Cornwall Ontario – Cornwall Memes captured the interest of the region. The childish, rude, and insulting Facebook page ridiculed City Hall, local schools, and the “Culture” and institutions of Cornwall Ontario. The page drew over 5,500 “likes” in just one month eclipsing the actual City of Cornwall’s Facebook page.
While CFN does not know the identity of the creator of Cornwall Memes we can confirm that via messaging through Facebook they confirmed that they had received a visit from Cornwall Police. The Police did not have a name, but had simply followed up on the IP number that Facebook would have most likely given if an entity like the city had it legally attained.
Shortly after that conversation the page was taken down from Facebook. We do not know if it was done by Facebook or voluntarily taken down; but many people are asking questions and wanting answers.
In the meanwhile a new page has been created. LINK
Bring Back Cornwall Memes gives the public a chance to like the page and hopefully for the truth to be found out.
What do you think dear viewers of CFN? You can post your comments below.
Does our police only do what the city wants.I remember back that they wouldn,t act on stolen & damaged signs but now act on mere words .A police state bulling at its best
mariah just a note that we do not confirmation that the police did visit – am working on that. We only have the statement via fb from Cornwall Memes.
My question arising out of this story is…did intimidation win out over freedom of speech ?
I’ve never visited the site but the two pictures you show above would be enough for Facebook to delete the site based on their “Community Standards”, especially if they received enough complaints.
Really Roger? how did the 2 pictures above in any way contravene Facebook’s ToC?
@ Anon – ” how did the 2 pictures above in any way contravene Facebook’s ToC?”
Well there is a swastika on the arm of the person looking in the window in the teenage pregnancy toon. Oh wait, the school board doesn’t consider that offensive anymore so it doesn’t bread the “Community Standards”.
Dear Reg
Facebook recently changed the rules and now allow videos of people being beheaded as long as the poster is using it to say they don’t like the practice BBC News - 2 days ago
A film of a woman being beheaded in Mexico caused an international outcry when Facebook refused to remove the offending footage
So I guess making fun of Cornwall is worse than killing videos????????
The amount of info facebook collects about the people CRAZY enough to post their whole lives online makes the NSA look like inspector Clouseau Every time somebody gets arrested or in any trouble the news media…including Jamie.goes to their facebook page and often the pictures they chose are not flattering…a certain city hall employee sitting on some guys knee comes to mind
I visited the Meme site and couldn’t understand half the humor on there but surely to goodness our Police force would have more important things to do. The OPP was recently linked to “special” visits to the homes of protesters (As the Star’s Thomas Walkom reported this weekend, opponents of the proposed Kincardine nuclear waste dump — and at least one supporter — have been visited by OPP officers at their homes and asked questions about whether they planned to demonstrate.)
Really, Police were used to find a page on facebook? Wow, great use of the police and the tax payers money to work on this case.
Go Cornwall GO! Not.
What a waste. People need to get the stick out of their a**es and lighten the hell up.
I am sure there are WORSE things that a meme on facebook telling you what you already know about Cornwall.
FFS! SMH!
It isn’t easy to get an IP address
But on TV show about Canada Border security…they show officers going thru cel phone and computers looking for info…..if you password protect your device they can’t force you to give it to them..but..they can seize your device
This despite the fact the Canadian supreme court just ruled police need a warrant to go thru your devices
Police entering a home with a search warrant have no right to examine any computers they find unless a judge has given them specific permission, the Supreme Court of Canada has ruled unanimously If they do not have a warrant specifying a computer search, police are entitled to seize and hold computers while they seek a judge’s authorization to look at their contents, the court said.
this from a July RCMP forum on internet fraud
In recent years, providers of web-based email addresses have eliminated the senders IP address from email headers and replaced them with their own IP address. In order for police to track the origin of emails sent for criminal reasons, police must now seek judicial authorization to get the senders IP address.
Once police get this information, they need a further authorization to be served on the Internet service provider (ISP) asking them to identify who was using the IP address. Two steps where there should be, and used to be, one.
Because the providers of many of these web-based email addresses are located outside Canada, an MLAT is required. There is very little appetite on the part of most to assist police in obtaining an MLAT for a crime of this nature
Hey STF what if someone at City Hall used to work for a large successful Internet company?
LOL LOL. I have seen a write up that describes Cornwall to a T about teenage pregnancy and the young people and other things. I didn’t see any swasticas in this unless I missed something. I don’t use Facebook or any of that childishness so I don’t go there at all.
Jules, you really really really need a Facebook page. It would be a hoot!
We could be “friends”!
I’m not sure the type of content that was on this facebook page lately but if it contained material that was offensive to specific individuals (including peoples pictures taken) then it could have classified as hate speech or at the least offensive to the point where the individual being ridiculed would be in a position to ask the page owner to take the material down. If the page owner did not remove the offensive material or did not remove it in a timely manner than the person would be in a position to sue the posters and possibly the page owner for libel damages.
I realize people like to throw out “free speech” but free speech doesn’t give someone carte blanche to say whatever they want without repercussions. Whether you(we) agree with it or not there are numerous cases of someone being brought to court over online comments and have to pay financially for it. Even if someone were to loose the lawsuit the party making the comments can get tied up in the court system (with appeals and such) for years, all the while accumulating a hefty bill for lawyers.
I’m a parent, as for police “wasting their time tracking people down on facebook” with todays amount of cyber bullying and harassment up to and including kids killing themselves because of it I’d much rather police investigate online bulling and hate sites than if someone stole my kids bike.
I’m not sure the specifics of why the original page was removed, people make fun of their home towns all the time kinda hard to control that. If the content took a turn for the nasty and got personal than it could have been violating the law.
Making fun of people who appear handicap or jokes about nazi’s drowning pregnant women in some kind of chamber doesn’t strike me as even remotely funny *shrugs*
admin November 8, 2013 at 1:36 pm
Hey STF what if someone at City Hall used to work for a large successful Internet company?
If they went from successful company to City Hall they would need more help than i can give them
Even if the cops show up at your house they still have to try and prove WHO was on the computer
Just remember KIDS if you have files you won’t gone….use a heavy duty file destroyer so you don’t get caught out like the guy with the deleted file of the Rob Ford crack video that they managed to recover
I agree with Tim Bradley about facebook making fun of people and ridicule and so much so that many young people are committing suicide. I too am a parent and wouldn’t want this to happen. I think that facebook should be abolished all together.
Furtz I wouldn’t give you the opportunity of having me on facebook at all whatsoever. This world is in enough hell with that site on. I do not agree with any of it at all. I come on here and there are people who do not take me serious but more for entertainment. Well Furtz I am serious what I say whether people take me serious or not would be their own personal opinion.
Seriously though, the Cornwall Memes page was a hoot. The commentary and photos, though often crude, really hit home.
The only thing I can think of that may have caused the page to be removed, were photos of a certain chipstand owned by a local man, known as a hebephile. There erupted several heated discussions involving him, his children and young girls who had worked for him. These arguments crossed the line in a big way, and would have been definite and justifiable grounds for removal of the page. It’s a pity, because the iconoiclastic posts were quite a hoot, till that line got crossed…
Hopefully, the chipstand owner is being investigated, as well, as a result of admissions he made on the page.
No worries, Jules. Just joking about being “friends”.
God bless, and all that stuff.
Troll is probably correct
Remember seeing all kinds of photos of the hotdog stand but didn’t take the time to figure out the story
If you are accusing people of a crime….I can see why cops might come knocking
Unless your Mayor Rob Ford and they see you exchanges packages with a known drug dealer..
Lawyer Clayton Ruby said cops should have got a warrant…taken a sample of the suspected drugs..tested them..then arrested the Mayor
Really really wished they would have done that..because this guy is going to have a heart attack live on TV and I don’t wish this on his young kids.
CBC Fifth Estate show last night was amazing…they put together every time Ford did a crime..each and every time he got away with saying SORRY..but then…repeating his actions…
Furtz you are a young man and have a lot of life yet to live. I have gone through the ridicules in my day in school and I used to be a very shy person but I outgrew all of that shyness and learned to fight back. A lot of young people today are stuck behind the computer and know nothing at all about life and how to deal with others. I am getting old now at 62 years old and have many long years ahead of you. I used to be a little bit like you where I didn’t believe in the Good Lord and questioned everything like why does God do this or not punish the bad and all. I even said that to my young son many years ago when he was in school and he said to me “God gives us choices and if we choose the wrong path then we pay for it” and many other things and it took a young child at the time to help direct me the right way. I listen to many things and read many things and came to many realizations. What I see around me in today’s world makes me want to curse. This isn’t the kind of world that I like or want to live in but I am stuck here. Everyone has to bear with me. We are all different in every way and if we were all alike it would be mighty boring indeed. I am too old to go on nonsensical things like Facebook. That site destroyed many people. I don’t know who this man is who has a chipstand or whatever it may be but the crazy things that must have gone on has destroyed his business and well being in Fossoli.
If only the 5th Estate would tackle a Liberal Mayor like Bob Kilger as hard as they have a Conservative one in Rob Ford…. http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/toronto/rob-ford-crack-video-hunt-drew-threats-offers-of-cash-1.2420035
I think it was very nice of the Cornwall Police to take time out of the very busy and somewhat shady schedules to stop doing Police work and stop on someones Freedom of Speech. Does someones harmless opinion of their city (as many people feel the same) warrant a visit by the police? Is that truly a crime, let alone the crime we need them focusing on? Someone should tell them, there’s no bribe in that!
Seriously, Maybe Cornwall should look towards improving their image, generate more higher paying jobs, create activities for the kids and help get the vast majority off drugs. Create events to draw families and single people to Cornwall.
Personally I support the meme as I believe it gives everyone with their heads in the sand a perspective of what a majority actually think, instead of just turning a blind eye on opinions while muttering “Our city is GREAT!”.
What do i know. I guess the lack of population growth in over 20 years should speak for itself.
Again, for the record, we do not have confirmation of the allegation about a police visit to the home of Cornwall Memes originator. And for the record I am not Cornwall Memes, nor know the identity of whomever ran it.
@ Jules. Don’t make assumptions. I’m retired, and old enough to receive old age security. Believe it or not, but you aren’t the only one around here who’s been around the block a few times.
Furtz the way you write I assumed that you were a young person in your twenties and thirties. You see Furtz when people blog and don’t know one another you cannot tell who is who and when people go on the likes of Facebook and other such nonsense and hurt others without knowing them then how do you think the other person takes that. I knew the people who hurt me in school but that is water all gone under the bridge as they say and life goes on. When people are so ignorant to trash others on the likes of Facebook and that is world wide.
I feel very sorry for Mayor Ford but he is a mature man and is supposed to know better. He holds a position much higher than other mayors because TO is the biggest city in Canada. Mayor Ford does not come from the gutter class and should show good morals to everyone. He made very serious mistakes and now he has to pay the price.
When you laugh at people with whom you don’t even know personally and make attacks that doesn’t sound good at all. You said that you are a mature person in age well show your maturity and not act like a young child or a very young adult. You may get a kick out of what I write but I don’t – I am very serious in what I say unless I show that I am laughing. I don’t go on such stupidity as Facebook or any other and I can tell you that I was invited more times than I can count even by my husband’s niece in Australia. I have no time for such things. I like and respect Jamie (Admin.) and this is the only paper that I read and I swear to that besides a lot of Yahoo’s stupid news.
Is there ever any positive/good news that ever comes out of that city by the river? Surely, if all of this negative publicity the City of Cornwall experiences were just a run of bad luck, that bad luck would have run out by now.
Wouldn’t it have?
Cory it is more than Cornwall just having bad luck. This kind of thing has been going on before I was ever born but nothing was publicized on TV or international news like what it is today. There has always been poverty and unemployment in Cornwall even when Domtar and Courthaulds and other industries were in full operation. The problem with Cornwall is that only certain people were employed in the mills and they were pulled in by their fathers and grandfathers throughout time and others were left at the wayside in life. Pedophelia exists in most places but Cornwall is well renowned for it more than a lot of places. Smuggling was always done by the Native people but it was never like what it is today involving so many whites and other groups and people at the top of the food chain who are involved in all this illegal activity. Teenage pregnancy existed in my day and one very good math teacher at a school in Cornwall’s daughter (originally from Ottawa) got pregnant and her father lost his job. Most teen pregnancies existed with the lower class but others went through this as well even some of the higher income groups whose daughters got in the family way as well and hid themselves in Ottawa (one other girl was originally from here) so as to try and hide the shame in those days. Cornwall always had a bad reputation but today it is much more renowned than ever before. I have been with some of the nicest people that I would ever imagine in Cornwall and have known some of the very worst. That is anywhere you go but Cornwall has a bad reputation mostly because of the lack of education.
It’s doubtful that the police or any like authority were responsible … otherwise http://home.cogeco.ca/~vote/pageCorruption.html would disappear too.
@ Jules. A few days ago, you trashed EVERYONE who chooses to remain in Cornwall. How mature and thoughtful was that? And later you said that I have a lot of learning to do because I don’t share your religious views! And now you are suggesting that I am an immature senior, it seems, because I have a sense of humor and enjoy joking around now and then. From one senior (slightly older) to another, I offer this… Just because you’ve lived for sixty-two years, doesn’t mean you have automatically acquired infinite wisdom even though you might think you have.
Furtz I too love to joke around and believe me I joke a lot in my household. My children are so serious that I cannot joke with them at all and only with my husband when he is in a good mood or I try to put him in one. When it comes to strangers that I do not know then I am usually more serious except certain times. The young people in Cornwall have no future with industries all gone and yes they have to go and find work elsewhere. This is a worldwide catastrophe that we are facing and not just for Cornwall. It isn’t because the earth isn’t big enough but it has to do with the resources and the food and other things. My husband read about what is happening today back in the 1960’s era. When I tell people that they have to leave Cornwall for elsewhere I do not kid around with this I mean it. Cornwall is only going to be a seniors town and it is already happening. I have read that in the Toronto area – its suburbs – the people are moving out of them since it takes people 2 1/2 hours to commute one way to the city and that some live in 4000 square foot homes that they can no longer afford to keep up and that with the time they won’t even be able to give them away that is how things are going to get and that here in Canada housing will go down with the time similar to what happened in the US. Things are still going down in the US and I have seen homes that were valued at $700K go for $150K and still could not sell. Young people have to go where the job is and not throw their lives away. That is with whom I am talking about and not people of our senior age. I make fun of Bare Ass and his gang of thieves and liars. I make fun at SF – the toilet paper of record and I make fun at the Keystone cops or what is the name I usually give them oh yes the Barney Fife PD. Yes I have my fun at this end and even in person I can come out with some doozies. I got the name Barney Fife PD from a neighbor of my mom’s who is from Cornwall but lives in Toronto. I do try to be serious since I do not know who is on the other end. I am a big religious and I thank the Good Lord for whatever little I have. People have to be thankful for what they have in life and not expect more but to be in good health and live a happy life. That is who I am Furtz.
When I came to Ottawa close to 40 years ago I dreaded it so much that my husband and I used to go back to Cornwall every evening to spend time with my parents since it was hard for this small town girl to get used to being in a big city. I hated every minute of it back then until I adjusted and got used to life here. That was when Ottawa was smaller and more quiet than what it is today. People have to adapt. I live with the hustle and bustle of life. Some of the guys that my son went to school with in Cornwall are now living in Ottawa since there is nothing in Cornwall. Yes I will criticize and that is me.
Furtz there is something about me and that is I would not go and take pictures of a business and post it on the net whether good or bad since that would hurt that person’s business. I joke plenty about Cornwall and some of its people but would not hurt a business nor an individual unless I felt that I had to for a certain reason. I poke fun at Bare Ass and his gang (clique) since they are public figures and are crazy. I would not go and take an individual like yourself and put your picture and poke fun at you or someone else whether it is true or not. Bare Ass and Mayor Ford are public figures and should know better but they are not better than the rest of us and sure screw up badly. Whoever put photos up about someone who operates a chip stand or whatever it is has put this person’s business in jeopardy. It is up to the individual if you purchase from him or not but not to hurt that person.
OK Jules. Let’s call a truce for now. All I ask is that you stop insulting me for not sharing your religious views. We all bumble through life as best as we can, and judging others based on your own personal life experience is way over the line and not appreciated.
Furtz I have absolutely nothing against you. I don’t know you at all personally nor anyone else here on the blogs. I always say what I think and feel and it may hurt some people at times but that is me. I remember the good days of Cornwall and they are always implanted in me and will never leave. I do not like today’s Cornwall at all whatsoever. Cornwall has not changed for the better but for something that is despicable. You and I are up in age and we have seen the better days. This is not a personal insult to you when I lash out so don’t take it personally. The days that I remember about Cornwall can never be taken out of me because those days were good compared to today.
I think that it was Cornwall Memsies who wrote that if Cornwall had better jobs then people would not be on drugs. I have to disagree. Look at Mayor Ford this man is the head of Canada’s largest city and look at what he did. I worked with a lovely young man (young back when we were young today we are older) and he was on drugs and he had a university degree in business and was one of the nicest people that I ever got to know and he worked in my unit. He had a beautiful girlfriend and he bet her up because the drugs did something to him. This man was earning big money and had an expensive apartment in those days downtown (a condo) and he dressed impeccably well and made me look more like the former comedian Red Skeleton in dress wear. LOL LOL. ROLF! One day I was outside of a drugstore waiting for some people to come out that I knew and there was this man Steve that I worked with here in Ottawa. My apartment was nearby and he said “well you sure are close to home” and then he told me about the man that we both worked with and what happened.
Some of the people at Domtar in Cornwall earning big money were smuggling cigarettes and everything else so if you think that good jobs are going to make changes in Cornwall you are mistaken. It is the people who make up a town and if the people are not good and want to bury their heads in the sand and not make good changes in their personal behavior, etc. then nothing will ever change. I live in a little hovel here in Ottawa way up in the sky (highrise) and believe me I am happy. Money will not make me any better at all. Happyness comes from within. We had a house and it didn’t make me happier and in fact I am more happy now than I have been in a mighty long time. The good people have left Cornwall and I have mighty good memories of the 1950’s and 60’s as well as the 70’s until I left in the mid 70’s and came back for my mom who was dying of cancer and she too preferred that we stay in Ottawa because there was nothing left in Cornwall and it went down hill even further.
As one of the remaining douchebags (in a town of only douchebags, the douchiest is king!), may I extend an unwelcome to you then jules? If there are no good people, and no good businesses, why do you continue to come back? If everyone in town is beneath you, why do you persist in to grace us with your presence? Judge not lest you be judged jules! IF everyone around you is an asshole, perhaps you are pointing at the wrong people. The hate in your heart is killing you faster than any of the toxic folks here in town. Keep your insults and inaginings to yourself jules, and stay in the city with your own kind, it’s where the ignorant bigots thrive.
The good people have not left Cornwall.
The city has its own identity that benefits from all the positive energies of its populace. Regardless of the contentious issues that plague the community (many of the same issues that plague every other community for that matter) Cornwall has a heart and lots of young people that shouldn’t be saddled with a stigma they had no part in creating. Cities change and sometimes for the better. Cornwall is only doomed if the people who live there give up. This publication gives me hope because of the impassioned and erudite comments offered by many of Cornwall’s citizens. I believe these comments and energies will bring positive change in the future.
oops here I go stacking my comments again.
Something that doesn’t get stated enough.
As long as I can remember and I see that it continues today, Cornwall has had a proud tradition of producing exceptional young talents in many different fields of endeavour including music, the theatre and amatuer sports. Talents that have left a positive impression of Cornwall wherever they travelled. Somebody is doing something right in the community
It’s true that we have good young people, and it’s true that they are not the ones responsible for the degeneration of a community.
It is true also, that our responsible and intelligent young people are leaving the rot, corruption and backwardness of the Cornwall establishment in droves… fairness and opportunity are more easily acquired, and hard work and honestly better rewarded elsewhere.
Meanwhile, the greedy powers that be in Cornwall — a shameless clique that first serves its family and friends — a brood of snakes that offers little to the likes of us. They are graceless and corrupt enough to not just withold opportunities for our children today, but they are even selling this young generation’s future..
Just take a look at our waterfront, smothered by a low level bridge, paved over with a huge new intersection to serve the PARIS Holdings speculators, bricked and mortared with a permanent CBSA Port of Entry facility. Look at the money taken off the backs and tables of taxpayers in Cornwall to pay the legal bills for despicable boinkers that would see honest protectors of our elderly thrown under the bus, correction…actually throw them under the bus themselves.
Ahhh, but you’ve heard it before.
Michael your 2:33pm post is right on.
When reading some of these post it is surprising that there are citizens still living in Cornwall.