it.

Hosted by: Santiago Helou Quintero and Jessa McLean.

Call to Action:

Related Episodes:

More Resources:

• CFMM; Study on BBC Gaza/Israel Double Standards
• Gilmore: Toronto Suns Ottawa Bureau Chief Tweet
• I resigned from Canada’s largest broadcasting corporation over its complicity in Israel’s genocide – Mondoweiss

📺YOU CAN CATCH US LIVE EVERY FRIDAY AT 12pm E.T. on our YouTube Channel.

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CROSSPOSTED FROM RABBLE RANTS - be sure to subscribe to this second podcast from the folks who brought you Blueprints of Disruption. One focused on the news, as it relates to our movements.

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ICE raids, mass deportations and communities resisting it all.

Will the images filling our screens serve as a cautionary tale, or will Canadians convince themselves that those kinds of abuses wouldn't happen here?

Hosts Santiago Helou Quintero and Jessa McLean try to answer that with discussions on recent Liberal legislation (Bill C12), the Safe Third Country Agreement we have with the United States, and the impact its already having on migrants.

Find our written piece to accompany this episode on our SUBSTACK

Calls to ACTION

1. Tell Senators: Vote No on Bill C-12 - Migrant Rights Network

Resources / Links / Referenced Material:

• Amnesty International; Safe Third Country Agreement
• The Guardian; 2025 was ICE’s deadliest year in two decades.
• Jessa McLean; Canada's Own Brand of ICE

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All of our content is free - made possible by the generous sponsorships of our Patrons. If you would like to support us: Patreon

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Resources:

• Amnesty International; Safe Third Country Agreement
• The Guardian; 2025 was ICE’s deadliest year in two decades.
• Jessa McLean; Canada's Own Brand of ICE

With Venezuela in the spotlight, we called in Raul Burbano of the Venezuelan Solidarity Coalition to give us a run down of what people in Canada are doing to resist yet another chapter of U.S. imperialist aggression.

For almost a decade, organizers have been educating, advocating and mobilizing around the devastating sanctions and other forms of foreign intervention at the hands of the Canadian government. With Carney seemingly siding with Trump on the kidnapping of President Maduro and his wife, activists here are working overtime to turn the tide.

Raul, himself a longtime activist, talks about the importance of building relationships between social movements and labour organizations across the Americas, and the shift the work has taken in the past few weeks.

Hosted by: Jessa McLean and Santiago Helou Quintero

Call to Action: Day of Action on January 24th, 2026

Related Episodes:

1. Venezuelan Chavistas vs. US Imperialism w/Geo Maher. Hear how the decades of struggle and the impact of the Bolivarian Revolution have made Venezuela ungovernable to anyone but the people.
2. Lessons from South America (Dec 2022) Learning from the social movements of Venezuela, and drawing comparisons to Canadian politics.

More Resources:

• International Brigade arrives in Venezuela - Instituto Simón Bolívar
• Details on Canada's 'Special Economic Measures' Against Venezuela
• Statement by Prime Minister Carney on the situation in Venezuela | Prime Minister of Canada

You can find even more content on our Substack.

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Professor, activist, abolitionist and author of We Created Chavez, Geo Maher helps unpack what's going on in Venezuela from the often neglected perspective of the grassroots.

While the moves of state actors are to be watched and analyzed, Maher argues they alone do not hold the fate of Venezuela in their hands.

Semi-autonomous communities, mostly within the poorer barrios of the country, with roots older than even Chavez, wield a power that goes well beyond that of Maduro or the ruling Party. Maher talks about how those 'communes' and the history of the Bolivarian Revolution will be massive barriers to Trump's Imperialist agenda.

These 'experiments in democracy', as Maher refers to them, may hold some answers to the questions Canadians find themselves asking in the wake of Trump's threats against them. Namely, how do we best protect against US aggression?

Hosted by: Jessa McLean

Call to Action: Contact Your MP and demand Canada lift all sanctions against Venezuela

Related Episodes:

• Lessons From: South America, Alexander Moldovan on the social movements in Venezuela; stories of workers and communities fighting back while building networks of support.
• Canadian Mining Imperialism, on a Canadian landmark legal case that exposed the industry's use of sexual violence, destruction, and death in Guatemala.

More Resources:

• Venezuela Month of Action - International League of Peoples' Struggle
• BBC: US Discussing Options to Acquire Greenland
• Canada's Official Statement on Venezuela
• Guest's Recommended Read: America, América – Greg Grandin
• Canada imposes new sanctions against Venezuelan officials (Mar 2025)

For more Blueprints, including articles and resources for activists: Subscribe to our SUBSTACK

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Activists from Jews Say NO to Genocide are working to challenge the coordinated narratives around the antisemitic violence at Bondi Beach in Australia - narratives that help pave the way for dangerous legislation like Canada's own Bill C9.

Louise, also of Independent Jewish Voices, goes over Carney's pending Act to Amend the Criminal Code, and its possible ramifications. From the new intimidation offence, to the vague wording around restricted spaces and symbols, the case is made that this is another tool for the powerful to suppress opponents at will.

Toronto based activist, Molly Kraft, also of SURJ Toronto, talks about how the prioritizing the feelings of some at the expense of the rights of others is all just part of the larger scheme to suppress dissent and benefit, not Jewish people, but white, Christian nationalists, Imperialism and ultimately, Capital.

Gur Tsabar, of the Movement Media Hub and spokesperson for the group, says we need to be asking the hard questions in the immediate wake of events like Bondi Beach and October 7th. He insists its in those moments the machinery working against us goes into overdrive to lay the "moral foundation" for the horrors that come next.

Hosted by: Jessa McLean

Call to Action: Say NO to Bill C-9 (Action Network Petition)

Related Episodes:

1. Jews Say NO to Genocide (Dec 2024) The organization's first appearance on Blueprints to talk about the Jewish identity crisis purposely being crafted by the Israeli lobby.
2. Weaponizing Canadian Law for Israel (Jul 2024) Martin Lukacs on Toronto Police's Project Resolute and the secretive committee tasked with cracking down on Palestinian solidarity activism.

More Resources:

• The Independent: UK Terror Arrests
• CBC: On Bloc's Proposed Changes to Bill C9
• Toronto Star: Calls for Antisemitism Task Force After Bondi Beach
• Bill C-9 Threatens Freedom of Peaceful Assembly and Freedom of Expression in Canada – Canadian BDS Coalition & International BDS Allies
• Bill C9: Legislative Info

Be sure to check out our Substack for more content and resources for activists.

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